License Management - Desktop App
I led the redesign of a desktop application used to license and download purchased products. The original developer-built interface was confusing and caused heavy reliance on customer support. My goal was to simplify the experience by restructuring workflows and creating a more intuitive, user-friendly design.
The result was a streamlined product that reduced support tickets, empowered users to license and download independently, and significantly improved overall usability.
License Manager: Project Overview
My Role:
Mid UX Designer
Team:
Team Size: 6
Producer
2 BE Developers
QA
SME/Stakeholder
UX designer
Duration:
10 months
Deliverables:
I was responsible for Stake holder/SME interviews, Use Case Chart, Flow Diagram, Site Map, Wireframes, Prototypes, Mood-board, UI Kit and Style Guide, Usability Testing, Iconography, and Final UI design.
Process:
Discovery
Interviews
Existing user issues
Evaluation of product
Company expectations
Define
Use cases
Users
Flow diagram
Ideate
Sketches
Wireframes
Brainstorming
Site map
Prototypes
User testing
Design
Final Design & Launch
Mock ups
Moodboard
Visual Design
UI Kit/Style Guide
User testing
Final design docs
UX/UI Review
Tools:
Challenges:
The project began as an in-house effort but was transitioned mid-development to an outsourcing partner. The internal team was disbanded, though I remained on the project to provide continuity and collaborated with the external team and a newly assigned Product Owner in Prague. Before the product was completed, I was reassigned to another project.
At this time, the UX process within the company was still in its infancy. It was not well defined, supported, or included in the formal review pipeline. As a result, designs were often poorly implemented by the outsourcers and functionality suffered. A comprehensive UX review was eventually conducted shortly before delivery, which allowed many issues to be corrected prior to release, while others were addressed in later updates.
The project’s scope also shifted significantly. Initially framed as a quick, low-cost reskin of an existing product to patch usability concerns, it evolved into a full redesign once it became clear that the legacy product could not be salvaged.
Additional challenges included:
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A producer who, while deeply invested in the product’s success, attempted to micro-manage design decisions.
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A development culture that was historically developer-driven, with limited understanding or acceptance of UX as a discipline.
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Operating within the military simulation industry, where direct access to end users was not possible. Requests for research access were often denied with the explanation that only procurement, not users, was available for communication.
Ultimately, I had to operate within a lean UX approach, building processes and advocacy as I went, while navigating organizational resistance, limited user input, and evolving project goals.
Lessons learned:
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Usability testing as conflict resolution: Leveraging usability test results proved to be a powerful way to resolve design conflicts and gain alignment across stakeholders.
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Upfront process alignment: A clearly defined UX process needs to be planned, documented, and agreed upon by the Product Owner before development begins to prevent ambiguity later in the project.
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Integration into development pipelines: Embedding UX into the review and QA process before features are merged into the master build is essential for ensuring that design quality is maintained through implementation.
What didn't work:
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Non-linear, open workflow: The first redesign attempt focused on making incremental changes to the existing product. This approach offered very limited design flexibility and ultimately failed to solve the core usability issues. Users continued to struggle, and the workflow provided no clear path toward successful outcomes.
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Hybrid open/linear workflow: The next attempt introduced a more structured flow while retaining some of the open, non-linear elements. Although this provided more user guidance, it remained confusing without heavy reliance on documentation and on-screen instructions. Instead of simplifying the experience, it added layers of complexity.
Accomplishments:
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Shift in UX adoption: Prior to this project, UX designers were only brought in to assist with isolated features. After the success of License Manager, Product Owners began requesting dedicated UX designers on their teams full-time, establishing UX as a core discipline within the company.
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Elevated design quality: I introduced a modernized design style that improved both the visual appearance and usability of the product, setting a new benchmark for future projects.
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Improved customer experience: Customer support reported a noticeable decline in support tickets related to licensing and downloading, directly tied to the usability improvements.
License Manager: Research & Discovery
Research existing product version:
To evaluate the existing application, I began by attempting to license and download products myself. Despite my experience, I was unsuccessful in completing the process. The order of required steps was unclear, and there were no affordances to guide users through the correct sequence.
