Paul Wentzell UX
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About
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Paul Wentzell UX
Home
About
Work

Decisions on the line. Designed for the people making them.

Financial platforms, insurance quoting and underwriting, compliance tools, industrial diagnostics, aviation systems, and HR & compensation platforms. The data has to be readable under pressure, and friction has a cost.

  • Research

  • Systems Thinking

  • Information Architecture

  • Prototyping

  • Decision Surfaces

  • Token Architecture

  • Stakeholder Alignment

  • Facilitation

  • Accessibility

  • Real-Time Workflows

  • Cross-Framework Design

  • User Testing

Trusted By

Wired for complexity

Wired for complexity

12+ years designing enterprise systems where the data is dense, the users are experts, and the interface has to earn trust every time someone opens it. Financial services, compliance, aviation, data-heavy workflows where a bad design decision isn't just frustrating. It has consequences.

12+ years designing enterprise systems where the data is dense, the users are experts, and the interface has to earn trust every time someone opens it. Financial services, compliance, aviation, data-heavy workflows where a bad design decision isn't just frustrating. It has consequences.

LINKEDIN

LINKEDIN

Wired for complexity

12+ years designing enterprise systems where the data is dense, the users are experts, and the interface has to earn trust every time someone opens it. Financial services, compliance, aviation, data-heavy workflows where a bad design decision isn't just frustrating. It has consequences.

LINKEDIN

My Process

My Process

My Process

Most design problems aren't what they look like on the surface. I spend time finding the real problem before I touch a wireframe, then frame it so the team can actually build against it. From there I shape solutions that hold up against infrastructure constraints, edge cases, and stakeholders with strong opinions. I design for the pitch, because the work has to make sense to people who weren't in the room.

Most design problems aren't what they look like on the surface. I spend time finding the real problem before I touch a wireframe, then frame it so the team can actually build against it. From there I shape solutions that hold up against infrastructure constraints, edge cases, and stakeholders with strong opinions. I design for the pitch, because the work has to make sense to people who weren't in the room.

Most design problems aren't what they look like on the surface. I spend time finding the real problem before I touch a wireframe, then frame it so the team can actually build against it. From there I shape solutions that hold up against infrastructure constraints, edge cases, and stakeholders with strong opinions. I design for the pitch, because the work has to make sense to people who weren't in the room.

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Understanding the problem

  • Stakeholder Discovery: Run interviews and working sessions to surface business goals, constraints, and success metrics, translating ambiguous asks into a clearly framed problem space.
  • Mixed-Methods User Research: Plan and run interviews, surveys, behavioral analytics, and usability studies so decisions are grounded in real evidence.
  • AI-Accelerated Synthesis: Use GenAI tools to speed up transcript analysis, theme clustering, and pattern recognition, keeping human judgment on what the findings mean.
  • Competitive and Heuristic Audits: Pull patterns and gaps from competitor products and existing flows to identify where the real opportunity lives.

Recent Work

Recent Work

Recent Work

AI-Assisted Design-to-Code

AI-Assisted Design-to-Code

Two problems I'd spent years watching from the design side. One build to finally solve both.

Two problems I'd spent years watching from the design side. One build to finally solve both.

Two problems I'd spent years watching from the design side. One build to finally solve both.

VIEW CASE STUDY

VIEW CASE STUDY

Real-Time Monitoring

Real-Time Monitoring

Real-Time Monitoring

Hardware-aware diagnostics for industrial flame sensor field technicians.

Hardware-aware diagnostics for industrial flame sensor field technicians.

Hardware-aware diagnostics for industrial flame sensor field technicians.

VIEW CASE STUDY

VIEW CASE STUDY

One Workspace for Every Team

One Workspace for Every Team

One Workspace for Every Team

Dashboard built around how underwriters actually think through risk.

Dashboard built around how underwriters actually think through risk.

Dashboard built around how underwriters actually think through risk.

VIEW CASE STUDY

VIEW CASE STUDY

Toolbox

Toolbox

Toolbox

From the first whiteboard to the live prototype, these are the tools that move work forward and maintain momentum through every handoff. They support how I research, design, prototype, test, and collaborate with engineers and stakeholders.

From the first whiteboard to the live prototype, these are the tools that move work forward and maintain momentum through every handoff. They support how I research, design, prototype, test, and collaborate with engineers and stakeholders.

