Industries
Design for HR and workforce software
We have designed in this category and we have also built in it. MuchSkills is our own product, and it won a Red Dot Design Award in 2020.
2020 Red Dot Design Award
MIT Design LabWhy HR software is a design problem before it is a feature problem
Skills, learning and performance data is genuinely complex. Proficiency levels, certifications, gaps, team composition, utilisation. The instinct is to build an interface as complicated as the data model. We went the other way when we built MuchSkills, and that one decision is most of why it works.
Adoption is the product here. A platform nobody logs into produces no data, and with no data the dashboard the buyer paid for is empty at the first quarterly review. Renewal conversations in this category tend to come back to usage.
The buying committee is unusual too. HR runs the evaluation, IT can veto on security, finance can veto on price, and across much of Europe a works council has a say before anything reaches employees. Your product has to answer four separate anxieties inside one demo.
What usually brings people to us
Six situations. The first is the one people underestimate.
Nobody logs in after the rollout
The platform is bought by a leader and used by everyone else, or not used at all. Design decides which. This is the failure mode that kills renewals, and it is rarely a missing feature.
The data model is showing through the interface
Proficiency levels, certifications, gaps, utilisation. When the screen mirrors the schema, employees give up on the first form. MuchSkills went the other way: visual skills maps, light input flows, and dashboards a leader can read without a data analyst.
You are selling a category with no budget line
Skills intelligence, capability mapping and internal mobility are newer than the categories they compete with for budget. The site has to teach and sell in the same visit.
Enterprise buyers want trust signals you do not have yet
Security, data handling and reference customers get checked before your feature list does. Most of that is a design and content problem long before it becomes a compliance one.
You sell to four stakeholders with different fears
HR wants adoption. IT wants control. Finance wants a number. Employees want to know their manager will not use it against them. One demo, four anxieties.
The marketing site reads like every other HR platform
Empower your people. Unlock potential. When a whole category writes the same sentence, a buyer has nothing left to choose on except price.
What we do in this category
Four things. MuchSkills is where all four ran at once, on our own money.
Product design for complex people data
Skills maps, proficiency input, team views and leadership dashboards, designed so the complexity stays in the model and out of the interface.
Adoption and onboarding design
The first ten minutes an employee spends in the product decides whether there is any data to report on later. We design that path deliberately rather than leaving it to a tooltip.
Brand and design system
An identity that works for an HR team at a global consultancy and a compliance lead in a regulated industry, plus the tokens and components to keep it consistent as the product grows.
Positioning, website and search
Category education, messaging for four stakeholders, and a content architecture built around what buyers search while they are evaluating.
How a project runs
Five phases. We have run this on client work and on our own product, which is a useful difference.
- Phase 1
Start with the problem, not the product
MuchSkills began with research into how organisations manage skills: the spreadsheets, the guesswork, the talent decisions made on instinct. Every project since has started the same way.
- Phase 2
Workshops
HR, IT, product and sales in one room, because each of them will also be sitting in the buying committee on the other side.
- Phase 3
Structure
Product structure, information architecture and messaging for each stakeholder, settled before design begins.
- Phase 4
Design and build
Interface design, brand, design system and website, produced with your team.
- Phase 5
Launch and keep shipping
MuchSkills has never stopped evolving. CV inventory, compliance tracking, resource management and API integrations were all designed and shipped as the platform grew.
How we work with your team
We have sat on your side of this table, which shows up mostly in arguments about scope.
We have been the client too
We built MuchSkills ourselves on a bootstrapped budget, from business case to launch. Every trade-off you are weighing, we have weighed with our own money.
Strategy early, then execution
Direction is settled in the first weeks, then we build. You are not asked to review every screen.
We test with employees, not only buyers
The person who signs and the person who logs in are different people with different reasons to care. Testing only with the buyer is how adoption problems get discovered after launch.
You keep the system
Design tokens, component library and documentation, so your team ships new features without waiting on us.
Work in HR and workforce software
One venture of our own and two client products.
MuchSkills
Our own venture. Concept, product design, brand, build and go to market, on a bootstrapped budget. It holds a Red Dot Design Award for product design and has been recognised by Everest Group as a Major Contender in its PEAK Matrix.Read the case study
Learnit
Upskilling for SMBs and large enterprises in the US and beyond. We rebuilt the online presence: website copy and design, brand, and the customer journeys behind them.Read the case study
HardSkills
A product built from an idea, connecting patent holders, experts and innovators with opportunities. Web app, brand, website and go to market, designed and built from the ground up.Read the case study
Related pages
FAQ about HR and workforce software design
What experience do you have in HR technology?
We built MuchSkills, a skills intelligence platform, from the business case through product design to global launch. It is used by consulting firms, universities, industrial companies and technology organisations. We also rebuilt Learnit's brand, website and customer journeys, and designed HardSkills from an idea into a working product.
Our platform has low adoption. Is that a design problem?
Usually a large part of it is. Adoption in HR software is decided in the first session an employee has with the product: how much is asked of them, how quickly they get something useful back, and whether they understand who can see their data. All three are design decisions.
How do you design an interface for complex skills data?
By keeping the complexity in the model and out of the screen. MuchSkills handles proficiency levels, certifications, gaps and utilisation, and the interface is built on visual skills maps and light input flows rather than a form that mirrors the database.
Can you help with positioning and the website as well as the product?
Yes, and in this category they are the same problem. The site has to teach a new category and win budget from an existing one in the same visit, which makes the message and the product experience a single piece of work.
Do you work with our in-house product team?
Yes. Most of our product work runs alongside an existing team, with design on our side and engineering on yours.
What about GDPR and employee data concerns?
We design for them rather than advise on them. Being explicit about what is collected, who can see it and why is an interface and content decision, and getting it wrong costs adoption long before it costs anything legal. Your counsel owns the compliance itself.
Where are you based?
Gothenburg, Sweden. We work with companies across Europe, the US and Asia.
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Tell us what your usage numbers look like
If adoption is flat, the reason is usually visible in the first session a new employee has with the product. Send us a demo account and we will tell you what we see.
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