The design relied heavily on external documentation, which was equally confusing and failed to clarify the workflow. Users whose needs fell outside the documented use cases were left with no option but to contact support.
From the very first day of release, the support team was inundated with tickets from customers struggling to activate their licenses, highlighting critical usability issues in the product.
Screenshots:
Interviews with SME’s:
Since I did not have direct access to customers, I relied on subject matter experts (SMEs) from Support, Producers, and Product Owners who interacted with users daily. These conversations provided critical insight into the pain points customers faced.
Through these discussions, it became clear that users were struggling with the same issues I had encountered in my own testing: the app was unintuitive, task order was unclear, and the documentation created more confusion than clarity.
In informal interviews with the support team, I collected information about the program’s shortcomings, customer frustrations, and potential solutions. I asked what success would look like from their perspective, focusing on ways to reduce reliance on support, minimize errors, and improve usability.
To further ground my understanding, I also reviewed support tickets to identify recurring problems and patterns in user confusion.
License Manager: Define
Defining Users:
Even after speaking with stakeholders and SMEs, only a limited amount of concrete user information was available. The audience was described broadly, essentially boiling down to:
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Military Customers – Marines, U.S. Army, foreign militaries, IT staff, developers, contractors, interns, business developers, and executives.
As one Support Specialist put it: “Don’t forget that Koreans, Japanese, Americans, French, British, Canadian, German, Swedes, or even Serbians will be using it as well.” -
BISim Employees – Internal staff also relied on the tool for licensing and product management.
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Everyone Else – “That’s only a taste of the kind of people that use our software.” – Ryan G., Support Specialist
This meant the product had to serve an extremely wide and diverse user base. In practice, it became a “design for everyone” scenario—one of the most difficult (and least effective) approaches to product design. The challenge was to create a system simple and clear enough for a broad global audience, while avoiding oversimplification that could hinder power users.
User Stories Diagram:
To capture the complexity of the licensing process, the team mapped out user stories across the different workflows. Each workflow had distinct requirements based on the user’s environment, role, and technical setup.
For example, within the online licensing workflow alone, we identified five unique user stories. Each one was diagrammed to show how that user would move through the activation process, what dependencies existed, and what steps were required for success with their existing system configuration.
These diagrams helped clarify hidden complexities, ensured edge cases were not overlooked, and created a shared visual reference for stakeholders and SMEs. They also became a foundation for simplifying and standardizing the redesigned experience.
Flow Chart:
The final flow chart was built from the research insights, sketches, and design explorations conducted earlier in the process. It consolidated findings from SME interviews, support ticket reviews, and brainstorming sessions into a clear visual representation of the licensing workflow.
This artifact served multiple purposes: it clarified the current state of the process, exposed pain points, and provided a shared foundation for aligning stakeholders around opportunities for simplification. It also became a blueprint for iterating on and testing redesigned workflows.
License Manager: Ideation
Sketches, Brainstorming & Wireframes:
Numerous design directions were explored through whiteboarding, brainstorming sessions, and sketches before moving into low-fidelity wireframes. We experimented with approaches that ranged from clarifying the original design to proposing a complete redesign of the application.
As concepts evolved, higher-fidelity wireframes were developed to better map the complex workflows required to accommodate diverse customer use cases. These explorations helped surface potential friction points and informed layout decisions.
Once a few strong directions emerged, the wireframes were reviewed with SMEs and stakeholders for feedback and validation. Through this process, it became clear that a wizard-style approach would best support users by guiding them step by step, reducing confusion, and eliminating reliance on external documentation.
Site Map:
Once a clear design direction was approved, I created a site map to define the structure of the application. This ensured that all workflows and licensing paths were accounted for and logically organized.
Error Handling and Prevention:
As part of the redesign, we held dedicated sessions to identify all potential errors users might encounter during the licensing process. Each error was evaluated to determine whether it could be prevented through design or technical safeguards.
Where prevention was not feasible due to technical or timeline constraints, we focused on clear error handling. This included designing messaging that explained the issue in plain language, provided actionable next steps, and minimized user frustration.
