Linq Connect
Linq Connect
Year
2024
Discipline
Product Design, UX Research, Design Systems
Industry
EdTech, K-12
Overview
Linq Connect is a mobile app used by parents to manage school meals, payments, and kid dashboards. We were brought in to redesign the product from the ground up. Through iterative user testing, current state assessment, and best-in-class benchmarking, we translated research findings into a visually fresh redesign that simplified complex workflows, modernized the interface, and built a foundation for future growth.
My Role
Design oversight and direction across research, strategy, and execution. Guided the team on usability and direction throughout the engagement, from shaping the research approach and facilitating workshops to directing the mobile design and building out key desktop screens. Also helped craft the design system that underpinned the full redesign.
Problem
The app was nearly unusable. Navigation was cumbersome, UI patterns were inconsistent, and users struggled to complete basic tasks. The app rating reflected it — sitting below 2 stars when we came in. The core features were there, but the experience surrounding them made them inaccessible.
Solution
We started by listening to users and conducting a thorough current state assessment. Research informed the priorities: simplify navigation, surface the most important tasks upfront, and tackle the most complex feature head-on. The meal menu calendar was the hardest problem. We stripped it back to what users actually needed — which meals, not which meetings — and rebuilt it around familiar, modern calendar patterns. Payments and kid dashboards were redesigned for one-click access. A prototype was built and validation-tested before anything was pushed to engineering. The design team stayed embedded with the technology team throughout build, available to answer questions and make decisions in real time.
Outcome
The app went from a sub-2-star rating to 4.5 stars in under a year. During usability testing, people were moving through flows they had previously struggled with. The team delivered a complete redesign across mobile with paired desktop screens, a modern design system, and a close partnership with engineering that carried the work through to a quality release.
What I'm Proud Of
The star rating turnaround. Going from below 2 stars to 4.5 in less than a year is a clear, public signal that the work landed. That kind of result only happens when the research is honest, the design decisions are grounded, and the team executes without ego.