Hi! I'm Ruchin Shah
I've worked with teams at frog, IKEA, Atlassian, Google, IBM, and others to make technology consumable and experiences humane.
I draw from my experience of running complex, large scale programmes across the globe for clients in various industry domains.
Many of my projects involve designing experiences that disrupt markets and influence future user behavior, therefore they remain confidential; while some of them have won international awards and have been featured in the news. Happy to share more when you get in touch!
Consulting
I was a Principal Designer at frog and a Lead UX Designer at Globant. I also advise the Office of the Principal Scientific Advisor to the Govt. of India, through iSpirt.
Affiliations & Fellowships
I am a member of the Association of Designers of India (ADI); lead IITBAA Bangalore's Design Track and I was a Designer-in-residence at ownpath.
Public Speaking, Teaching & Media
My work and ideas have featured in international conferences and exhibitions like UX-India, World Information Architecture Day, IndiaHCI, Cumulus, Icograda, Typography Day, Tech-Fest and media like Design Drives, Times of India, Kyoorius Design Magazine, DNA and others.
In 2021-2022, I hosted a series of design talks with design leaders on topics related to industry best practices and careers. I sometimes visit Design colleges as an adjunct faculty and for juries. Most recently, I conducted a 2 week course on Design research at MIT ID, Pune.
Writing & Books
I am pretty shy but I've started expressing my thoughts on Design and experiences on my blog and on social media. I've also designed experiential books for heritage walks and temple experiences.
Key Programs and their Impact
The following examples illustrate the wins end-users, teams and businesses have attained through my strategic approach, leadership and management style.
Leading Cross-JIRA Product Experiences
Future of Work • Productivity • Business Growth
Role: Lead Designer, Atlassian
1 year
Please reach out for access.
🎉 Purchases are above target
Our strategy has paid off. The team's effort in reactivation, onboarding and upgrade purchase experiences have helped Jira exceed its business targets in FY24.
We've been recognised as a ‘Leader’ in The Forrester Wave: ESM, Q4 2024 for Strategy.
🛣️ Continuous research
Speaking to customers is a weekly habit we've established in the team.
🛣️ Influencing roadmaps
Influenced roadmaps across GTM, Product Marketing Discovery, Product onboarding, and product feature teams.
🔬 10+ experiences shipped
While we keep adding ideas to our backlog, we've already done over 10 experiments, shipped a couple of features and done a bunch of user research in FY24.
This Is a Title
Making Homes Smarter for the Many People
Consumer IoT • Well-being • Smart Homes • Home Furnishings
Role: Principal Designer, frog
2+ years
Please reach out for access.
💯 Increase in ratings: ~90%
App ratings went from 1.8 to 3.9 on Android and from 2.4 to 4.1 on iOS in a span of 2-3 months.
📦 16+ smart products launched
Launched 16 new products and many features over the course of 2 years.
🎉 Failure of integrations reduced from 60% to 4%
We identified and solved a major customer pain-points regularly.
📈 Growth in team and projects: 2x
Consistently won more work across verticals and expanded the team to double the size.
👏 Awards and Recognition
Contributed to the winning of several awards - from the prestigious Red Dot to client's yearly Best Innovation and frog's Make Your Mark awards.
This project requires a password. Message me to view and learn how we achieved these outcomes.
Optimising Caregiving for Nurses
💯 Meeting Utilization: 95%
Meeting target turnaround times increased to 95% for utilization management.
📈 27% Increase in engagement
Customer engagement improved by 27%. Specifically for chronic disease management, it improved by 38%.
🎉 Customers gained: 18%
Net new customers increased in a year after the new design direction was launched.
🎖️ Client love: 91 CSAT score
The client enjoyed working with us (and vice-versa). We got some great work done.
🗣️ 66 interviews in 5 US cities
We conducted interviews and conducted ideation 3+ workshops with nurses, doctors and medical staff in a month.
