Conversations in Centric PLM
I led the redesign of Conversations in Centric PLM across two releases, turning years of customer friction into a faster, secure collaboration for teams at global brands.
Sole Lead Designer
System Thinking
UX Strategy
2025
Context
Problems
As data volume grew and external parties were involved, the original Conversations began to slow teams down and introduce risk.
Too many clicks to reach conversations
Users often work in a season-level collection to view all products, but have to open each item to see or start conversations.
Suppliers see sensitive internal discussions
Internal teams discussed target pricing or supplier comparisons without realizing suppliers could see them, resulting in a loss of customer trust.
Lose track of ongoing discussions
Users in large companies can receive 100+ notifications a day, making it hard to follow up using the Notifications panel.
The New Experience
The new Conversations enables fast, in-context collaboration, helping teams discuss product data confidently and stay on top of updates.
Impact
The new Conversations solved pain points customers had lived with for years, rebuilding trust and enabling faster decision-making in PLM. Designed as a system-level framework, it now scales across other Centric product lines.
195% ↑
Monthly new conversations
In the first 3 months after launch
60% ↓
Workflow friction
To start, track, and manage conversations
45% ↓
Request tickets
Across 1,000+ customers after revamp
Research Insights
From research, I found that users spent too much effort navigating the system to start, find, and track conversations. The main goal was to use conversations when needed as quickly as possible so communication becomes faster and natural.
Start readily
Have conversations available where they work
Talk with confidence
Reach the intended audience
Stay on updates
Keep track of discussions with clear context
System Analysis
To support these user goals, I analyzed how product data is structured in the system, then identified two key behaviors the system must support.
Adapt to where users work
Users could encounter the same product data across different views. Conversations should be accessible wherever users work and alllow them to talk about the data readily.
Surface the right audience
Who users can talk to depends on the data being discussed. The system should automatically show the valid audience so users don't have to think by themselves.
Reframing the Problem
Instead of letting users manage system complexity, Conversations should adapt to users' working context, clarify who they are talking to, and help them stay on top of what matters.
Defining the Framework
In the new framework, I aimed at letting the system handle complexity, so users can focus on communicating.
Design Exploration
Research showed that large customers primarily work at the Season level, as it offers the quickest access to core product data. I framed the main design challenge around supporting a contextual experience at the Season level.
Iterations
V1
Context-aware tabs
🟢 Pros:
Quickly focus on the scope
🔴 Cons:
Hard to track all conversations related to a Style
V2 Persistent Object Selector
🟢 Pros:
Follows the data hierarchy, making it clear what the conversations are about
🔴 Cons:
Too rigid and slow for fast-paced workflows
When working with Child Objects' views, users always have to start from Style selection
V3 Selector Follows Working View
🟢 Pros:
Aligns with users' working context
Can directly access child object, reducing hierarchy friction
🔴 Cons:
Starting a conversation is less intuitive; can't start while scanning a list of items and must select one first
Actions for narrowing down the list (object selection, search, filter) are fragmented
Final
Unified Contextual Control
A single control for setting conversation context and refining results
New Conversation
Start a conversation on any product data
Solution Walkthrough
1️⃣ Contextual conversations by working view
I designed the conversation panel to adapt to the active object domain, so users always see conversations in the context of what they are currently working on, rather than navigating a fixed hierarchy.
Contextual conversations based on working view
Focus on one Style
2️⃣ Target the Right Audience
By letting the system surface audience, users simply decide whom to talk to.
Set the audience up front
Send messages to multiple suppliers at once
3️⃣ Stay updated
Track all my conversations in a global inbox to quickly review updates, reply, and take action.
Quick access to My Conversations
Respond within context
Scalibility to other domains
With a solid foundation in place, I supported the 3D Viewer team by adapting the experience to meet their specific workflows. We also extended Conversations into the retail domain at the request of our largest retail customer, ALDI.
3D Viewer
Retail
Maintaining shared assets
To scale Conversations across domains and product lines, I owned the core components and aligned with other product teams to evolve components for their use cases.
Reflection
Continuous customer engagement strengthened the product
Throughout the project, we kept a close loop with key customers and our business consultants. From the very first prototype review to pre-launch, we maintained a dedicated test server and ran multiple feedback sessions, which surfaced a series of product opportunities that we translated into the roadmap by priority and ultimately delivered.
Growing into System-Level Ownership and Cross-Team Alignment
Since PLM and 3D Cloud run on separate services and release cycles, both teams had to co-develop the same functionality. I played a key role in elevating the product by maintaining design–dev consistency.
One of the largest shared components was the Rich Text Editor. I owned the design of 16 individual sub-features. Noticing the long implementation cycle, I initiated regular cross-team reviews (Design System, 3D Cloud, and our Conversations team) to align on parallel development and prevent blockers.
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