Fidelity Investments · Platform systems
Creating a shared product model across NetBenefits.
NetBenefits teams could draw from a mature enterprise component library. Navigation, page structure, and recurring interactions were still defined product by product. I led the models, standards, and governance that established a consistent foundation across more than 70 teams.
- Role
- Principal UX Designer, later Director (IC)
- Focus
- Information architecture, page templates, interaction standards, and governance
- Scale
- 33 million users · 70+ product teams
- Outcomes
- 67% adoption · 40% faster delivery
Outcomes
67%
Standards adoption
Product teams adopted the shared navigation, page template, and interaction standards.
40%
Faster delivery
Teams spent less time redefining foundational structure at the start of new work.
70+
Product teams aligned
The shared product model coordinated structural decisions across the platform.
The context
The gap between components and product structure
NetBenefits already had a mature enterprise design system with reusable interface components. It did not define how product areas related to one another, how pages should be structured, or how common interactions should behave across experiences.
Each team filled in those gaps independently. The result was repeated design work, inconsistent experiences, and implementation debate across a platform serving 33 million people.
Findings
Teams were solving the same structural problems independently.
- Navigation models varied by product
- Related experiences used different navigation models. Users had to reorient themselves as they moved between product areas and tasks.
- Page structure started from scratch
- Teams had shared components but no common models for page hierarchy, layout, or behavior.
- Recurring interactions lacked shared standards
- Button groups, dialogs, next-best-action cards, and other recurring patterns behaved differently across products addressing the same needs.
The decision
Standardize the product decisions teams made repeatedly.
I defined the structural decisions that belonged in a shared NetBenefits model: navigation, page templates, interaction patterns, and implementation guidance.
It established a common foundation for decisions shared across NetBenefits. Product teams continued to define workflows specific to their areas.
The shared product model
Guidance from platform navigation to interface behavior
The model connected three levels of the experience: how users moved between product areas, how pages organized information and actions, and how recurring interactions behaved.
01Give the platform a shared navigation model
Defined the relationships among product areas and established a consistent way for users to orient themselves and move between tasks.
02Provide reusable page templates
Four page-level models gave teams a starting structure for hub pages, feature pages, and focused task flows across desktop and mobile.
03Standardize recurring interaction patterns
Documented patterns for button groups, dialogs, next-best-action cards, and cross-product flows reduced the need to resolve the same behaviors repeatedly.
Adoption
Making the standards usable across 70+ teams
Each standard was paired with usage and implementation guidance. We aligned the design documentation with Storybook and React and established contribution, review, and maintenance workflows for teams extending the system.
Moira’s leadership, generosity, and design excellence made a lasting impact on me and so many others at Fidelity! Thank you for always showing up with clarity, care, and initiative. I’m excited to see her thrive and continue raising the bar for UX.