In a product company, how you make products influences and is influenced by how the rest of the company operates. Participate was still operating under a traditional organization structure, with management dictating product decisions based on what they thought was best.
We went down to Participate’s headquarters for a three-day UX process audit. After meeting with the product team, the organizational pain points were immediately clear. It wasn’t a lack of talent stopping Participate from creating an awesome product. It was a lack of communication, clear goal-setting and product management.
And then there was the number one issue: a lack of user research. Customer-centric products are only successful when customer needs directly lead the design, yet features were coming from salespeople and management. The result was an ineffective platform that struggled with user acquisition and engagement. Fixing that was our first hurdle.