Hello, my name is Sonali Zaveri.I am an accessibility certified product designer and front-end developer.
I currently lead design at ideas42 ventures where we are helping entrepreneurs build social impact businesses that alleviate the poverty tax. Learn more about our work by visiting our website.
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Design
User Focused Design
I have a passion for building products that provide real value for users and create positive change in the world. I believe strongly that business value can only be created if user value is created. Whether along side a research team or on my own, learning from directly users is a key part of my design process.
Design Leadership
As a design leader, I believe in the value of process, clarity and alignment in building the best creative space for my team. I strive to be the coach and advocate my direct reports need.
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Engineering
Software Development
Throughout my career I’ve held hybrid designer / developer roles, allowing me to embed within engineering teams and tackle problems alongside them, whether it be writing code myself or building systems to enable all engineers to work better.
Design Systems & Accessibility
As a design system owner, I pair closely with engineering teams to build design best practices into our systems and improve our team’s front end development capability. As a Certified Professional in Web Accessibility, I understand the value of design systems built with accessibility in mind, allowing us to build better products faster.
Don't just take my word for it
“I had the pleasure of directly managing Sonali in my role as VP of UX at OpenGov. Sonali brings a unique skill set to her role—she's a phenomenal designer, a sharp front-end developer, and a dedicated servant leader to her team. While at OpenGov, she single-handedly ran the design system, scaled adoption, led the company's extensive accessibility program, and led product design for several key initiatives. Her work ethic and passion for excellence are inspiring. Sonali is an asset to any organization. Most importantly, she was a delight to work with and I hope to work with her again soon.”
- Richard Baker, Former VP of UX at OpenGov
Highlights from my work
Browse through some quick spotlights on projects I’ve done.
Building New Products & Ventures
At ideas42 Ventures, we believe in bringing entrepreneurs with lived experience in a problem area and building a businesses alongside them. I have been through several iterations of developing new businesses from an initial problem statement to the launch of a first product offering. In addition to designing the product, I’ve led research, product strategy, and roadmap development for each new venture.
Designing with Behavioral Science
While design has the power to change the world, psychology has the power to change people. At Opower (acquired by Oracle Utilities), I harnessed the power of behavioral science to reduce energy usage by utility customers. Now at ideas42 Ventures, I work alongside behavioral scientists to build the core principles of behavioral psychology into every product we build.
Innovating at Enterprise Scale
At Oracle Utilities, it was clear that our on-premise products used by service center representatives were difficult to use. I led an effort to create a new, customer-focused, modern SaaS vision for our flagship product that I presented to customers at our annual conference. Our vision combined insights gained from first-hand experience watching customer service representatives on the job and the power of some of Oracle’s existing cloud solutions.
Implementing & Scaling a Design System
The OpenGov design system was under utilized which left it unable to scale with the fast growing start-up. I joined and quickly began design and development of key missing components, implemented new cross team processes, and developed a roadmap to align the system with business goals. My efforts increased adoption and development velocity.
Launching an Accessibility Program
With the goal of turning a weakness into a competitive advantage, I advocated for and received the resources to launch a full scale accessibility program at the company. For the program, I developed and ran training for all engineers and hired dedicated accessibility testing support. This critical in moving us towards our goal of ADA compliance across all products, a necessity for selling to government entities.
Developing Company-Wide People Operations
As the Operations Lead for ideas42 Ventures, I recognized the value in building formalized performance management for our small team. Our team wanted feedback and transparency be a core component of our Studio. I implemented engagement surveys, a feedback cycle program and other critical missing pieces to ensure our team could thrive.
Project Deep Dives
Get a detailed look at some of my work.