Project Details
Product type
SaaS
Role
Design Lead
Duration
February 2025 - current
Challenge
The original subscription model was built on a rigid foundation with limited configuration for users. Because of these limitations and the evolving needs of users, the product became unusable. In order to bring value to the company, we had a limited timeframe to provide a viable proof of concept to move the project forward.
Solution
I reframed the work from a visual redesign to a backend overhaul. The update removed key configuration barriers and introduced updated controls that support all subscriptions types and scale for future growth.
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Subscriptions sit at the intersection of learning operations and commerce within the platform. Organizations use the product to manage ongoing access to learning experiences, making subscriptions a critical part of how customers plan and sustain training over time.
The initial release focused on the admin setup experience, which is a highly information-dense workflow where administrators define subscription configurations, manage rules, and prepare offerings before they go live. Because these decisions affect everything regarding subscriptions, the setup experience required transparency and flexibility.
This work was delivered as an open beta, allowing us to introduce a more flexible subscription structure while learning from real usage. Future phases expand the system to support end-user subscription interactions as payment settings become fully connected, followed by seat management tools for admins. This phased approach ensured we could evolve a complex system safely while designing toward a long-term, scalable subscription model.
Since 2015, there have been several failed attempts to evolve the subscription model. The operational dependencies, system risk and limited team capacities made progress difficult. Completing the first phase marked the first effort to successfully establish a scalable foundation for subscriptions.
More than a design issue
What users struggled with 🤔
What the system struggled with 🤖
Ultimately, the focus had to shift from providing a system glow-up to laying the groundwork for an entire subscription system that could grow.
Personas within subscriptions
Although subscriptions operate within a shared system framework, the experience differed depending on user roles and responsibilities. These differences shaped how each user interacted with subscription rules, and where friction surfaced.
Through stakeholder interviews and customer walkthroughs of how they've configured subscriptions for their needs, clear behavioral patterns began to emerge. Following those conversations, were able to narrow it down to three archetypes:
Superadmins who define a subscription's structure and content
Local-level managers who meet immediate demands
The end user/learner who is subject to their decisions
Focusing on these core behaviors allowed us to design for meaningful differences without overfitting the system to edge cases.
Global admin
Task: Define and manage subscription structures across the organization
✅ Goals
Establish subscription configurations that work across teams or regions
Balance flexibility with organizational standards
Make decisions that affect billing, access, and scalability
❌ Constraints
Needed broad configurability but was limited by rigid material rules
Had to predict downstream impacts of setup decisions without clear system feedback
Faced risk when modifying existing structures tied to live users
Required solutions that scaled beyond one-off use cases
Local admin
Task: Adapt subscriptions to meet local team or department needs
✅ Goals
Manage subscriptions for a specific group of learners
Adjust configurations based on evolving training needs
Ensure learners have appropriate access at the right time
❌ Constraints
Encountered restrictions that didn’t align with real operational workflows
Struggled to modify active subscriptions without starting over
Experienced inconsistent behavior depending on configuration type
Needed clarity on what could vs. couldn’t be changed
Learner - end user
Task: Access learning experiences provided through subscriptions
✅ Goals
Doesn’t configure subscriptions, but is directly affected by admin decisions
Experiences the outcome of setup logic through access and availability
❌ Constraints
Access could be delayed or limited due to rigid setup rules
Changes at the admin level could unintentionally affect learning continuity
System behavior felt opaque when access didn’t match expectations
Strategizing within constraints
Because previous attempts to evolve subscriptions had stalled, leadership required a rapid proof-of-concept to secure buy-in. We relied on our stakeholder walkthroughs, customer surveys and targeted user interviews to build the confidence and momentum necessary to move the project forward.
We also wanted to avoid losing momentum in exhaustive system mapping, and honed in on creating simple relationship and task diagrams to understand the core actions our users need help accomplishing.
Updating subscription was going to be a massive undertaking, and we wanted to be mindful that any suggested changes would affect customer configurations. Before diving into designs, we first established our base need. From our goal statement:
We followed with loose ideas by asking
We recognized that subscription success depends on how effectively admins can configure the system from the start. And given an ambitious timeline to deliver a proof of concept, we limited our discovery time and focused on establishing key decisions early on. Our goals included:
Provide proof of concept to help stakeholders visualize enhancements
Emphasize subscription changes will take place over multiple release cycles, with first release focusing on admin setup
Prioritize a B2C over B2B experience, planning for tiered sales structures down the road
Setting up admins for success
This phase of work focused on establishing a stable foundation in an area of the product that had been difficult to evolve. The primary milestone, delivering a functional admin setup for open beta, marked the first successful step forward despite previous failed attempts.
Updated landing page
Before: Basic metadata overview
After: Actionable information with extra controls
Subscription setup
Before: Three-step process
After: Single page with tabs
The original subscription setup followed a rigid three-step wizard, which forced admins into a linear flow and made it difficult to revisit or adjust specific settings later. We redesigned this into a tabbed configuration experience that supports admins who work more organically.
Configuring content, pricing and emails
Content, pricing and emails were the meat and potatoes of our test build and initial release. The current admin experience has these controls nested in areas that admins don't usually access, or were not unavailable as configurations. We wanted to ensure these were accessible items that didn't require admins to navigate out of the system or rely on third-party software for support. As one user quoted:
"
This will make life so much easier! I won't have to spend half my day sending out emails when we make changes!
Leveraging new backend AI capabilities
AI was embedded into key setup workflows to reduce manual effort and support decision-making. During subscription creation, AI can assist in generating subscription descriptions and suggesting content, helping reduce cognitive load upfront and improving consistency across subscriptions.
We're also planning to use AI during seat assignment, helping suggest relevant users and departments for global and local admins. These assistive features reduce manual effort, speed up configuration, and help admins make more informed decisions without removing control.
Growing pains
In the original subscription model, administrators had to build content bundles before attaching them to a subscription. This created user friction since the types of materials that could be included were restricted. There also wasn't a space available for users to manage existing bundles, meaning they were tied to individual subscriptions.
In the redesign, we removed the bundling requirement and allowed admins to add content directly into subscriptions. User testing showed strong positive feedback — the experience felt faster, clearer, and more flexible. For future enhancements, we considered
If administrators later need reusable content groupings, how should those be structured and stored?
Taking the original limited features into consideration, we focused on subscription creation with a duplication feature. We are looking into the feasibility of templates vs. a central repository if content bundles become a return request in the future.
What's next?
This phase of work focused on establishing a stable foundation in an area of the product that had been difficult to evolve. The primary milestone, delivering a functional admin setup for open beta, marked the first successful step forward despite previous failed attempts.
The next step is the learner journey. We will explore the full lifecycle of subscription access, from checkout through ongoing engagement.
Finally, we will address local admin seat management, ensuring organizations can distribute and manage access at scale while preserving the structural patterns established in the initial release.
Let's connect!
I'm always open to discussing new projects, creative ideas, or opportunities to be part of your vision. Feel free to reach out!
© 2026 Liana Tuliau. All rights reserved.
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