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Luis Landi · founder, Salsedine
The system is rarely broken. The person is never the problem. The distance between them is the work.
That distance is not in the interface, which is why it survives a redesign. It is forty risk datasets that are each correct and together unreadable. It is a contract measured in seconds per month, held by a company whose own customers have never seen it. It is a public service organised by the department that owns it, for a person who only has a problem.
So the work is deciding what to put in front of someone, and when. What are they trying to reach? What matters most on the way there? Which of the several cases this product serves is this one? And where in the journey are they standing, given that the same screen is a different screen on the first day and on the two hundredth? Answer those and a product can show what is needed at the moment it is needed, and leave the rest out.
Seven companies, six industries, two countries, and the last three products are my own.
This page is the background: where I have worked, in what order, and what I was actually responsible for in each place.
The short version, if you are matching me against a role. Over ten years of UX and product work inside large organisations, mostly on software that is difficult because the subject is difficult rather than because the interface is fancy. Seven companies, six industries, two countries, and the last three products are my own.
How it went
Four steps, and each one was caused by the last.
The ledger
Eight numbers, and each one has a case study behind it.
Nothing here is a claim I can only make in a paragraph. Every figure below was a measure the team agreed before the work started, and every one of them is explained in full on the page it came from.
The studio
Salsedine exists because I got tired of handing over a folder.
Over ten years of client work taught me where design actually fails. Almost never in the design. It fails in the six weeks afterwards, when the thing gets built by people who were not in the room, against constraints nobody drew, and the version that ships is a negotiated settlement nobody is happy with.
So Salsedine is a studio that stays through delivery, and it builds its own products as well as clients'. Owning three products is the most useful thing I have ever done for the client work, because it means I have been on the other side of every argument a client is about to have with me: what to cut, what a model gets wrong, what happens when nobody uses the feature you were sure about.
All three are mine, they are live with real users, and one of them quietly holds up the other two.
Routina
A health app that refuses to grade you. Routine actions that build, in a system that still works in the week you are not motivated.
ParrotB
The office a small trade never had. Calls answered, jobs booked against the real diary, paperwork chased, in four languages.
Saveri
A receipt reader that admits when it is unsure, and the pantry that two of the other products now build on.
Practically
The things people ask before the first call.
From the people who worked with me
A product owner, two engineers, a designer and a recruiter.
Deliberately not only designers. If the only people who can describe your work are other designers, the work probably did not leave the design team.
"I had the pleasure of working with Luis at LexisNexis for the last year on a project that involved a significant redesign of an existing product. As it was a redesign, there were many non optimal, ingrained concepts and practices that threatened to be repeated if not addressed by a UX expert.
Luis had a challenge ahead of him to not only understand the complex business logic, but also to guide a development team through the implementation of the future vision. Luis was very quick to grasp the concepts and brought a lot of new and innovative thinking to the project. He challenged preconceived notions and clearly articulated the benefits of different, UX friendly approaches.
In my mind, the role of a UX designer is not to simply produce pretty wireframes and usability concepts, but instead it is to gain an in depth understanding of the purpose of the product, how it fits into the workflows of users and to make sure that the end result acts as an enabler and not a hindrance to the users. Luis achieved this, despite the challenges of a company that does not fully value UX and of course the pandemic that forced us into remote working."
Michael ReidProduct Owner, LexisNexis
"He is a hard worker and great communicator. His designs, user journeys, UX research reports and usability tests are always done with a focus on end users, dedication and high quality, and they were always clear, well reported and defined at any stage, so that everyone in the team was on the same page. I was the backend engineer in the same team, but even if I was not designing any user interface, I had a strong collaboration with Luis to design and implement the best product for end users."
Lorenzo MartinoBackend engineer, Ericsson
"I got a chance to work closely with him while working on usability testing for our team's product. His designs are excellent, and well presented in the sense that a non UX person, me, was able to grasp the benefits and reasoning for doing things a certain way. He was a pleasure to work with, and I wish him all the best in his future work."
Oshi KavadiaDevOps, Ericsson
"I worked with Luis for a couple of years on a very technical project at Ericsson. I found Luis to be a passionate designer who was quick to offer compelling design solutions, often under pressure and to tight deadlines. He was great with detail, open to new ideas and was fun to work with. I have no hesitation in recommending Luis as a UX and UI designer."
Marlon BundayLead Designer, Ericsson
"Luis is an excellent UI and UX designer with a broad range of experience. I helped place Luis into his contract role with LexisNexis. All feedback has been excellent from management and he has been a dream to work with. I hope to continue working with Luis into the future."
Arron ConroyRecruiter, LexisNexis