Designing a Guided Workflow
Turning a confusing workflow into a guided experience that users could complete, without assistance.
Confidentiality notice: This project was designed for an internal enterprise product. Screens have been reconstructed and content anonymised to protect proprietary information while preserving the design decisions and interaction patterns.
About the product
I designed a web-based editor used by the scientific copy editors. This editor guides users through a structured copyediting workflow, one step at a time. One of those steps is Reviewing Abbreviations, where the system scans an article and asks the editors to verify abbreviation and their expansions before moving forward. This was only one step in a much larger workflow.
This screenshot shows the older version of ‘Review Abbreviations’ step
The Problem
In testing, this design held up fine. Users moved through it easily, completed the task, gave decent feedback. So we shipped it. Then it went live and all heck broke loose. Without the guidance people couldn't get through even the first task. They hesitated, clicked the wrong actions, and often weren't sure what the system expected next.
This design failed the moment real users touched it without me in the room. That very gap is where this case study starts.
Finding out why?
Rather than jumping into solutions, I spent time observing users complete this step. The patterns shown below emerged consistently across sessions.
Over time, stakeholder requests like "Add this data also" and "Show that as well" had accumulated into a screen that contained everything users might need, but didn't help them understand what they needed to do.
The Insight
Everything required to complete the task was already on the screen. What they didn't have was direction, a sense of what to do first, and why it mattered.
Users were expected to identify the given information, figure out how to use it, understand the split between the 2 parts, and decide on the next action without the proper guidance from design. If I had written the book, the title would be, 'You're making me think too much.' (It's a reference to a book 'Don't make me think')
Design Principles that formed the basis of my next iteration
Instead of redesigning everything, I focused on reducing uncertainty. Every design decision followed four principles.
1. Explain before asking for action. Users should understand the task before interacting with it.
2. Keep one mental model. Each screen should represent one clear goal.
3. Make progress obvious. Users should always know where they are in the workflow.
4. Reduce cognitive load. Important decisions should stand out without competing with unnecessary UI.
Iterating through focussed prototypes
I deliberately avoided redesigning the entire workflow before testing. Instead, I built small prototypes for quick validations. My questions to the users were simple:
Do you know what you’re suppose to do?
Are you still confused?
Can you understand the difference between the two parts?
Testing smaller ideas helped me validate assumptions much faster than producing complete mockups.
Glimpse of small experiments done with users before redesigning the entire panel
The Final Design
The redesign didn't introduce new functionality. Instead, it changed how the interface communicated.
What's different? (AI wrote it)
- Clear explanation of the task before any action is required.
- Better separation between Part 1 and Part 2.
- Stronger visual hierarchy around important information.
- Guidance that tells users what to review, not just what exists.
- Completion messaging that explains what happens next.
What's different? (I wrote it)
Now, it's a screen that talks back. It tells users exactly what to look at, and in what order. It flags what's missing or wrong before the user has to go find it themselves. And it draws a hard line between the two steps.
I'll be honest, from an engineering point of view, some of this looks like unnecessary weight. More labels, more states, more copy to write and maintain. But in actual use, that's exactly what people notice, even if they couldn't tell you why. It's the difference between a tool that has the right information and one that actually guides you.
Below are the components that changed inside that had significant impact on the experience. Like now the text field looked like something user could key in terms and not use it as search bar. Seriously that search bar thing was a revelation for me.
Outcome
The redesign kept the underlying workflow exactly the same. What changed was how users understood it.
Users immediately understood which task they were performing.
Users no longer confused review with correction
Participants stopped asking whether changes would apply automatically.
Participants expressed greater confidence that they had completed the task correctly.
One user even said, “This version looks far better than the previous one.”
Something that my fellow designers can take from it
Testing isn't enough.
Facilitated testing can hide problems because users naturally rely on the person running the session.
Information doesn't equal guidance.
Interfaces often fail not because they're missing content, but because they fail to tell users what matters.
Prototype questions, not screens.
Building focused prototypes around one assumption helped me learn much faster than designing complete flows.