Collaborative Digital Workspace for Streamlined Design Process

Design Playground is a digital workspace designed to enhance team collaboration, promote a consistent design language, and improve overall work efficiency.

My work focused on creating a shared digital space for collaborative design exploration to support non-design partners, such as Product Managers and Software Engineers. I conducted user research to understand team workflows, developed interaction concepts to facilitate seamless collaboration, and designed an intuitive system to maintain visual consistency across projects. Through usability testing and iterative prototyping, I refined the experience to maximize efficiency and ensure alignment with established design standards.

Due to NDA, I am unable to share project details. However, feel free to reach out via email or LinkedIn to learn more!

TEAM

Amazon Photos Team
Maria Bolivar-Tucker, UX Design Manager
Jia Hao, Design Mentor
Designers and Researchers from Amazon Photos

SKILLS

Concept Exploration & Development
Design System
User research & testing

MY ROLE

UX Design Intern

TIMELINE

May 2023 - August 2023

Challenge

Build design repository for non-design partners at Amazon Photos team in a way that allows them to independently visualize and implement ideas for customer problem-solving.

During the summer 2023, I had the privilege to be part of the Amazon Photos UX Core Team as a UX Design Intern. From being part of this internship experience, I was able to engage and work with an exceptional and nurturing community comprising dedicated UX Designers, UX Researchers, Product Managers, and Software Engineers, fostering both learning and collaboration.

The Amazon Photos UX Core Team focuses on crafting engaging and user-friendly experiences and interactions to enhance the digital services for various platforms (e.g. iOS, Android, Web and Desktop) while prioritizing customer satisfaction through elegant and simple designs that are backed by analytical precision and a commitment to end-to-end experience delivery. As an intern, I was tasked to create a shared digital space for collaborative design exploration for our non-designer partners (e.g. Product Managers and Software Engineers), fostering team communication, encouraging a cohesive design language, maximizing efficiency, and maintaining visual consistency with design standards, regardless of direct designer involvement.

To achieve the project's goal, I conducted an extensive research and exploration process, which led me to refine my research question into:
What strategies can be implemented to create a team-wide digital space that addresses technical challenges, provides clear guidance, and ensures consistency with the established design standards and styles within the team's existing design system?

What I did

As a UX Design Intern at Amazon, I focused on strengthening the team’s design infrastructure and enhancing workflow efficiency. My work involved building scalable resources and enabling smoother collaboration across teams. Key contributions included:

  • Developing a foundational design toolkit. Spearheaded the creation of a design toolkit adopted by the team, serving around 200 individuals to support consistent and efficient design practices.

  • ‍Enhancing integration of existing design system elements. Designed seamless user experiences that allowed for easy incorporation of existing components and configurations from the team’s design system.

  • Creating new components and templates. Innovated beyond the existing design system by developing new components and templates, giving stakeholders greater flexibility and expanded design options.

  • Leading educational workshops. Facilitated workshops to help stakeholders build proficiency in using design-centric tools, improving overall team adoption and confidence in applying the toolkit.

This experience not only enhanced the team’s design capabilities but also sharpened my skills in building scalable systems that empower teams to work more efficiently and cohesively.

What I learned

During my internship at Amazon, I worked within a fast-paced environment that emphasized data-driven design and iterative problem-solving. Beyond sharpening my core UX skills, I gained key lessons that have stuck with me and continue to influence my approach to design today:

  • Grounding design in research-backed data. I learned the significance of anchoring design iterations and decisions in insights derived directly from user research, ensuring that every solution is purposeful and validated.

  • ‍Embracing long-term process change. I recognized that introducing new practices within a team is not instantaneous; adoption takes time, and meaningful change requires persistence and strategic alignment.

  • Viewing failure as valuable data. I came to understand that failed attempts aren't just setbacks—they provide crucial information about what didn’t work and why, helping inform more effective future solutions.

Ultimately, these lessons pushed me to think more systemically about design’s role within both product and organizational success.

Some of the pictures that I took during my internship at Seattle!

Reflecting on My Time at Amazon

I joined Amazon to gain experience in a fast-paced, data-driven environment and to deepen my understanding of how large organizations approach UX at scale. Through my internship, I worked on foundational design systems and toolkits that supported hundreds of stakeholders, giving me firsthand experience in building scalable, efficient design solutions.
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Working in a collaborative and high-expectation environment honed my ability to balance user needs with technical constraints and taught me the value of data-backed decision-making and iterative problem-solving.
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Interested in learning more? Let’s connect—you can reach me directly here.

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© 2024 Angela Nam