Creating UIs for an Award-Winning Neurodiversity Platform
Project overview
Cognassist is a neuro-inclusion platform that provides cognitive assessments, tailored workplace and learning support, and training for organisations and education providers. As a product designer, my role is to shape experiences that make cognitive insights more accessible and actionable for users, including tutors, learners, managers, and employers.
Working within a cross-functional team, I’ve contributed to several initiatives aimed at improving how neurodivergent individuals are supported across education and the workplace.
Problem
Despite having access to rich cognitive data and inclusive support tools, users often struggled to:
- Understand what the data meant in practical terms
- Know how to act on insights in day-to-day scenarios
- Feel confident that they were offering the right support
The challenge was to reduce complexity, increase clarity, and ensure each design decision supported neuro-inclusion.
Design process
I worked closely with product managers, engineers and key internal stakeholders to crystalise what ‘good’ looked like. Rather than focusing solely on ‘look and feel’ we tried to understand the jobs to be done for our users. Design decisions were grounded in real-world scenarios: understanding how best to communicate with an employee, planning a 1:1, delivering tailored support, or simply understanding your own cognitive results.
Solution
The result was a series of connected improvements across the platform. Cognitive results became easier to digest, with plain-language summaries and more intuitive visual cues. Tutors were able to spend more time supporting their learners and less time trying to digest a huge stack of reports. Managers received clearer guidance on how best to communicate with their employees. And learners were presented with insights that felt relevant and empowering rather than intimidating and disheartening.
These changes weren’t delivered as one-off features, but as part of a broader shift towards inclusive design thinking — embedded into the product over time.
Validation
To ensure we were delivering the best solutions for our users we validated our design descisons through extensive user testing. This included running internal design feedback sessions, speaking directly to our end users and running external unmoderated tests to validate both usability and value.
Handoff
The product team worked closely with the engineering team throughout the discovery block to continually check solutions for viability and to ensure there were no ‘gotcha’s’ throughout the design process. To aid in the handoff process, designs were annotated to help the wider engineering team understand the value and reasoning on why design decisions had been made.
Outcome
We saw a marked improvement in user confidence, both in qualitative feedback and usage patterns. Tutors reported feeling more capable in understanding learners cognitive results. Learners were more engaged with their results. Managers began using insights more proactively.