Core Feature: Grouper Directory
The Grouper Directory was released in December 2024, following two major scope reductions.
TL;DR
Grouper, formerly Element3 Health, is a mission-driven startup focused on improving the well-being of senior citizens by fostering social connection through group-based activities. Offered as a benefit through healthcare providers like UnitedHealthcare, Grouper gives eligible members access to in-person groups, virtual classes, and online communities to help reduce isolation and encourage physical activity.
As the sole product designer for Grouper’s Member Directory, I was responsible for the end-to-end design of a feature that would help senior citizens discover and connect with groups aligned with their interests. This included user flows, wireframes, high-fidelity designs, and design system updates in Figma, along with engineering handoff, Jira documentation, and QA testing. Despite the absence of a formal research budget, I volunteered with a local senior walking program to inform my design decisions and better empathize with our audience.
The project underwent multiple pivots and scope reductions due to shifting business priorities and tight deadlines. Originally intended as a robust group discovery tool, the directory was significantly scoped down to meet end-of-year launch goals. I led several redesigns—including the last-minute “December .5” released version—each time simplifying the feature set while ensuring usability and alignment with Grouper’s core mission.
Eventually, we began expanding the MVP again, incorporating two new initiatives: Group Events and Virtual Communities. This led to a more scalable vision where members could discover activities across in-person, virtual, and hybrid channels.
Though Grouper made significant personnel cuts across the board which affected me before this next iteration launched, the experience deepened my understanding of what it takes to ship a core product from scratch within a startup—navigating through very ambiguous requirements, aligning daily with cross-functional teams, and advocating for user needs every step of the way.
Who is Grouper?
Grouper, formerly known as Element3 Health, is an early-stage tech startup focused on enriching the lives of senior citizens. Through partnerships with major healthcare providers like UnitedHealthcare, Grouper is offered as a core benefit to insurance members. Eligible members receive free access to a wide range of group activities — from in-person events and instructor-led virtual classes to an active online community of fellow Grouper members. Grouper has proven effective in helping seniors combat loneliness and isolation by promoting social connection and physical engagement.
Directory Overview
Grouper’s mission is to “encourage healthy living through meaningful social connection and shared experiences.” To support this, members are given access to a vast database of groups they can browse and join based on their interests. Once they find a group that resonates, they’re able to connect in person through shared social activities. Grouper aims to spark initial introductions and provide a platform for those relationships to grow through mutual experiences.
Users and audience
Grouper's members join through two distinct channels. Healthcare providers, like UnitedHealthcare, directly refer one group, while the other comes through partnerships with national organizations such as the U.S. Bowling Congress or the National Pickleball League. In the latter case, these organizations would promote Grouper to their members. These users would then complete an online eligibility check with us to verify age and healthcare provider. Once deemed eligible, they would proceed with onboarding and gain access to our directory. The primary target audience for the Directory consisted of members who did not belong to any national organization or group, as those joining through such organizations were already part of established communities.
Directory Goals
Short term
Increase group offerings in the database to enhance member choice and engagement
Connect members to interest-based groups for deeper, more relevant connections
Surface national associations prominently within the Directory
Long-term
Partner with national associations to co-host events aimed at increasing both overall membership and individual group participation
Develop endpoints that surface valuable information to members, enabling them to make informed decisions about which groups are the best fit for their interests and needs
Implement a simple and efficient communication method to connect members directly with their chosen groups
Scope and constraints
Grouper is an early-stage tech startup still finding its footing, so the scope of the Directory evolved and pivoted frequently which is something you'll notice throughout this case study.
Time and budget were two of the primary constraints. Other challenges included:
Certain deliverables were committed without sufficient planning or understanding, triggering a chain reaction of changes that significantly impacted the Directory's release timeline
Since the product was being built from the ground up, every pivot or change had a significant impact on engineering efforts, which in turn delayed progress on design work
The budget didn’t account for essential needs like usability testing, which required some creative problem-solving to work around
Roles and responsibilities
As the product designer for the Member Directory experience, I was responsible for end-to-end design - from creating user flows, wireframes, and high-fidelity designs in Figma to building interactive prototypes. I regularly presented my work to key stakeholders throughout the project. I also handled engineering handoff by preparing detailed documentation, writing Jira tickets, and conducting QA testing prior to release.
My Process
Problem Definition
I was part of Team Groups, responsible for developing the Directory experience. The team consisted of a product owner, five engineers, and me as the product designer. Given that this was a core new feature for a startup on a new platform, we had limited data to inform our decisions. To navigate this, I created problem statements based on the product requirements document to guide our design and development process. Then, I made How Might We’s based on the problem statements.
User Flows
After drafting problem statements and How Might We questions, I started working on the flows for the Directory MVP. The flow begins at the Dashboard, where members land after completing enrollment and onboarding - a different team managed this part of the experience. However, once members entered the directory, my team was responsible for everything related to that flow.
