Funsize, Internal Design Tooling

As Funsize grew, designers lacked a shared framework for understanding role expectations, skill progression, and how to grow from one level to the next. There was no common language for skills, no clear rubric for progression, and no consistent way to assess growth or guide mentorship conversations.

I led the design of a Career Progression Hub, an internal system that brings clarity to roles, skills, and expectations.Rather than shipping a coded product, we moved quickly and pragmatically, using **Notion** and **Figma** to create a usable MVP focused on clarity, adoption, and real-world use.

The result was a structured skills taxonomy, a role-level rubric, and a self-assessment workflow that helped designers understand where they are, what’s expected next, and how to take ownership of their growth. This project positioned design not just as execution, but as a tool for shaping culture, alignment, and shared understanding.

As Funsize grew, designers lacked a shared framework for understanding role expectations, skill progression, and how to grow from one level to the next. Expectations varied by project and mentor, skill definitions were inconsistent, and designers often struggled to assess where they stood or what "good" looked like at the next level.

This wasn't a tooling problem—it was a clarity problem. Designers wanted a common language for skills, transparent expectations across roles, and a way to take ownership of their growth without relying solely on ad hoc feedback.

Approach

I took full ownership of defining and designing a Career Progression Hub—a system that brings structure and shared understanding to how designers grow at Funsize.

Rather than jumping straight to tooling, I focused first on designing the underlying system:

Clarifying what skills matter and how they're defined

Separating skills from roles to reduce confusion and anxiety

Making progression visible without turning it into a checklist

Because the goal was adoption and real-world use—not a polished software product—we intentionally used Notion and Figma to move quickly, iterate in the open, and keep friction low.

Key components of the system included:

A structured skills taxonomy grouped into Core, Growth, and Specialty skills

Proficiency levels that show how skills evolve over time

A role-level rubric (L1–L5) that connects expectations to behaviors

An interactive self-assessment worksheet that supports reflection and goal setting

Throughout the process, I shared progress with leadership, gathered feedback from designers, and refined language to reduce ambiguity—without positioning this as a performance management tool.

Outcome

The Career Progression Hub shipped as a usable MVP within three months, including:

A centralized Notion hub designers could reference anytime

A Figma-based self-assessment tool to support reflection and growth planning

Clear, shared language for skills, roles, and expectations

Designers reported feeling more confident about where they stood, better equipped to discuss growth with mentors, and more empowered to drive their own development. For the organization, the system created alignment and consistency without introducing heavy process or people management overhead.

This project positioned design not just as execution, but as a tool for shaping clarity, culture, and shared understanding—demonstrating leadership through systems and influence rather than direct management.

As Funsize grew, designers increasingly asked the same questions:

What's expected of me at my level?

How do I know if I'm progressing?

What does "next" actually look like?

There was no shared framework for answering them. Skill definitions varied by person and project. Role expectations were implicit rather than documented. Growth conversations depended heavily on individual mentors, making the experience uneven and often ambiguous.

This wasn't a tooling gap—it was a clarity gap. Designers wanted transparency, shared language, and a way to understand their growth without relying solely on informal feedback.

Problem

Funsize lacked a clear, consistent system for defining:

Design skills and how they evolve

Expectations across roles and levels

How designers could assess where they were and what to work on next

Without this clarity:

Designers felt uncertain about expectations

Growth conversations were harder than they needed to be

Skills were often conflated with titles or tenure

How might we design a system that brings clarity to growth—without turning it into a rigid checklist or a people-management tool?

Goals

The goal was to create a shared, usable framework that:

Clearly defines design skills and expectations

Shows how skills evolve across levels

Helps designers assess themselves and identify growth areas

Supports better mentor conversations

Encourages ownership of development

Just as importantly, the system needed to feel supportive, flexible, and human—not evaluative or punitive.

Strategic Framing

This project required leadership, but not people management.

I approached it as a systems design problem:

Design shared language

Reduce ambiguity

Make expectations visible

Empower individuals to drive their own growth

Rather than waiting for a formal process or tooling investment, we focused on building something practical, testable, and immediately useful.

Designing the System

Defining Our Skills

The first step was creating a clear, navigable skills foundation by:

Refining the existing skill list and clarified definitions

Grouping skills into Core, Growth, and Specialty categories

Loosely mapped skills to Funsize service offerings

Structuring the content for easy navigation and reference

To show progression over time, I introduced proficiency levels—not as grades, but as descriptions of how skills evolve with experience.

Why this mattered:

Without shared definitions, designers were rating themselves against different mental models. Clarity here was foundational.

Separating Skills from Roles

A key tension surfaced early: designers often interpreted skill ratings as role qualifications.

To address this I:

Explicitly separated skills from roles

Designed role descriptions that focused on behaviors and expectations

Introduced a rubric that showed how skills show up differently at each level

This helped reduce anxiety and reframed growth as progression, not judgment.

Creating a Self-Assessment Tool

To make the system actionable, I designed an interactive self-assessment worksheet in Figma.

Designers could:

Rate confidence across skills

Reflect on strengths and gaps

Define goals and areas of focus

This tool encouraged reflection without prescribing outcomes—and became a useful artifact for mentor conversations.

Why Figma:

It was familiar, flexible, and allowed us to prototype behavior without engineering overhead.

Building the Role-Level Rubric

I created a role-level rubric spanning L1–L5, including:

Clear expectations per level

Behavioral indicators

Growth-focused language

To add nuance without rigidity, I introduced Walking / Jogging / Sprinting bands to describe how designers grow within a level.

Testing revealed that while the rubric worked well, the bands felt abstract—an insight that shaped future iteration.

Testing & Feedback

I conducted four qualitative interviews with designers to understand:

Whether the system felt clear and usable

Where language still caused confusion

How designers interpreted skill ratings and roles

What worked well:

The rubric helped visualize growth

The worksheet supported reflection

Language felt approachable and clear

What needed refinement:

Skill-to-role mapping needed more clarity

Bands required better explanation and examples

This feedback reinforced the value of shipping something usable, then improving it through real use.

Shipping an MVP

Rather than waiting for perfection, we shipped a working MVP that included:

A centralized Notion hub for skills, roles, and documentation

The Figma self-assessment worksheet

Short how-to videos explaining how to use the system

Using Notion allowed us to:

Move quickly

Lower adoption friction

Iterate in the open

The goal wasn't polish—it was usefulness.

Outcome

Within three months, the Career Progression Hub became a shared reference point for designers at Funsize.

Designers:

Felt clearer about expectations

Had better tools for growth conversations

Felt more ownership over their development

The organization gained:

Shared language around skills and roles

Greater consistency without heavy process

A foundation that could evolve over time

This work demonstrated how design can shape culture and clarity—leading through systems and influence rather than formal authority or people management.

Learnings

Clear UX writing is critical when designing abstract systems

Designers benefit from context more than complexity

Shipping something usable accelerates learning more than waiting for alignment

Challenges

Managing the complexity of skills, levels, and bands

Untangling skills from perceived role qualifications

Designing for digestibility without oversimplifying

Wins

Fully owned a complex, high-impact internal initiative

Turned vague expectations into a structured, usable system

Shipped an MVP quickly while leaving room to evolve

What I'd Do Next

With more time, I'd refine skill-to-role mapping—especially at senior levels—and explore ways to make progression more dynamic while preserving clarity.

"Not only did Nicole almost single-handedly produce all aspects of our career progression hub, she was also instrumental in helping refine and clarify it's vision and intent. When I saw the MVP release I was blown away at its thoughtfulness and thoroughness."

— Lee Brenner, Head of Design