Transforming Internal Project Workflows with an AI-Powered Dashboard
Transforming Internal Project Workflows with an AI-Powered Dashboard
Transforming Internal Project Workflows with an AI-Powered Dashboard
overview
In mid-2025, I partnered with a Hong Kong event agency struggling with workflow chaos after their project volume doubled. As the lead freelance UX Designer, my mission was to design a solution from the ground up: Eventist Dashboard, a unified, AI-powered platform to streamline collaboration and project management for their three core user groups: Sales, Team Leads, and Designers.
TEAM
Project Manager, UX Designer (Me), 2 UI Designer
MY ROLE
UX Designer (Ideation, Wireframe, Interactive Prototype, UI Library / Design System, Information Architecture)
TIMELINE
5 months (mid - late 2025 )
RESULTS
A Design System 20-30 reusable components with comprehensive documentation guidelines
Full-fidelity interactive prototypes covering all core features and user interactions
Complete UI coverage for Sales, Team Lead, and Designer workflows
About the business
Eventist is a premier event and exhibition agency in Hong Kong, renowned for creating immersive brand experiences and executing large-scale corporate events. They built their reputation on a foundation of creativity, high-touch client service, and a hands-on, boutique-style approach to project management.
Challenges: The agency's success became its biggest challenge in early 2025 when project volume doubled overnight. Their manual workflows crumbled under the new scale, leading to fragmented communication, lost information, and a team on the verge of burnout. They needed to scale, and fast. My role was to design the centralized platform that would enable this transition from a small-scale operation to a fully scalable business.
The Research Foundation
My design process began by immersing myself in the foundational research conducted by the project management team. They performed 13 in-depth, qualitative interviews with key internal stakeholders to understand the true source of the operational friction.
My critical first task was not to conduct new research, but to synthesize these rich findings into an actionable design strategy.
Where was the Problem
The Existing Workflow
These pain points were a direct result of the existing workflow. This diagram, based on the research, illustrates the tangled, inefficient communication loops between the key roles. There was no central hub, leading to constant back-and-forth, lost feedback, and duplicated effort.
*Existing workflow diagram for the traditional event and exhibition industry from the research
Defining the Internal Challenge
Understanding Our Internal Users
To pinpoint the source of these growing pains, I investigated the daily workflows of our key internal teams: Sales, Design, and Management based on the research. The analysis uncovered four critical challenges that were creating operational friction and directly impacting project delivery.
Information Silos
"I feel like I'm constantly chasing information instead of doing my actual job."
No Single Source of Truth
"We can't confidently make decisions because we're never sure if we're looking at the latest information."
Inefficient Workflows
"My day is a stream of interruptions that kill my focus and my team's productivity."
Ambiguous Communication
"Vague requests and misaligned expectations lead to endless rework."
The opportunities
To move beyond assumptions, we adopted a mixed-method research approach to build a deep understanding of our target audience (18-32 year olds). Our process included:
Quantitative Analysis
An online questionnaire distributed to over 60 young professionals to identify broad trends and statistical patterns.And a personality questionnaire which received 200+ responses.
Qualitative Analysis
A series of 8 in-depth, one-on-one interviews to uncover the stories, motivations, and anxieties behind the numbers.
design principle
To ensure our solution directly addressed our research insights, we established three core design principles:
Attractive
To combat the "YOLO" mindset and low motivation, the experience must be fun, rewarding, and gamified to encourage continuous saving.
Emergency-Ready
To provide the psychological safety users crave, the product must offer a fast, simple, and transparent way to access funds in a crisis.
Boundless
The solution offering customised advice and product recommendations that adapt to unique financial situations.
ideation: user flow
Armed with our research insights, our goal was to design a logical and frictionless product experience. We mapped out the three most critical user flows that define the product's value proposition from the user's perspective:
New User Onboarding
The crucial first-time experience, turning a curious visitor into an active user.
Daily Engagement Loop
The habit-forming mechanic that encourages consistent saving.
Redeeming a Reward
Closing the loop from saving to tangible benefit, reinforcing the product's value.
Flow 1: New User Acquisition & Onboarding
This flow is the most critical for growth. It outlines the journey of a brand-new user, from initial discovery on social media to making their first deposit.
Flow 2: The Daily Engagement Loop
This flow is designed to build a daily habit and foster financial literacy in a light, rewarding way. It creates a low-effort, high-value reason for users to return to the app every day.
Flow 3: Redeeming the Emergency Fund
This flow is intentionally designed with "purposeful friction." The goal is to make the process clear and secure, while also encouraging users to pause and reflect before withdrawing from their safety net.
