Topia
Rebuilding Topia from the Ground Up
2019 – 2021
B2B
Web & Mobile
Product Design
Design Systems
Helping to rethink how global mobility works by redesigning the user experience. Showcasing my diverse experience spanning mobile and web platforms.
Unified a fragmented experience across multiple acquired products
Reduced onboarding time from over a year to just weeks for some clients
Designed intuitive tools for complex scenarios like simulations, compensation, and policies
Built a scalable foundation for Topia’s modern design system across mobile and web
Role
Product Designer
Collaborators
Visual Designer
Chief Product Officer
Design Manager
Chief Strategy Officer
Product Manager
Content Designer
Tool stack
Figma
Confluence
JIRA
Mixpanel
I led end-to-end product design across multiple products during Topia’s UX transformation. My work focused on:
Designing core features and new experiences across mobile and web
Prototyping and validating complex interaction models pre- and post-launch
Collaborating closely with engineering, strategy, and design leadership
Encouraging ambitious visual thinking while ensuring feasibility
Background
Topia had grown through acquisitions, leading to a fragmented product suite. Each acquired company had different design languages and workflows, making the experience inconsistent and difficult to implement. For some clients, it took more than a year to fully onboard.
The business made a bold decision: rebuild the product from scratch.
Challenge
We had to deliver an intuitive, unified platform that:
Was flexible enough to handle enterprise-level customisation
Could scale across mobility use cases, from policy builders to payroll
Would drastically reduce time to value for customers
And we had to do it while teams were still figuring out what the "new" Topia should look and feel like.
Approach
Step 1 Set vision and push for clarity
We started from zero. I led design efforts on multiple features, creating early concept prototypes and designs to test ideas.
We didn’t want another spreadsheet. It needed to stand out in the market both from visual and UX perspective.
Step 2 Design core tools
My design work focused on tools that balanced enterprise complexity with intuitive interactions:
Simulations: side-by-side comparisons of global mobility scenarios. These helped HR teams compare options for moving employees across countries.
Compensation worksheets: replacing convoluted Excel sheets with real-time, transparent visual outputs
Policy builder: one of the most complex experiences I’ve worked on — turning weeks of setup into a guided, self-service flow
Step 3 Simplify, test, iterate
I worked in close loops with our internal experts, developers, and customers to refine these experiences. Many features went through multiple iterations to balance power, speed, and clarity.
Mobile parity was also a focus — I ensured that employee experiences were just as smooth on the go.
Key screens
Simulations
Simulations: let users compare multiple relocation scenarios side-by-side
Compensation worksheets: helped explain pay, tax, and incentive breakdowns clearly
Policy builder: turned complex configurations into a guided experience
Employee experience: mobile-friendly UI for managing tasks, viewing life abroad, and submitting expenses
Results
Reduced time to onboard enterprise clients from 12+ months to just weeks
Enabled sales and implementation teams to showcase clarity over complexity
Created a scalable design foundation used across future Topia experiences
Learnings
Sometimes the best design challenge is the mess you inherit
Good systems thinking enables simplicity at scale
You can lead even without a leadership title by pushing standards, clarity, and ambition
What happened next
I went on to lead the design team for Topia, building on the systems and visual language we created here. This foundation gave us the speed and confidence to respond to changing market needs in record time.