From the first whiteboard to the live prototype, these are the tools that move work forward and maintain momentum through every handoff. They support how I research, design, prototype, test, and collaborate with engineers and stakeholders.

Figma

Adobe Creative Suite

Miro

UserTesting.com

Jira

Confluence

Axure RP

Claude Code

BotPress

ChatGPT

CoPilot

Google Analytics

Notion

Framer

Skills

Skills

Skills

Good enterprise design requires a wide toolkit. The ability to diagnose a problem, frame a solution, design the system, and get the right people aligned around it. These are the areas where I consistently deliver.

Good enterprise design requires a wide toolkit. The ability to diagnose a problem, frame a solution, design the system, and get the right people aligned around it. These are the areas where I consistently deliver.

Good enterprise design requires a wide toolkit. The ability to diagnose a problem, frame a solution, design the system, and get the right people aligned around it. These are the areas where I consistently deliver.

Collaboration

Collaboration

Most of my work runs across product managers, project managers, engineering, marketing, and the business stakeholders who own the domain, so keeping that whole group pointed at the same problem is a big part of the job. Co-design workshops and working sessions in Miro and FigJam are where alignment happens, backed by story mapping and prioritization sessions to agree on scope and what matters most. Design critiques and regular show-and-tells keep everyone moving together, and shared Figma and FigJam files carry the collaboration async between meetings. With engineers I stay close on what is actually buildable, and storytelling keeps every group anchored to the reasoning behind a decision.

Data-Driven UX Design

Data-Driven UX Design

Analytics drive the design decisions, mostly Google Analytics for funnels, task completion, and conversion, so I can see what's working and where the next gain is. Working with engineering, I define the events worth tracking, so the product captures what users actually do and design questions get answered with real numbers. Sales, support, and the channels where users leave feedback and reviews all carry the voice of the user, a direct line to what people are asking for and what they value most. Reading all of it together is how I point information architecture, flows, and calls to action in the right direction.

Designing for AI Products

Designing for AI Products

This is where I've gone deepest lately, working hands-on with the patterns AI interfaces actually need: human-in-the-loop flows, confidence-aware language so people know how far to trust an output, guardrails, and the microcopy that carries an LLM interaction. AI tooling also runs through my own process, not only the products I design. The work is backed by an MIT certification in designing and building AI products.

Design Tools

Design Tools

Designing and prototyping in Figma, Adobe Creative Suite, and Axure RP, plus Miro and FigJam on the collaboration side. Files stay organized with Auto Layout, components, variants, and consistent naming, so the work is easy for the team to pick up and build on.

Mentorship

Mentorship

Mentoring junior designers with clear goals, regular feedback, and an open back-and-forth where they can bring me anything and get a straight answer. Sharing what I know and staying available when they need it.

Project Management

Project Management

In Jira I write user stories and contribute to the backlog, so the work is clear and ready for the team to pick up. Documentation goes in Confluence. Figma I keep organized, with team libraries, version history, and a clean file structure the whole team can work from.

Prototyping

Prototyping

Interactive prototypes, built fast, so feedback comes in on something people can actually click through. Prototyping early shows how a flow really behaves once it is in motion, the timing, the transitions, the moments that come alive when you move through them. The same prototypes earn their keep in stakeholder reviews, where a working demo leads to clear decisions.

Responsive Design

Responsive Design

Mobile-first design, with layouts that hold their shape from a phone in someone's hand to a 4K monitor. The consistency comes from reusable tokens I build for the layout, spacing, sizing, grid, and breakpoints, so one set of values carries the design across that whole span. The same system keeps touch targets comfortable and content readable as the screen scales.

User Research

User Research

Mixed methods, chosen to fit the question. For discovery I run user and stakeholder interviews, surveys, contextual inquiry, and Voice of the Customer analysis to learn how people actually work. Through competitive analysis and heuristic evaluation I map what existing products do well and where the opportunities are. For evaluation I use moderated and unmoderated usability testing, plus card sorting and tree testing for information architecture. I bring the findings together through affinity mapping and thematic analysis into personas, journey maps, and the patterns that point design in the right direction.

Web Development

Web Development

12+ years writing HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and building alongside engineering teams in .NET, .NET MAUI, React, and Blazor. Designing with the build in mind keeps the handoff smooth.