Redesign a Screen That Frustrates People
Maps to: Designer · Product Designer · UX Designer · UI Designer · Design Systems Designer
You're going to take a real screen that frustrates people (a confusing checkout, a cluttered app, a signup that makes you give up), work out what's actually going wrong for the person using it, and redesign it to fix THAT. The skill is judgment: deciding what 'better' means for a real person's problem, committing to a tradeoff (a faster checkout might mean fewer choices on screen), and explaining every change by how it helps, including the boring screens most designs skip: what people see while it's loading, when there's nothing there yet, and when something goes wrong. That's the side of design that lasts, the part about decisions and not just making things look nice. You'll have made a real screen genuinely better, and be able to say exactly why.
You're done when: A before-and-after redesign (or one piece of a screen with every state it can be in) where every change points back to a written problem, you can say what you made better and what you gave up and why, you handled the boring screens AI skips, and you tested it on at least one real person and put it online. The judgment is the work: not 'it looks nicer,' but 'every change points back to the problem.'
How this shows up on a resume or college app
I redesigned a real product screen against a stated user problem, diagnosing what was failing users, committing to a design tradeoff, and defending every change by how it served the problem (including the loading, empty, and error states most designs skip). I learned that product design is about decisions under a real constraint, not making things pretty, and that 'good' is defined by the user's problem, not taste.
When you finish, BuildMe drafts your Common App activity description from what you actually built.
Not sure yet? Play 5 minutes as a designer first and see how the work feels.
The plan
- 1
Step 1
Pick a screen and name the real problem
Pick a screen or a set of steps that genuinely frustrates people (or one piece of it, like a signup form). Then resist the urge to say 'it's ugly' and work out what actually GOES WRONG for the person using it: who are they, what are they trying to do, and where does it break? Write that down. It decides every change you make later.
- 2
Step 1-2
Decide what you'll give up, then rebuild it
Before you make anything look good, make the real decision: what are you making better, and what will you give up to get it? A faster checkout might mean fewer choices on screen. That's a tradeoff, and owning it is the job. THEN rebuild it in Figma, boring screens included: loading, nothing-there-yet, and something-went-wrong.
- 3
Step 2-3
Show before and after, and explain every change
Lay your work out as before and after, and write next to each change the reason it helps: 'I moved X because people kept getting stuck at Y.' If you can't tie a change back to the problem, it probably shouldn't be there. This is the thing that proves you can think, not just make things look nice.
- 4
Step 3-4
Try it on real people, then put it out
Show your before and after to 2-3 people, starting with the problem ('here's what was hard, is this better?'), and make one change based on what you learn. Then put your Figma link online with a short write-up.