As a Senior UX Designer at DAT, I’ve taken an active role in transforming how teams collaborate across the organization, starting with the relationship between mobile development and design. In my first year, I focused on aligning engineering processes with UX goals, streamlining workflows, and building trust. By my second year, I had expanded my efforts to rebuild and foster collaboration not only within mobile development but also across other departments like customer success and support teams, ensuring a unified and inclusive approach to product development.

When I joined, the relationship between mobile development and design was strained. The design team operated under a “my way or no way” approach, where UX dictated decisions without input from developers. This created silos, limiting creativity and discouraging developers from voicing concerns or proposing solutions. Recognizing this challenge, I rebuilt the relationship by introducing regular collaboration sessions. These meetings gave the developers a platform to share challenges, offer insights, and collaborate on solutions with me. In turn, I approached my work more openly, actively incorporating developer input into user workflows and experiences.

As this collaboration grew stronger, I expanded this approach across other teams outside of product. I worked to establish cross-departmental workflows that brought together design, customer support, sales, partnerships and other key teams. Regular touchpoints allowed these departments to share feedback, insights, and product challenges directly with me and other designers. These exchanges helped create a shared understanding of user needs and business goals, ensuring a wide range of informed design decisions and perspectives. The more junior designers were thankful for the greater depth of knowledge they had access to.

The shift has been transformative. The mobile development and UX design team now work as true partners, solving problems collaboratively and fostering a culture of trust. Across the organization, the design team has become a model for cross-departmental collaboration, demonstrating how open communication and shared goals can lead to better outcomes.

This experience has shown me the power of rebuilding relationships and creating systems that prioritize collaboration. By fostering these connections, I’ve helped DAT deliver products that align with user needs and reflect the collective expertise and insights of the entire organization.