A Trusted Source for Political Intelligence

2022 Product Design

Translating complexity into clarity

Dods is an advanced information and services platform serving the public and private sectors, with a focus on politics, public affairs, and communication. When they decided to rebuild their core web app—spanning two separate legacy platforms and housing vast amounts of data across deeply interconnected taxonomies—they turned to CI&T for our expertise in enterprise UX platform design.

I was tasked with leading the UI design for the new platform, chosen for my experience designing intuitive interfaces for complex systems. This wasn’t just a visual overhaul—it demanded thoughtful information architecture, scalable UI patterns, and workflow design that could accommodate users ranging from political consultants to internal editors, all while navigating legacy constraints.

Cohesion at scale: the power of a design system

Simplifying the experience without oversimplifying the product was one of our biggest design challenges. Together with UX designer Alexandra, I collaborated on shaping the platform’s core information architecture—helping restructure the sitemap, redefine content hierarchies, and untangle flows inherited from legacy systems.

As we moved through discovery, we uncovered technical constraints that significantly impacted UX decisions—including the inability to update the People Directory database, late-stage descoping of features, and a shift away from the originally intended SaaS model. These forced us to rethink how we approached user access levels, navigation logic, and the onboarding experience, particularly for power users like policy consultants.

On the UI side, I translated these constraints into a coherent, scalable design system. I crafted high-density interfaces with a focus on UI scalability across multiple workflows—key parts of the user journey such as registration and login, account creation, alerts and rules (including a simplified post-wizard flow), content upload, and library browsing. Each screen required clear visual hierarchy and consistent interaction patterns to make the platform approachable without flattening its depth.

The advanced filtering system in particular demanded precise component logic and interface clarity, allowing users to drill into content across people, organisations, and document types—without overwhelming them. I also designed the People and Organisation directories, balancing visual consistency with backend limitations to maintain usability even where structural change wasn’t possible.

Where design makes a difference

I believe we achieved the goal of turning a fragmented and technically constrained platform into a more unified, usable, and scalable product. Despite the limitations, we delivered a consistent interface that made it easier for users to find what they needed and for internal teams to manage complex data.

The component-based design system was one of the most meaningful outcomes of the project. Built from the ground up to support a wide range of use cases, it brought cohesion to the product and laid the foundation for future evolution. With 1,929 components, it allowed us to manage complex UI states, apply consistent patterns across advanced filtering, tagging, and data presentation, and scale interface elements across multiple workflows. It also helped reduce redundancy, streamline cross-functional collaboration and developer handoff, and ensure accessibility—supporting a platform that needed to feel both authoritative and intuitive.

In the end, we didn’t just redesign a platform—we reshaped how political professionals interact with information. By turning a dense, legacy database into a responsive and intuitive tool, we gave journalists, consultants, and researchers the clarity they need to move faster, think deeper, and make better decisions.