N-able UX: Who we are
The N-able UX team: how we fit into the MSP world and at N-able.
N-able, who?
N-able is a global leader in comprehensive, scalable IT service management solutions for MSPs and IT service providers.
Approximately 25,000 IT services providers around the world trust N‑able solutions to run their business and secure and manage their small and mid-size enterprise customers. Built on a scalable platform, N‑able offers secure infrastructure and tools to simplify complex ecosystems, as well as resources to navigate evolving IT needs.
Wait, what does N-able do? We make products for Managed Service Providers (MSPs).
But what is an MSP? If you have never worked with, or for, an MSP you might be asking yourself, “what or who is that?”. To put it simply, the term MSP applies to outsourced IT services. If a company cannot manage its IT internally, it would hire an MSP to do it for them.
Managing an IT service is such a broad term, but it includes managing IT infrastructure (including physical devices, networks, and in the cloud), security, user accounts, passwords, and data, to name a few.
What about the UX team, how do we fit into the MSP world and at N-able?
N-able UX
We are a team of designers, researchers, and UX leaders on a mission to improve the usability, usefulness, and desirability of our products by applying user-centered design practices across all product development phases.
That is certainly a mouthful, but what we are trying to say is that we are focused on our users, we always stand up for their needs, and we ensure that usability and usefulness are at the forefront of everything we do, every step of the way.
We work collaboratively with cross-functional teams, including product managers, engineering, product marketing, executives, engineering architects, and many other company stakeholders.
Our research, design, and leadership roles are distinct as we feel it is important to have expertise in each of these fields so that each role can focus on what they do best.
Our researchers are responsible for understanding our users, and understanding the value for the user in the work we are doing. They are fundamental in uncovering product needs and eliminating assumptions through qualitative and quantitative methods. They are the voice of the user and are key in relaying that voice to the rest of the business. If we do not understand the “who” and the “why”, we will not build the right things.
Our designers are responsible for taking that voice and turning it into a tangible workflow, a feature, or a product. They are fundamental in fulfilling the user’s needs, providing meaningful experiences, improving the user’s efficiency to accomplish tasks, and, dare we say, delighting them. They provide the “what” that derives from the “who” and the “why”.
Our UX leaders are responsible for ensuring that all of these processes and methods flow properly through the product lifecycle. They are fundamental in developing our UX practices and working with the business to understand the importance of the user’s voice, and most importantly ensuring that our designers and researchers feel supported. They are the engine that keeps the “who”, the “why”, and the “what” going.
Now let’s dive a little deeper into how we break out our roles, to further understand who we are.
The N-able Product Group
The N-able UX team is part of a large ecosystem of engineers, product managers, and engineering architects that form The Product Group (TPG). Together, we focus on the products themselves, and how to make them great.
The TPG is broken out into smaller sub-groups, and each designer, researcher, and UX leader is assigned to one or more of these different sub-groups. This is where our day-to-day work is mostly spent; where we develop expertise within our dedicated areas. For example, we have a group that is dedicated to our remote monitoring and management products, and another that is dedicated to security, which touches a number of our products. By structuring our team like this, we are able to have a pool of designers, researchers, and UX leaders that can help deliver a strong user experience, together.
UX is more than just our products
Apex Design System
Another important group is the Design System Team, which consists of UX designers, researchers, and leaders, as well as engineering leaders and developers. Over the past year, we have dedicated a lot of time and effort into creating our own design system to meet our user and product needs. We use this design system to help us design easy-to-use, cohesive, and beautiful experiences across all our products, with common patterns and workflows at the forefront.
Vision
It is important to point out that we not only focus on the “now”, but also on the future of our products as well. We have a small but mighty team dedicated to putting workflows, customer journeys, mockups, and research together for the future vision of our products. Having this team helps us illustrate the TPG’s ideas, and engage our partners with a future vision that is worthy of excitement.
Initiatives
The Product Group, the Design System, and the vision are all important pieces to the way our team works together, but we also ensure that we spend time improving ourselves, our team, and our UX processes.
For this, we have created yearly UX initiatives where we define key topics that tie back into the overall business goals for N-able, but in a way that UX can move forward and improve. Each UX team member helps drive these initiatives. For example, some of the things we have focused on this year include building stronger partnerships, expanding the way we use data to inform decisions, and brand experience.
Every single person on our UX team is appreciated, needed, and instrumental in making our team the best it can possibly be and our users will always be our primary focus. To say that we are dedicated to UX is an understatement. We are a team that works together, listens to its users, and tries to tackle the root of the problem.
Stay tuned for the next article where we’ll explain more about how we work.
Credits
Sandra Dennis
Senior UX Designer
