Microsoft x Purdue UX

Customer Experience & Success Business Intelligence (CE&S BI) is a team within Microsoft, a multinational technology solutions company. This team is responsible for providing a single platform which takes complex data and unifies it into a secure and governed source of truth. Their Unified Data Platform (UDP) acts as a central hub for the datasheets of over 20k clients. In addition to storing all this data, CE&S BI also uses metrics, automation, and AI to provide additional analytic tools.

Company

Microsoft CE&S BI

Date

Jan 2026 - May 2026

Collaborators

Ava Biegel, Katie Chen, Emily Clark, Hammad Javaid, Jun Hyok Lim, Ashton Sun

Izza Barbar, Saathvika Talluri,
Stella Lim, David Levine, Jean Chou

My Contributions

UX Research, Enterprise UX Design, Usability Testing, Prototyping

Usability Testing, Flowchart Mapping,
Low-Fidelity Prototypes,
High-Fidelity Prototypes, Documentation

User Group

Internal Microsoft Employees

Individuals in California
seeking self-help legal services

Problem Space

Microsoft’s CE&S BI request intake experience was difficult for employees to navigate due to technical terminology, unclear workflows, and limited visibility after submission. Users often struggled to understand form requirements, track request progress, and confidently submit requests independently, leading to confusion, inefficiencies, and increased reliance on support teams.

Results

The redesigned experience streamlined the request intake workflow through simplified multi-step forms, clearer feedback systems, and improved request tracking visibility. By restructuring complex workflows, reducing cognitive load, and introducing intuitive dashboard and confirmation experiences, the final solution created a more transparent and user-friendly enterprise request management system.

Research & Insights

To better understand usability challenges within Microsoft’s CE&S BI request intake experience, our team researched enterprise workflows, form design, and request management systems. Since we were provided screenshots and documentation rather than direct platform access, our process focused on analyzing pain points and validating design decisions through iterative prototyping and usability testing.

Literature Review
I contributed to researching best practices surrounding form design, cognitive load, and enterprise workflows to better understand how users interact with complex request management systems. These findings helped guide our approach toward improving clarity, workflow structure, and feedback visibility.

Heuristic Evaluation
Using screenshots and documentation provided by our sponsors, I participated in heuristic evaluations to identify usability breakdowns involving technical terminology, unclear hierarchy, inconsistent layouts, and dense information structures within the existing intake experience.

Competitive Analysis
I contributed to analyzing enterprise platforms such as Jira, Zendesk, Salesforce, and Trello to better understand request tracking, workflow organization, and dashboard visibility. This research helped our team identify patterns that could improve clarity and usability within the redesigned experience.

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Sahana Bala's Portfolio

Resume

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Sahana Bala's Portfolio

Resume

Mail

Coming Soon.

This page is currently being updated!