License Manager: Prototype & User Testing
Prototype - High fidelity
A full-color prototype of the entire application was developed to ensure every licensing workflow could be tested end to end. This prototype allowed users to move through the wizard-style workflow, intentionally take wrong paths, and attempt self-correction—critical for validating whether the redesigned flow supported recovery and aligned with user story data.
Testing also focused on the visual design. Since the company’s product line had been outdated, this prototype introduced a refreshed style and color scheme, allowing us to gather feedback on both usability and aesthetics.
In addition to testing the online workflows, the prototype also included:
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Offline licensing workflows
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Stepper-based navigation
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Dongle use cases
This comprehensive approach ensured the design addressed both edge cases and large-scale usability improvements.
User Testing:
We conducted three rounds of usability testing before arriving at a successful solution.
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Session 1
Participants navigated seven use cases with 13 main points being tested. Findings included some small fixes (such as button labels), but there were also five major areas to retest due to confusion with functionality.
These included:
• License monitoring page
• Filtering system
• Functionality of the computer selection in the cards
• Make a support option to retrieve a license footprint file
• Make the downloads authorization file process on the support page the same as in the main workflow
• Rename the “Close” button to “Exit License Manager”
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Session 2
Once solutions were implemented into the prototype they were retested. Many fixes were successful, but some created new usability issues. The tabs solution for the monitoring page was not successful, while the filter solution worked. We needed to retest the downloads authorization file and the tables solution. Results for those two were inconclusive, so another round was necessary. -
Session 3
All users completed tasks successfully without getting stuck. The solutions were working, so further rounds of testing were not needed at that time.
Explorations that were tested for the filter and sort functionality:
User testing revealed that the filter and sort functionality was a major source of confusion. Users struggled to understand how filters were applied and how to turn them on or off.
To resolve this, we explored multiple design variations and tested them across three rounds of usability sessions. Through iteration, we refined the interactions until users could confidently apply, adjust, and clear filters without hesitation. The final solution provided a clear, consistent interaction model that aligned with user expectations and reduced errors.
License Manager: Design
IU Kit, Style Guide, Mood Boards & Iconography:
Designing the UI for License Manager was a pivotal moment in the UX/UI process. It provided the opportunity to define a modern look and feel that would influence all upcoming company products.
This was the first time the company allowed a design team to deviate from the outdated, developer-created styles that had been in use for years. Those earlier designs were unintuitive, difficult for users to learn, and optimized more for the creators than the end users.
For License Manager, we introduced a dark UI scheme to maintain continuity with the existing product line while modernizing the overall experience. To create clearer product differentiation, we established a highlight color system:
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License Manager → Green
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Main Product → Orange (retained)
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Developer Tools → Purple
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Additional products each received their own accent color
The updated style was widely accepted and embraced across the company, ultimately becoming the foundation for the redesign of the flagship product. The creation of a UI kit, style guide, mood boards, and iconography ensured this new direction could scale consistently across future applications.
The final design for the License Manager application was implemented and released with the core features in place.
After launch, the company collected user feedback. While the design itself addressed many of the original pain points, the feedback revealed that development issues and bugs prevented the product from working as intended.
A subsequent round of bug fixing and improvements was prioritized, and an update was released to stabilize the experience. Additionally, a key feature that had been cut from the initial release was later identified as critical for one of the company’s largest customers. That functionality was implemented and released approximately a year later.
License Manager: Develop and Launch
Results to the company:
A few years after release, the License Manager application proved successful in achieving its primary goal: to improve the usability for users which in turn drastically reducing the amount of time support teams spent walking customers through the licensing and download process.
When support data was compiled, overall ticket volume had increased, but the nature of the issues had shifted. Tickets were now primarily related to technical system and networking configurations on the customer side, rather than usability problems with the application.
The switch to the WIBU licensing system improved security while the redesigned workflows improved clarity and ease of use. Together, these changes positioned the License Manager as a more sustainable, user-friendly solution, even in the context of customers’ complex IT environments.