FINAL DESIGNS
AI-Assisted Task Creation
"Our Sales team struggled to write clear design briefs and often set unrealistic deadlines, creating friction with the design team." This feature ensures that every request entering the system is clear, complete, and realistic from the very beginning, eliminating costly back-and-forth.
Reflection & Future Outlook
This project was a valuable exercise in translating user anxiety into a tangible, positive product concept. It reinforced the importance of grounding design decisions in both qualitative and quantitative data.
What I Learned
The Power of a "Lighthouse" Project
I learned that when faced with a legacy product full of issues, sometimes the most strategic approach isn't to fix everything at once. Proposing a single, high-value, self-contained feature can be a more effective way to change brand perception and prove the ROI of investing in a new user segment.
Bridging Strategy and UI
This project was a deep dive into connecting high-level business goals (increase youth engagement) and user research insights (desire for safety, financial literacy gap) directly to the final UI, from the gamified avatar to the wording on the buttons.
Constraints & Challenges
As a conceptual university project, we operated without access to BEA's internal analytics, technical infrastructure, or compliance limitations. This gave us creative freedom but also meant we had to make informed assumptions about technical feasibility and the true cost of implementation. If I had more time, I will:
Test the "Friction" of the Emergency Withdrawal
I would run usability tests specifically on the "Break Glass" feature. My hypothesis is that this moment of "positive friction" would encourage responsible use, but I would need to validate that it doesn't cause undue stress or frustration in a real emergency scenario.
Develop the "Smart Refill" Flow
I would design the user flow for how a user replenishes their emergency fund after a withdrawal, exploring automated options and gentle nudges to get them back on track.
overview
In mid-2025, I partnered with a Hong Kong event agency struggling with workflow chaos after their project volume doubled. As the lead freelance UX Designer, my mission was to design a solution from the ground up: Eventist Dashboard, a unified, AI-powered platform to streamline collaboration and project management for their three core user groups: Sales, Team Leads, and Designers.
MY ROLE
UX Designer (Ideation, Wireframe, Interactive Prototype, UI Library / Design System, Information Architecture)
RESULTS
A Design System 20-30 reusable components with comprehensive documentation guidelines
Full-fidelity interactive prototypes covering all core features and user interactions
Complete UI coverage for Sales, Team Lead, and Designer workflows
TIMELINE
3 months (2023)
TEAM
2 Product Designer
About the business
Eventist is a premier event and exhibition agency in Hong Kong, renowned for creating immersive brand experiences and executing large-scale corporate events. They built their reputation on a foundation of creativity, high-touch client service, and a hands-on, boutique-style approach to project management.
Challenges: The agency's success became its biggest challenge in early 2025 when project volume doubled overnight. Their manual workflows crumbled under the new scale, leading to fragmented communication, lost information, and a team on the verge of burnout. They needed to scale, and fast. My role was to design the centralized platform that would enable this transition from a small-scale operation to a fully scalable business.
The Research Foundation
My design process began by immersing myself in the foundational research conducted by the project management team. They performed 13 in-depth, qualitative interviews with key internal stakeholders to understand the true source of the operational friction.
My critical first task was not to conduct new research, but to synthesize these rich findings into an actionable design strategy.
Where was the Problem
The Existing Workflow
These pain points were a direct result of the existing workflow. This diagram, based on the research, illustrates the tangled, inefficient communication loops between the key roles. There was no central hub, leading to constant back-and-forth, lost feedback, and duplicated effort.
*Existing workflow diagram for the traditional event and exhibition industry from the research
Defining the Internal Challenge
Understanding Our Internal Users
To pinpoint the source of these growing pains, I investigated the daily workflows of our key internal teams: Sales, Design, and Management based on the research. The analysis uncovered four critical challenges that were creating operational friction and directly impacting project delivery.
Information Silos
"I feel like I'm constantly chasing information instead of doing my actual job."
No Single Source of Truth
"We can't confidently make decisions because we're never sure if we're looking at the latest information."
Inefficient Workflows
"My day is a stream of interruptions that kill my focus and my team's productivity."
Ambiguous Communication
"Vague requests and misaligned expectations lead to endless rework."
The opportunities
To move beyond assumptions, we adopted a mixed-method research approach to build a deep understanding of our target audience (18-32 year olds). Our process included:
Quantitative Analysis
An online questionnaire distributed to over 60 young professionals to identify broad trends and statistical patterns.And a personality questionnaire which received 200+ responses.
