The Quietest Win I’m Still Proud Of

It was part of our self-serve onboarding flow. A small, easily overlooked section that asked new users to choose between two workspace types. On paper, it was a simple fork: personal vs. team. But the copy was vague, the context wasn’t clear, and it wasn’t obvious what the choice meant - or if it could be changed later.

Most people picked randomly. Some dropped off entirely. The product still worked, technically - but the path they were choosing shaped how the dashboard looked, what tools were enabled by default, and how their data was structured. This wasn’t just a preference. It was a foundational decision, and we were asking users to make it with zero guidance.

I raised it a couple of times during sprint planning, but it was always deprioritized. “Low traffic.” “No one’s complaining.” And they weren’t - not loudly. But every once in a while, someone on support would mention it. “This user thought they joined a team account but ended up on a solo plan.” “Can we reverse this for them?”

So I decided to fix it anyway.

I rewrote the copy to clearly explain what each option meant - and more importantly, what it didn’t. I clarified that the choice wasn’t permanent. I worked with engineering to add a fallback so users could switch paths later if needed. I even adjusted the UI slightly so that team setup was the default, but personal was still accessible - a small nudge based on what we actually saw in successful onboarding patterns.

It took a few async check-ins with PM and dev, but we got it in. No fanfare, no announcement, just a better, cleaner step in the flow.

A week later, our support team sent fewer tickets about onboarding confusion. Two weeks later, self-serve team creation was slightly up. A month later, no one remembered the old flow: and that, honestly, felt like the win.

What I learned was simple: not every design impact shows up in dashboards. Sometimes it’s about preventing confusion before it happens. Sometimes it’s about giving people just enough context to feel confident. And sometimes it’s about doing the work even when no one’s asking for it - because the user can’t always tell you what’s wrong until after they’ve already quit.

It didn’t land in a portfolio deck. But that one small fix quietly made something better - and made me feel more grounded in why I do this work in the first place.