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OneAdvanced
Design Unification
Three companies acquired at once. Three design teams using three different tools — Sketch, Adobe XD, and an older Windows-only tool. Three visual languages that needed to become one. My job was to unify it all.
Role
Principal UX Designer
Timeline
2021
Duration
11 months
The Problem
Every team was working differently:
- Mitrefinch team on Sketch (Mac only)
- OneAdvanced team on an older Windows tool
- Clear Review designer on Adobe XD
The existing design system needed updating — it hadn't been built with tokenisation in mind. Three products that looked like they came from three different companies. Because they did.
Fragmented tools
The Solution
Built the business case for Figma — OS-agnostic, collaborative, modern. Got buy-in after some back-and-forth.
Rebuilt the design system with proper tokenisation. A team of 3-4 designers working on it — I did the initial unification concepts, but this was a proper collaboration. Migrated all teams, unified the visual language.
Design System 1
The Vision
With the unified design system in place, I started imagining how the entire HCM product suite would look and feel as one harmonised experience. Mocked up concepts showing all the products under my remit — Time & Attendance, Payroll, Access Control, Core HR — working together with a consistent visual language and shared patterns.
HCM Vision 1
Outcome
Design system fully implemented by the time I left. Got praise for the unification work and the approach was greenlit by leadership. Eleven months isn't long, but it was enough to leave things in a better state than I found them.