Qualitative Analysis
A series of 8 in-depth, one-on-one interviews to uncover the stories, motivations, and anxieties behind the numbers.
design principle
To ensure our solution directly addressed our research insights, we established three core design principles:
Attractive
To combat the "YOLO" mindset and low motivation, the experience must be fun, rewarding, and gamified to encourage continuous saving.
Emergency-Ready
To provide the psychological safety users crave, the product must offer a fast, simple, and transparent way to access funds in a crisis.
Boundless
The solution offering customised advice and product recommendations that adapt to unique financial situations.
ideation: user flow
Armed with our research insights, our goal was to design a logical and frictionless product experience. We mapped out the three most critical user flows that define the product's value proposition from the user's perspective:
New User Onboarding
The crucial first-time experience, turning a curious visitor into an active user.
Daily Engagement Loop
The habit-forming mechanic that encourages consistent saving.
Redeeming a Reward
Closing the loop from saving to tangible benefit, reinforcing the product's value.
Flow 1: New User Acquisition & Onboarding
This flow is the most critical for growth. It outlines the journey of a brand-new user, from initial discovery on social media to making their first deposit.
Flow 2: The Daily Engagement Loop
This flow is designed to build a daily habit and foster financial literacy in a light, rewarding way. It creates a low-effort, high-value reason for users to return to the app every day.
Flow 3: Redeeming the Emergency Fund
This flow is intentionally designed with "purposeful friction." The goal is to make the process clear and secure, while also encouraging users to pause and reflect before withdrawing from their safety net.
FINAL DESIGNS
AI-Assisted Task Creation
"Our Sales team struggled to write clear design briefs and often set unrealistic deadlines, creating friction with the design team." This feature ensures that every request entering the system is clear, complete, and realistic from the very beginning, eliminating costly back-and-forth.
Reflection & Future Outlook
This project was a valuable exercise in translating user anxiety into a tangible, positive product concept. It reinforced the importance of grounding design decisions in both qualitative and quantitative data.
What I Learned
The Power of a "Lighthouse" Project
I learned that when faced with a legacy product full of issues, sometimes the most strategic approach isn't to fix everything at once. Proposing a single, high-value, self-contained feature can be a more effective way to change brand perception and prove the ROI of investing in a new user segment.
Bridging Strategy and UI
This project was a deep dive into connecting high-level business goals (increase youth engagement) and user research insights (desire for safety, financial literacy gap) directly to the final UI, from the gamified avatar to the wording on the buttons.
Constraints & Challenges
As a conceptual university project, we operated without access to BEA's internal analytics, technical infrastructure, or compliance limitations. This gave us creative freedom but also meant we had to make informed assumptions about technical feasibility and the true cost of implementation. If I had more time, I will:
Test the "Friction" of the Emergency Withdrawal
I would run usability tests specifically on the "Break Glass" feature. My hypothesis is that this moment of "positive friction" would encourage responsible use, but I would need to validate that it doesn't cause undue stress or frustration in a real emergency scenario.
Develop the "Smart Refill" Flow
I would design the user flow for how a user replenishes their emergency fund after a withdrawal, exploring automated options and gentle nudges to get them back on track.
overview
In mid-2025, I partnered with a Hong Kong event agency struggling with workflow chaos after their project volume doubled. As the lead freelance UX Designer, my mission was to design a solution from the ground up: Eventist Dashboard, a unified, AI-powered platform to streamline collaboration and project management for their three core user groups: Sales, Team Leads, and Designers.
TEAM
Project Manager, UX Designer (Me), 2 UI Designer
MY ROLE
UX Designer (Ideation, Wireframe, Interactive Prototype, UI Library / Design System, Information Architecture)
TIMELINE
5 months (mid - late 2025 )
RESULTS
A Design System 20-30 reusable components with comprehensive documentation guidelines
Full-fidelity interactive prototypes covering all core features and user interactions
Complete UI coverage for Sales, Team Lead, and Designer workflows
About the business
Eventist is a premier event and exhibition agency in Hong Kong, renowned for creating immersive brand experiences and executing large-scale corporate events. They built their reputation on a foundation of creativity, high-touch client service, and a hands-on, boutique-style approach to project management.
Challenges: The agency's success became its biggest challenge in early 2025 when project volume doubled overnight. Their manual workflows crumbled under the new scale, leading to fragmented communication, lost information, and a team on the verge of burnout. They needed to scale, and fast. My role was to design the centralized platform that would enable this transition from a small-scale operation to a fully scalable business.
The Research Foundation
My design process began by immersing myself in the foundational research conducted by the project management team. They performed 13 in-depth, qualitative interviews with key internal stakeholders to understand the true source of the operational friction.
