SAM+ Hub

SAM+ Hub was a zero-to-one product for Softchoice customers managing software assets, renewals and licensing decisions. The initiative combined a new customer-facing experience with complex data architecture and an emerging operating model. When I joined, the business understood which data points needed to be available, but the product experience and information hierarchy had not been defined.

I served as the UX Strategy & Product Design Lead and sole practitioner for SAM+ Hub. I worked daily with a product owner from Sales, data architects, front-end developers and project managers. The SAM+ programme owners acted as business partners and represented the broader organizational mandate. I had broad authority to shape the experience as long as the product met the required data and programme objectives.

I owned the UX strategy, interaction model, information architecture, prototypes, design system, developer handoff and design QA. I also led the conversations that determined which information deserved prominence and how it should support customer decisions. I led through product expertise and cross-functional influence, with no direct reports on the initiative.

The product owner managed product requirements and the engineering group owned technical implementation. I translated business and data requirements into a coherent experience, resolved ambiguity with partners and reviewed deployed work against the design intent. I also prepared the prototype and walkthrough used to present the product to the Board at launch.

The initial product concept resembled a large spreadsheet: a dense collection of data points presented with limited hierarchy. That approach reflected how the organization stored and discussed the information, but it did not reflect the decisions customers needed to make. It also risked turning a strategic service into a reporting surface that required expert interpretation.

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The central unresolved question was what the product should help customers notice and do. Renewals, licensing exposure, recommendations and programme activity competed for attention. Without a clear hierarchy, every data point could appear equally important and the product would struggle to guide action.

The delivery environment added risk. This was a new product with no established UX practice in the programme and no traditional pre-launch testing window. The interface had to be understandable at launch, feasible for the engineering architecture and flexible enough to absorb future capabilities.

Define the product around decisions

I led working conversations about the role each data point played in the customer journey. We evaluated information by the decision it supported, the urgency it carried and the level of detail required. That work established a hierarchy for the hub and shifted the product discussion from data availability to customer value.

Use progressive disclosure

I introduced a card-based dashboard that surfaced meaningful signals and allowed customers to move into detail when needed. The model supported scanning, grouping and prioritization while preserving access to the underlying data. It also gave the product a modular structure for future capabilities.

Reduce launch risk through familiar affordances

Because a full pre-launch research programme was not available, I made an explicit risk-management choice to use established interaction patterns and familiar enterprise conventions. Navigation, filters, cards, status treatments and drill-down behaviours drew on proven affordances. This reduced the amount of new interaction logic customers had to learn.

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Discovery happened through close collaboration with the product owner, programme owners, engineering and subject-matter experts. I used requirement reviews, data-model discussions and workflow analysis to identify the questions customers needed the product to answer. The main insight was that value came from prioritization and interpretation, since access to raw data alone did not support timely action.

A summary needed a clear point of view

The hub could not treat every metric as equally urgent. Customers needed a concise view of what required attention, why it mattered and where to investigate. That informed the card hierarchy and the relationship between overview and detail.

The interface had to reflect the data architecture

Daily work with data architects helped me understand where data was stable, where relationships were complex and where the front end needed to account for incomplete states. The resulting patterns balanced customer clarity with the realities of the system.

The product would expand

The programme had an ambitious roadmap. Components therefore needed to support new data types and features without forcing a visual redesign each time. Modularity became a product strategy decision as well as a design-system decision.

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I designed the hub around modular cards, a clear navigation structure and layered information. High-value signals appeared at the overview level, while tables and detailed records supported investigation. Status language and visual treatments helped customers distinguish routine information from items requiring attention.

I built a working prototype to align business and technical partners and to make the product tangible before development was complete. The prototype supported decision-making in working sessions and became the basis of the launch walkthrough presented to the Board.

During implementation, I conducted design QA and experience audits on the developers' output. I documented discrepancies, clarified responsive and state behaviour and worked directly with engineering to protect the hierarchy and interaction model. The component library established during the work became the foundation for subsequent design on the same platform.

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By 2026, the product had reached nearly 4,000 users across approximately 3,300 active accounts. Monthly active users reached 944 against a plan of 800. Half of sessions lasted less than five minutes, a useful efficiency signal for a product designed to help customers identify status and next actions quickly.

Behavioural data also revealed the next product opportunity. Approximately 3,400 users took a purchase-related step and 281 requested a quote. The gap between interest and completed commercial action helped frame the case for a Subscription Marketplace and gave the programme a clearer conversion problem to solve.

The launch also established the first formal UX foundation for the programme. The design system, modular architecture, prototype-led alignment and design QA process gave future teams a more reliable way to extend the platform.

SAM+ Hub shows how I operate when a product has strong business ambition and limited experience definition. I converted requirements into a product model, made the information hierarchy a strategic conversation and created a structure that could scale with the programme.

The work also demonstrates senior UX leadership without a reporting line. Product, engineering and programme partners retained their authority, while I supplied the experience strategy and the mechanisms needed to reach decisions. The result was a launchable product and a reusable foundation for the platform that followed.

Adoption, account, monthly active user, session-duration and conversion measures come from Softchoice product analytics available through 2026. The figures describe product performance and opportunity signals. They are presented alongside the UX contribution without claiming that interface design alone produced the business results.