This Is a Title
Transforming the Animal Husbandry Sector in India
Public Sector • Impact Sector • Animal Husbandry
Role: VP-Design, NDLM
Office of the Principal Scientific Advisor to the Govt. of India
2+ years
📈 155 million transactions YTD
1.6 million transactions are done on the NDLM system per day. 4335 mobile vet vans sanctioned. Support center operational.
🎉 NDLM launched by India's PM
In March 2024, Bharat Pashudhan (NDLM) was launched by Prime Minister Modi.
🎓 Influenced India's top scientists
Priviledged to have influenced the Principal Scientific Advisor to the Govt. of India, India's Animal Husbandry Commissioner and the top scientists in this sector.
🏬 Established a first-of-its-kind Service Design Lab
Responsible for setting up a Service Design Lab for the Ministry of Animal Husbandry; right from selecting the location of the lab to specifying software and hardware required for service prototyping. I also created job descriptions, defined hiring criteria, ways of working (🙋♂️prototyping) for the design + research team.
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Project Diversity
🏗️ Industrial Risk mitigation software to make factories safe and reliable
Asset Performance Management・Predictive Analytics・IA・Visual Design
🛒 Retail Loss Prevention as a Service
Theft Detection・Retail Loss Prevention・Service Design・Digital Transformation
🔒Redesign of an End-Point Security Solution
Enterprise・Data Security and Policy・Privacy ・IA
🏃 Making fitness monitoring fun for children
Consumer IoT・NPD (New Product Development)・Mobile・Branding + Packaging
🤖 Cognitive Service Desk - AI driven Service Desk
AI・IT Service Desk・NPD・Prototype・Conference Presentation
📕Comprehensive Educational Solution for Schools
Education・Learning Management・School Admin・Research ・NPD
🗺️ Google Maps for Work onboarding experience for software developers
Onboarding・Dev Tooling・UX Design・IA・Visual Design
📋 Insurance Policy and Claims System Design
Insurance . System Design UX Research・UX Design
✈️ Airlines Country Manager's Dashboard
Airline Route optimisation Mobile・NPD
🦽 Service Design to Enable Affordable Home-based Healthcare
Medical Devices・Rentals・Service Design・NPD・Responsive UX Design・Branding
📊 Making Big Data Analytics user-friendly for non-technical users
Real World Evidence・Pharma・Service Design・NPD・UX Design・
👗 Personalisation as a Service
Product Personalisation ・Responsive UX Design・NPD・Conceptualisation
and many more experiences designed and experiences gained...
Belief
"Design makes futures. Designing that does not Speculate, Criticise, Provoke, Discourse, Interrogate, Probe, Play is inadequate designing." – Cameron Tonkenwise
Thinking that all these things are additional or optional to the process of design reinforces the mistaken belief that Design is just an instrumental technical task — styling. By extrapolation, organisations have to acknowledge that designing is a collective enterprise that involves many hours of many people in messy debates, asking hard questions, making iterations to product and process to deliver value.
Inspiration
I get fascinated by a lot of things around me but here are some that have influenced me a bit more:
Monocle, Diablo, Semiology of Graphics, Tromsø, Westworld, Cuckold, Death Note, Italy, Aperol Spritz, Travelman, Orchestral Qawwali, The Art of Looking Sideways, Coldplay, Baraka, Gregorian, Black Mirror, E.H. Gombrich, Indian Mythology, Rebecca, Joe Hisaishi, Shakespeare, Sandalwood Incense Sticks, The Economist, Thesis, Kashmir, Strawberries, Lord of the Rings, Rajasthan, Wallpaper, FKJ, W+K, Bhutan, Braid, Hugh Jackman, Hans Zimmer, Ramin Djawadi, Nicole Kidman, Hampi, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Mumbai, Gujarati Thali, Godel-Escher-Bach, Age of Empires, Ferrero Rocher, The Weeknd, Frutiger, The Fall, Domus, Rotis, Old Fashioned, Kohei Sugiura, DragonAge Origins, Kumbakonam, QAF, The Last Samurai, Inception, Ulhas Moses, Edward Maya, Pune, Shankar Tucker, Dario's, Gorgonzola Cheese, IDC, Candies, Ittar...