Shaping the product vision and strategic UX/UI redesign for a behavioral AI startup.
Councyl is a software startup helping organizations improve decision-making through Behavioral AI. Their technology—originally developed at TU Delft—models how expert decisions are made & provides support for ongoing decisions.
When I joined, Councyl was at a critical moment: evolving from a research-based prototype into a scalable, user-facing product. Councyl’s product vision was still emerging and my task was to help define that vision and translate it into a cohesive, high-fidelity product concept, laying the foundation for digitization, user testing, and scalable development.
Product Designer
UX/UI Design, Interaction Design, Design Systems, Information Architecture, Figma & Miro Prototyping
March 2022 - August 2022
At the start of the project, Councyl’s product vision existed across slide decks, internal conversations, and institutional knowledge. While their software had proven value, the user experience hadn’t caught up. Internal analysts were working with limited, clunky tools—and the platform wasn’t yet ready for external use.
What began as a UX/UI redesign quickly grew into a broader strategic challenge:
How could we support current workflows and behaviors while planning for future users?
How could we turn a research-heavy tool into a usable, scalable product?
And how could we unify brand, product, and vision into a cohesive platform?
Over six months, I helped drive that transformation by delivering:
A reimagined product experience grounded in real analyst workflows and future user roles, improving usability and scalability
A modernized UX architecture and high-fidelity interface, designed to guide new users while empowering expert users
A modular design system and refreshed visual identity, enabling consistency across product and marketing touchpoints
A redesigned website to communicate the platform’s new direction and support business development
Cross-functional collaboration with product, engineering, and leadership, ensuring design decisions aligned with business goals and technical feasibility
Before jumping into the design, I needed to understand how the platform was currently being used, where friction existed, and what Councyl’s vision for the future product entailed. To do this, I needed to understand two key groups:
1.
Internal decision analysts (current users), who were highly familiar with the product but often relied on workarounds.
2.
External managers and decision handlers (future users), who would need a simpler, more guided experience.
My research process included:
Reviewing existing user interviews and product documentation
Conducting new interviews with internal analysts and product stakeholders.
Analyzing the current UX flow and pain points
Mapping workflows using service blueprints to reveal manual steps and gaps in both client-facing processes and internal interactions with the software
This helped me surface key patterns: what was working, what wasn’t, and what needed to be reimagined to support real-world workflows.
With research in hand, I created user profiles to guide design decisions. Each profile outlined motivations, key tasks, pain points, and software expectations.
Decision Analysts – expert users focused on building and testing decision models
Decision Managers – outcome-driven users who oversee teams and interpret data
Decision Handlers – end users who input real cases and receive decision support
Note: These personas were recreated for portfolio purposes, but are included to provide a visual that reflect the design processes and some of the high-level patterns identified during the project.
Senior Behavior Specialist | Speaks Dutch & English | MSc in Behavior Science
Uses Google Sheets, Google Docs, Miro, Councyl Platform
About
Builds and tests decision models based on behavioral logic. Needs full control, transparency, and precision.
Tasks Performed
- Structure complex decision frameworks with clients
- Define criteria, assign importance weights, and test models
- Document and share models internally and externally
- Train and support colleagues or clients in model use
Department Lead | Speaks English & Dutch | MBA in Public Administration Uses Outlook, Excel, Councyl Platform, PowerPoint
About
Oversees decision-making across teams. Needs insight into activity, outcome patterns, and model performance. Values simplicity and overview dashboards.
Tasks Performed
- Monitor decision-making activity and quality across teams
- Assign roles and manage platform permissions
- Report on outcomes and evaluate effectiveness
Case Handler | Speaks Dutch | Bachelor’s in Social Work
Uses Councyl Platform, Email, Internal CRM
About
Inputs real cases and receives guidance from decision models. Needs a simple, trustworthy, and supportive experience. Unfamiliar with the modeling process behind the tool.
Tasks Performed
- Enter real-life cases into the system
- Follow model guidance to make consistent decisions
- Log and track decisions over time
With clear user roles and workflows defined, I developed an information architecture that could serve both current and future users. This involved:
Mapping key tasks to navigation and feature groupings
Structuring the product to support guided decision-making for new users and flexibility for expert users
Collaborating closely with stakeholders to refine flows and validate task flows
This became the structural blueprint for every design decision that followed.
Note: The diagram below shows a high-level view of the information architecture created during the project. It has been simplified and adapted for portfolio purposes and does not reflect the full structure or key details of the final product.
With a strong foundation in place, I transitioned from system mapping to hands-on interface design. My approach was iterative and collaborative—ensuring that stakeholders stayed involved, and that design decisions were grounded in both user needs and technical feasibility.
My design process involved
Sketching key flows and wireframing major screens in Figma
Built feedback loops into the process with weekly reviews
Iterating quickly to align feasibility, usability, and stakeholder goals
Once flows were validated, I moved into high-fidelity UI design—crafting a modern, professional interface that reflected the complexity and intelligence of Councyl’s offering while remaining accessible to non-technical users. This included:
Crafted a modular design system (tables, forms, modals, etc.)
Refreshing the visual identity: color, typography, iconography
Using atomic design principles and design tokens for scalability
The redesigned interface focused on turning complexity into clarity—helping users structure decisions, create models, track outcomes, and guide their teams with confidence.
I designed and prototyped several core experiences that transformed how the platform worked:
Managers can add team members, assign roles, and control permissions with ease.
Transformed a complex modeling flow into a guided, step-by-step builder. Analysts can now define decision goals, set criteria and levels, assign weights, preview logic, test models, and deploy—all within one flow.
Decision handlers use a conversational interface to receive guidance (“what your colleagues would say”) based on deployed models.
Managers can view decision logs, analyze team activity, compare decision patterns, and reflect on outcomes.
A central hub for managing models, updating configurations, and maintaining platform oversight.
This project helped set the foundation for Councyl’s product direction, bringing clarity and cohesion to a tool that was ready to move into its next version. The designs were handed off for testing and iterative development, and several elements—like the navigation and decision support—have since been implemented in live environments.
Redesigning the Councyl platform was a defining moment in my growth as a Product Designer. It gave me end-to-end ownership of a complex project and allowed me to apply both UX/UI and service design methods in a real-world setting.
Through an iterative and research-driven process, I strengthened my ability to translate abstract strategy into usable, testable design. Working closely with internal stakeholders and developers, I honed my collaboration and communication skills—essential in aligning user needs with business and technical realities.
This project also taught me that design is about more than interfaces. I learned to map workflows, create role-based experiences, and build clarity into complex systems—supporting both expert users and newcomers. Tools like Figma, Miro, and blueprinting methods helped me move from insight to structure to polished UI.
Most importantly, this project reinforced my belief that great product design requires both zoomed-out systems thinking and zoomed-in attention to detail. I’m proud to have helped Councyl lay the foundation for a scalable, user-centered product—and to have grown significantly as a designer in the process.
"The wireframes you created are a major value add and forced us to think through aspects of the future software in detail that has not been discussed previously. This was a huge help not only in itself, but as a way of working in general."
Monica Ferraioli | Product Manager
Councyl
“Michal is an excellent designer and has shown that under the right guidance can develop well professionally On top of that, she has great work ethics”
Nicolaas Heyning | Co-Founder
Councyl