My critical first task was not to conduct new research, but to synthesize these rich findings into an actionable design strategy.
Where was the Problem
The Existing Workflow
These pain points were a direct result of the existing workflow. This diagram, based on the research, illustrates the tangled, inefficient communication loops between the key roles. There was no central hub, leading to constant back-and-forth, lost feedback, and duplicated effort.
*Existing workflow diagram for the traditional event and exhibition industry from the research
Defining the Internal Challenge
Understanding Our Internal Users
To pinpoint the source of these growing pains, I investigated the daily workflows of our key internal teams: Sales, Design, and Management based on the research. The analysis uncovered four critical challenges that were creating operational friction and directly impacting project delivery.
Information Silos
"I feel like I'm constantly chasing information instead of doing my actual job."
No Single Source of Truth
"We can't confidently make decisions because we're never sure if we're looking at the latest information."
Inefficient Workflows
"My day is a stream of interruptions that kill my focus and my team's productivity."
Ambiguous Communication
"Vague requests and misaligned expectations lead to endless rework."
The opportunities
To move beyond assumptions, we adopted a mixed-method research approach to build a deep understanding of our target audience (18-32 year olds). Our process included:
Quantitative Analysis
An online questionnaire distributed to over 60 young professionals to identify broad trends and statistical patterns.And a personality questionnaire which received 200+ responses.
Qualitative Analysis
A series of 8 in-depth, one-on-one interviews to uncover the stories, motivations, and anxieties behind the numbers.
design principle
To ensure our solution directly addressed our research insights, we established three core design principles:
Attractive
To combat the "YOLO" mindset and low motivation, the experience must be fun, rewarding, and gamified to encourage continuous saving.
Emergency-Ready
To provide the psychological safety users crave, the product must offer a fast, simple, and transparent way to access funds in a crisis.
Boundless
The solution offering customised advice and product recommendations that adapt to unique financial situations.
ideation: user flow
Armed with our research insights, our goal was to design a logical and frictionless product experience. We mapped out the three most critical user flows that define the product's value proposition from the user's perspective:
New User Onboarding
The crucial first-time experience, turning a curious visitor into an active user.
Daily Engagement Loop
The habit-forming mechanic that encourages consistent saving.
Redeeming a Reward
Closing the loop from saving to tangible benefit, reinforcing the product's value.
Flow 1: New User Acquisition & Onboarding
This flow is the most critical for growth. It outlines the journey of a brand-new user, from initial discovery on social media to making their first deposit.
Flow 2: The Daily Engagement Loop
This flow is designed to build a daily habit and foster financial literacy in a light, rewarding way. It creates a low-effort, high-value reason for users to return to the app every day.
Flow 3: Redeeming the Emergency Fund
This flow is intentionally designed with "purposeful friction." The goal is to make the process clear and secure, while also encouraging users to pause and reflect before withdrawing from their safety net.
FINAL DESIGNS
AI-Assisted Task Creation
"Our Sales team struggled to write clear design briefs and often set unrealistic deadlines, creating friction with the design team." This feature ensures that every request entering the system is clear, complete, and realistic from the very beginning, eliminating costly back-and-forth.
Reflection & Future Outlook
This project was a valuable exercise in translating user anxiety into a tangible, positive product concept. It reinforced the importance of grounding design decisions in both qualitative and quantitative data.
What I Learned
The Power of a "Lighthouse" Project
I learned that when faced with a legacy product full of issues, sometimes the most strategic approach isn't to fix everything at once. Proposing a single, high-value, self-contained feature can be a more effective way to change brand perception and prove the ROI of investing in a new user segment.
Bridging Strategy and UI
This project was a deep dive into connecting high-level business goals (increase youth engagement) and user research insights (desire for safety, financial literacy gap) directly to the final UI, from the gamified avatar to the wording on the buttons.
Constraints & Challenges
As a conceptual university project, we operated without access to BEA's internal analytics, technical infrastructure, or compliance limitations. This gave us creative freedom but also meant we had to make informed assumptions about technical feasibility and the true cost of implementation. If I had more time, I will:
Test the "Friction" of the Emergency Withdrawal
I would run usability tests specifically on the "Break Glass" feature. My hypothesis is that this moment of "positive friction" would encourage responsible use, but I would need to validate that it doesn't cause undue stress or frustration in a real emergency scenario.
Develop the "Smart Refill" Flow
I would design the user flow for how a user replenishes their emergency fund after a withdrawal, exploring automated options and gentle nudges to get them back on track.