Refining Your Search: A simpler way to find what you need
UX Designer I UX Researcher I Platform
The Challenge:
At The Home Depot, internal teams were wasting up to 50% of their workday searching for documents and resources. The average search took 18 minutes per document, making the process both frustrating and inefficient.
The Problem:
The platform’s outdated search experience lacked advanced filtering capabilities. Users had to rely on broad keyword searches and manual scrolling through long lists of results. This slowed workflows, reduced productivity, and increased user frustration.
Goal:
My goal was to design a filtering feature that would help users quickly locate the right documents, eliminate unnecessary steps, and create a streamlined, intuitive search experience that directly improves workflow efficiency.
My Role: UX Designer & UX Researcher
Team: UX Designer, UX Researcher, Developers, Product Manager, Stakeholders
Client: The Home Depot
Tools: Figma, FigJam, Jira, Miro, Zoom, Google Slides
Project Duration: 3 Weeks
Understanding the Roadblock
Our platform lacked an effective filtering system, making searches frustrating and overwhelming. Team members often spent hours—sometimes even days—navigating through an unstructured system.
My Game Plan: A Strategic Approach to a Seamless Filter Experience
The absence of a filtering system made finding information overwhelming. Some team members spent hours or even days trying to locate what they needed. This severely impacted productivity and morale.
Develop Proto-Personas
Understand user behaviors, goals, and frustrations.
Facilitate a Collaborative Design Studio
Conduct Usability Tests
Validate designs through hands-on testing and iteration.
Bring stakeholders, designers, researchers, and product managers together to co-create solutions.
Outcome: A User-Centric, High-Impact Solution
By grounding my approach in research, collaboration, and validation, I ensured the filter feature was not just another add-on but a transformational tool that optimized workflows, reduced search time, and delivered a frictionless experience for users.
01
Proto-Persona
I created proto-personas based on internal interviews and user observation. This helped align our design direction with real-world user challenges—focusing on how users search, what they need to find, and what slows them down.
02
Design Studio
To kick off the ideation phase, I led a design studio workshop with product managers, developers, designers, and stakeholders. Together we:
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Brainstormed multiple filtering mechanisms
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Sketched initial ideas
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Voted on the most viable concepts
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This collaboration established consensus and a clear direction forward.
03
Wireframing the solution
The journey to refining the filter experience started with a straightforward concept: a single search box combined with sorting. This approach was functional but had limitations—users needed more control over their searches to quickly find the exact information they needed.
Iteration 1: The Single Search Box & Sorting
I began with a clean, intuitive design, allowing users to search globally across all data and sort results. While this solution worked, it lacked precision—users often found themselves scrolling through irrelevant results, slowing down their workflow.
The Key Insight: A Small Change, Big Impact​
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After presenting initial wireframes, a key opportunity emerged:
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Let users filter by individual columns, instead of relying on a single global search box.
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This detail dramatically improved the search accuracy and usability of the feature.
Final Design: Precision at Every Step
The final wireframes introduced column-specific search functionality, allowing users to:
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Search within individual columns instead of scanning the entire dataset
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Combine multiple filters at once for more targeted results
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Reduce search time significantly, creating a smoother, frustration-free experience
Outcome: A Smarter, More Efficient Search Experience
This small but powerful tweak transformed the filter experience, making it more intuitive, precise, and efficient—a direct reflection of user needs and iterative design thinking in action.
04
Explore the Interactive Prototype!
With wireframes approved, I built a clickable interactive prototype to demo the feature’s flow and functionality. This prototype became the focal point for feedback from developers, stakeholders, and users.
05
Usability Testing & Key Takeaways
To validate the design, I conducted usability testing with 7 users. Their feedback shaped the final improvements:
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Filter Indicator – Users needed to see which filters were active at a glance.
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Multi-Criteria Filtering – Filtering by multiple attributes at once was a must-have.
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Export Functionality – Users wanted to download filtered results for offline use.
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These refinements ensured that the final feature was intuitive, powerful, and truly user-friendly.
Looking Back: Lessons & Growth
This project strengthened my skills in:
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Leading design studios and cross-functional workshops
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Conducting research and synthesizing insights
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Building and testing prototypes
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Presenting UX decisions to cross-functional teams
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If I were still on this project, my next step would be to support developers during implementation and gather post-launch feedback to guide future iterations.