Gradually

Plug-in Design · 6 Weeks · Estimated 7 min read

Duration

6 Weeks

Role

Product Strategist, User Researcher

Team

Ningyu Fan, Michael Agyeman-Prempeh

Softwares

Figma, Respondent

01 — Product Highlight

A wellness plug-in for the messy in-between.

Gradually is a browser-based wellness tool designed to support students and recent graduates navigating the uncertainty and emotional weight of entering the workforce. It combines affirmation-based nudges, personalized goal recommendations, and visual progress tracking to help users build confidence, regulate stress, and celebrate small wins along the way.

Welcome to the journey of growth with Gradually, where every small win is a habitual transformation for long-term wins!

02 — Problem Discovery

Preventive healthcare that is invisible, proactive, and emotional.

By analysing 3 macro trends from Frog Design's 2025 Futurescape Report — Unleashing Zero UI, Policy of Prevention, and The Mind-Body Program — my team focused our mutual domain of interests on Speculative Health. We discovered a transformative opportunity to revolutionize preventive healthcare by making it:

Invisible — having a silent helper
Proactive — shifting from treating illness to preventing it
Emotional — improving emotional well-being with focus on physical and mental health

We then brainstormed the groups of users that might benefit the most from a smart health solution — and identified an interesting transitioning phase where many young adults finishing academia and entering the workforce experience stress, burnout, and a lack of emotional support. Despite numerous productivity and job-search platforms, few tools acknowledge the emotional weight of this phase. Our team asked:

"How might we envision and design integrative health solutions that support young adults as they enter the early workforce, promoting long-term resilience?"

03 — Solution Scoping

Diverge, converge, and dot-vote toward "long-term resilience."

We went into a diverge + converge phase to define "promoting long-term resilience" in our initial HMW by really thinking through the need, stakeholder, and outcome. We first collected secondary resources and interviewed 6 peers for early-stage insights:

Young adults are open to intuitive and personalized preventative support but underserved.
There is prevalence in stress-induced health risks such as hypertension and diabetes in young adults.
Graduates feel isolated and unprepared without structured regimes they had in college.

I don't feel 'bad enough' for traditional therapy, but existing mental health apps feel generic. I need preventive tools integrated seamlessly into daily life — something personal, flexible, and engaging.

1How might we aid young adults transitioning from academia to workforce identify the right (tech) tools that give them the right information for success in the job market?

2How might we help young adults transitioning from academia to workforce better manage stress when facing career challenges while promoting overall wellness? ✓

3How might we provide young adults transitioning from academia to workforce with an integrated physical health program for better mental health management?

4How might we encourage young adults transitioning from academia to workforce to still have sight of their goals through consistent short-term planning to increase their efficiency?

Focusing on small wins.

Due to the limited timeline of the project, we chose to focus on small wins based on:

Urgency: political craziness — many roles will become tough, layoffs loom, and a large quantity of new grads is going off into the market.
Something that is unique, emotionally resonant, interesting.
The competitive landscape.

04 — Prototyping

A Chrome plugin that rewards, without distracting.

We agreed on a visual dashboard users engage with while job-surfing — but we didn't want it to be distracting. So we planned a Chrome plugin that rewards users with positive affirmations and small win badges. I created the workflow and UX content based on our revised HMW, and dived into what the small wins are and what our users — young adults overwhelmed by early career transition — need reminding of most to prevent them from crashing. For nudge names and tone, I took inspiration from apps that have done amazing things in encouraging habit-building, such as Duolingo and Headspace.

UX Elements and Workflow

UX visual designed by Ningyu Fan

We developed 2 hypotheses to test the mockup's affirmation prompts through moderated remote interviews with 2 health experts and 2 graduate students, plus unmoderated testing. H1: affirmations like virtual badges and small-win reminders benefit career transitions not just career-wise but health-wise. H2: if users can track and visualize small personal wins, they'll feel more motivated and less overwhelmed during their transition.

Unmoderated Testing

Survey designed by Michael Agyeman-Prempeh

We sent out a survey with semi-qualitative questions to understand how users interact with our mockup and what parts of the dashboard feel desirable.

71%

very likely to use a plugin like this during stressful periods

60%

found custom goal setting most useful and motivating

90%

liked the affirmative tone and health-conscious nudges

Next Iteration

Through a UX mockup, we validated that users found the gentle tone + visual metaphors (gardens, mood colors) highly effective — and many wanted the tool to "understand" their behaviours and proactively suggest next steps and goals that would best suit them.

05 — Value-Aligned Archetype System

Challenge + work style → sustainable goals.

Small wins are different for everyone, even at similar stages in life — so it's important to give users autonomy to customize their experience. This led to the Value-Aligned Archetype System, an onboarding process that helps a lightweight ML component make the plugin more responsive to a user's habits over time:

Users select how they feel (burnout, directionless, etc.)
They identify work values (e.g., stability, creativity)
A persona is generated (e.g., The Gentle Restarter) with mood-based badges and recommended micro-goals.

06 — Growth

Meeting users not just with features, but with care.

This project reinforced the importance of emotional UX design. Individually, I grew in:

Designing for tone adaptation.
Mapping user data into behavioral archetypes.
Diverging and converging throughout the design process to build for edge cases while keeping the experience soft and accessible — rather than overdesigning an all-in-one "wedding cake," I focused on shaping a delightful, testable "cupcake."

Next, I hope to refine this into a working MVP, integrating ML and testing how different user archetypes affect engagement, retention, and perceived emotional support.

Thanks for reading :)