Flowchart stemming from the Dashboard. Also noted are sections for the new pages.
Design Explorations
The flows indicated a need for a few different pages, so I worked on low and high-fidelity versions of:
Directory Landing Page
Search Results Page
Group Detail Pages
Profile Page
Along with
Error states
Filters
Grouper UI Kit
Next, I designed mid-fidelity versions of the required pages. My project manager and I worked closely together to quickly finalize these designs so I could move into high fidelity.
For the high fidelity work, I utilized the styling kit we received from an external agency that created Grouper’s distinctive brand before I joined the company. It included key elements such as a small color palette and a few typestyles.
However, the kit lacked certain styles, so I took the initiative to expand it. I developed additional styles to strengthen the hierarchical scale and included mobile-specific styles.
I also broadened the color palette by introducing neutrals, system colors, and various tints and shades to complement the existing brand colors, giving us more flexibility as designers.
MVP | Mid and High-fidelity designs
After members sign up and enroll with Grouper, they are directed to the Dashboard, where all their onboarding information is displayed. The team responsible for the dashboard ensured members could easily navigate to the directory, as outlined in the earlier flowchart.
To focus on the directory experience, data unrelated to this case study has been grayed out.
“Explore Activities” CTA takes the member to the directory.
The MVP Directory Landing Page features a column for filters alongside a list of groups. The activity-type filters were selected based on early third-party research, which revealed that these activities are among the most popular choices for senior citizens.
The filters were organized into distinct sections to ensure that users could still easily navigate and understand how to use them when additional filters were added. This was one of the ways I designed for scalability.
Given the massive time constraints on the Directory project, I typically design with scalability and the big picture in mind. However, for this project, a majority of those considerations were documented and set aside until after the MVP, when I could revisit and refine those ideas.
The search result cards display activity type, group information, logo, and a link, providing an affordance to get to the detail page.
I saw value in a future state where we would surface the number of Grouper members already in each group on the card. This would help members gauge a group’s popularity within the community, making them feel more confident about joining.
After clicking a group card, the member is directed to the Group’s Detail Page, where they can view specific information about the group, including the group leader's contact details. If the member wishes to add the group to their list of interests, they click 'Add This Group.' A modal then appears, informing the member that the group will be saved under their Profile settings, along with suggestions for next steps.
Due to the detail pages being pretty basic, I initiated discussions about a future state where we gave group leaders some control over their group’s detail page. Post MVP we would continue discussions on allowing photos or personalized messages from the group leaders to make members feel more welcome before stepping into something new. This would help prime their in-person experience by creating a warm, inviting atmosphere.
The Profile Page was the central hub for members to manage their added groups, essentially serving as a bookmark for easy access. Alongside the group contact information, we displayed next-step suggestions, which varied based on the available details for each group. The one consistent step was the requirement to meet up in person, reinforcing the importance of face-to-face interaction.
Throughout the design process, I received regular feedback from my team and held feasibility and endpoint discussions with the engineers. I ensured alignment with stakeholders by presenting the work, and later prepared the handoff documentation for engineering. We broke the scope into manageable sprints, and my PM and I collaborated on writing Jira tickets. Although we had plans to conduct usability testing soon, the project faced ongoing constraints due to limited time and budget, which prevented us from conducting testing before release.
A Note on “Usability Testing”
Although I didn’t formally conduct user testing, I volunteered my time with Walk With a Doc (WWAD), a walking program for senior citizens, which in my South Texas location is organized by a university hospital. The event begins with a health and wellness presentation by participating doctors, followed by a walk where attendees can socialize and ask the doctors questions. Since Grouper’s Member Engagement Team also participated in their own local WWAD events, I saw this as an opportunity to connect directly with potential members and gain valuable insights. My goal was to understand how they discovered this type of event, what other groups and activities they were involved in, and the kind of support they needed within those groups. One of my biggest surprises was how tech-savvy many of the participants were. They tracked their steps to close their rings and used apps that uploaded personal stats to their doctor’s office. The experience from the walks I participated in helped me better empathize with our users and provided us with valuable insights that will inform our future design decisions.
I gained some valuable high level insights into our demographic by volunteering at Walk With a Doc!
December 1.0
Before the pixel residue could settle after writing our last ticket in Jira, my team and I were informed of a significant business decision: the directory work needed to be released by the end of the year. We had only a few months to streamline the experience. In response, my team and I jokingly dubbed the project “December 1.0” to highlight the near-impossible task ahead. I immediately collaborated with the team to reduce the scope of the directory, optimizing it for faster implementation while ensuring it remained usable, provided user value, and met business requirements.
For the new Directory Landing Page rendition, I recommended removing the search query functionality and limiting members to search only by zip code. Although this seemed like a drastic change, it was necessary for speed and would be reintroduced as a fast follow. On the card side, we removed the top 'sort by' filter, and the cards' design remained unchanged.
