Context
Peraton project development teams require a rapid UI development platform for building information management systems for customers. Developing a new application from the ground up is often time-consuming and results in inconsistencies with customer UI expectations. Teams repeatedly rebuild similar data fabric components, leading to inefficiencies and fragmented user experiences. Without a standardized approach, these efforts fall short in delivering a cohesive and positive customer experience (CX). A standardized UX/UI Framework was developed by my team to address these issues by streamlining development, promoting design consistency, reducing duplication of effort, and aligning user interfaces with customer expectations.
Solution
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Design and maintain a scalable framework for rapidly developing information management systems built on a unified, consistent data-fabric foundation.
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Define and implement UI standards that ensure high levels of quality, usability, and visual consistency aligned with customer expectations.
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Create a framework that increases organizational efficiency by streamlining Peraton’s ability to quickly design, build, and deliver user-centered products that meet evolving customer needs.
Project Goals
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Gather user insights - needs, wants, expectations.
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Streamline application development across the organization by standardizing core data-fabric components and UI patterns, reducing development time and redundancy while enabling teams to build products faster, more easily, and with greater consistency. This approach ensures applications meet customer UI expectations and deliver a cohesive, high-quality customer experience (CX).
My Role
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Market Research (User Profile / Competitor Analysis)
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User Research - Screener Survey / User Flows
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Low Fidelity / Mid Fidelity
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Visual Design - High Fidelity Wireframes
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Usability Testing of Prototype
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Deliverable - Interactive HiFi Prototype
Understanding the Problem
Research
User Interviews
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The team implemented a comprehensive research plan to aid in uncovering the most essential way to created a product that meets the needs of development teams throughout Peraton.
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Garnered feedback from current project groups on the most essential/requested components needed from an information management system from customers.
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Uncover the pain points/problems/ and needs that Peraton project development teams have when fielding requests from customers.
Affinity Mapping
We used affinity mapping to synthesize insights from stakeholder interviews, workshops, and product audits. By grouping observations into themes, we identified shared challenges around development inefficiencies, inconsistent UI patterns, and CX gaps, aligning teams on priorities and informing a more standardized, scalable framework.
Design of the Solution
Decisions & Wireframes
Design Decisions
The goal of this product design is to provide a scalable starting point for teams building web applications. The design process begins by defining and validating essential user flows, ensuring a strong foundation for common use cases. Core components are then identified, evaluated, and designed to support a seamless and intuitive implementation experience.
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These concepts are iteratively refined through low-, mid-, and high-fidelity wireframes, with each iteration incorporating feedback to improve usability, consistency, and overall design quality.
User Flows
User flows were created to map key user tasks and interactions from start to finish, ensuring the product supports real user needs and use cases. By visualizing these paths early in the design process, we were able to identify gaps, reduce complexity, and align stakeholders on functionality before moving into detailed UI design. This approach helped establish a clear, scalable foundation and informed the creation of consistent, reusable components throughout the product.
Low/Mid Fidelity Wireframes
When designing the wireframes for the standardized framework, the goal was to establish a flexible base template that teams could easily adopt and scale. The layout features a persistent left-side navigation to support clear wayfinding, while reserving the main content area for core, reusable components. This structure promotes consistency, usability, and efficient implementation across applications.
Final Design Framework
The final design of the framework successfully addressed key goals for streamlining UI development across teams:
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Accelerated project startup: Teams can quickly begin building user interfaces without starting from scratch, as CUUF comes packaged and ready to deploy.
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Pre-built web app functionality: Core features are included by default, providing a solid foundation for customization and extension.
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Consistent branding: The framework adheres to Peraton’s branding standards—colors, logos, and icons are approved by the branding team—ensuring that apps built with CUUF feel like native Peraton products.
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Flexible white-labeling: CUUF can be easily customized with customer branding while maintaining a professional, standardized design.
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Accessibility and compliance: Built on the USWDS asset library and aligned with Section 508 accessibility standards, CUUF includes developer guidance to maintain compliance during customizations.
This approach created a unified, efficient, and scalable solution for designing web applications across the organization.
Results
The final design framework has become an invaluable resource for teams across the company, enabling faster project startups, consistent branding, and streamlined development processes. By providing pre-built components, adherence to accessibility standards, and clear guidance for customization, the framework allows teams to focus on delivering high-quality user experiences rather than reinventing the wheel. As a result, the standardized framework has increased efficiency, ensured design consistency, and empowered teams to create scalable, professional web applications with confidence.