Adding images was a significant lift, so the lead group image was removed from the Details Page. Additionally, the Grouper information at the bottom of the page was removed due to rapidly changing business decisions. It was in the best interest of everyone involved to temporarily remove this section until we had clear and stable information to present to members.
The most significant update came when we postponed the Profile Page, which meant one less page to build out. As a result, the 'My Group' information was moved from the Profile Page on to the Dashboard. I collaborated with the dashboard team to implement these changes, while the remaining sections of the Profile Page were planned for future iterations of the Directory experience.
December 1.0 Thoughts
December 1.0 was challenging to design for due to the rapid pace of change. It became a 'design and build first, ask questions later' situation, where scalability and big-picture thinking were often sidelined as significant pivots with unclear reasoning occurred daily. Despite the frustrations, the experience brought my team closer together. It was a shared challenge that taught me the importance of listening and empathizing with everyone involved. We developed a deep respect for each other’s expertise, and together, we understood the work needed to deliver a solid product.
December .5
After completing the sprint planning for December 1.0 and assigning the work, we were notified of another production delay. Engineers on my team were reassigned to handle other emergencies, and I had to support my design teammate with various deliverables. With only four weeks left to launch the end-of-year directory, just as the holidays approached, December 1.0 quickly turned into December .5, requiring another streamlining round.
The new Directory Landing Page of December .5 was further simplified to a single filter—the zip code filter. The search query and activity type pills were planned as fast follows. The search result cards were edited down to display only the essential information—the group name, summary, and a link to the detail page. All images were removed and planned for a separate epic for a future iteration.
The Group Detail Page remained relatively unchanged from the previous version. The logos, which had become part of the image epic, were also removed.
Finally, the 'My Groups' section on the Dashboard was updated to include cards that called out the added groups. We decided to match the design of the search result cards for ease of implementation. Features for managing added groups, such as joining or removing, were planned as a fast follow-up.
The Directory was finally released as “December .5” in December 2024:
Return of the MVP
Logically, I wanted to return to the original MVP vision after the December .5 release. While I was discussing revisiting the MVP with my PM, the business launched a new Group Events initiative.
Most of the groups in the database had in-person meetups, but many also hosted occasional events that we wanted to surface in the directory. Grouper collaborated with specific groups and strategically leveraged certain events to boost memberships—we would bring in current Grouper members who were interested in the event and could see if regular group attendees qualified for Grouper. When our members attended these events, they could count on other Grouper members being there, making connecting and growing their social circle easier.
Strategically, it made sense to incorporate this initiative into the updated designs moving forward.
In addition to the Events Initiative, we also aimed to expand our focus on virtual Communities. These Communities brought together members with shared interests - like walking, gardening, or pickleball - and served as a virtual extension of Grouper, allowing members to connect and share experiences from the comfort of home. This was especially valuable for members with limited mobility or those living in rural areas. Our goal was to integrate events—and by extension, groups—into local Communities to encourage in-person meetups and build long-lasting social connections. We partnered with an external agency and launched 14 Communities using a separate social platform engineered by that agency, with the hopes of combining Grouper and Communities into one seamless experience.
Since Events and Communities were interconnected and reliant on Groups, weaving the three into a cohesive, unified experience made logical sense. This integration would streamline navigation, reinforce the connection between virtual and in-person engagement, and support members in discovering meaningful social opportunities across different touchpoints.
With all of this in mind, we hypothesized that for this new MVP :
We needed a more robust filtering system that could accommodate the growing complexity of Events, Communities, and Groups while remaining intuitive and accessible for our members.
We needed a well-structured taxonomy to help members easily find the exact type of group they were looking for
Some members faced mobility limitations but still strongly desired to remain active and socially engaged, so we wanted to expand the filter criteria.
While creating wireframes, I focused on designing an experience that aligned with our hypotheses while remaining mindful of feasibility and engineering efficiency. My project manager and I began early discussions around taxonomy and explored various approaches to organizing group data.
In these low-fidelity designs, the Directory Landing Page expands into three tabs - Groups, Communities, and Events - to accommodate the new initiatives. Outside the filter box, the search query and zip code filter are prominently placed to support quick and easy searching. Upon expansion, additional filters appear. These include activity types with visual priority for popular options, activity attributes such as seated or limited mobility-friendly options, activity settings like time of day or in-person/virtual, and organization-level tiers tied to Grouper’s partnerships.
While this may not reflect the final filter interaction, my goal was to demonstrate the filters I believed would be most effective, while also visualizing how they could fit within a defined layout and scale within the interface.
What’s next?
I was among the 50% of the company laid off during the low-fidelity stage of the second MVP design process. While I am unsure what will happen to the directory, I know I came away with a much greater understanding of the holistic facets required to release a product and how a convoluted and ever-changing challenge can be overcome with strong communication with a team willing to learn and grow together.