General Star Insurance · Underwriting
25% faster underwriting decisions, five tools down to one.
I designed a role-based workspace from the decision outward, so underwriters stopped assembling risk across five screens.
Read Time: Snapshot 1 min · Full case study 7 min
Insurance
Underwriting
Dashboard Design
Responsive
Data Visualization
Client / General Star Insurance
Industry / Insurance
Team / UX, Product, Engineering
Platform / Desktop
Role / Lead UX Designer
Tools / Figma, Miro
Timeline / 6 months
Framework / React and Angular on .NET and Azure
SNAPSHOT
What I was asked to do, and what I did instead.
The ask. Redesign the underwriting workspace in GENESIS G2, General Star's underwriting platform, with one sprint for discovery and no rebuilds of the React and Angular modules already in production.
What I found. Underwriters were making risk decisions from end-of-day summaries and static exports, assembling one picture across five separate tools. The tools were built for data entry, and underwriters were using them to make decisions.
What I did. I ran stakeholder interviews across four underwriting roles in one sprint and built a current-state journey map that moved the product owner away from skipping straight to wireframes. Then I designed one role-based workspace from the decision outward: an underwriter activity dashboard, an AG Grid triage view, live weather and market data, and role-based access.
The result. Five tools became one. Underwriters made decisions 25% faster with zero custom workarounds, and React, Angular, AG Grid, and Power BI now run on one tokenized component system.
THE PROBLEM
Underwriters were deciding risk from yesterday's data.
General Star is a specialty insurance company. Its underwriters review submissions and decide whether to write a policy, and on what terms. The data they needed for each decision lived in five separate tools, with no shared view of a submission. Most decisions were made from end-of-day summaries and static exports.
The real cost was decision latency. In underwriting, slower decisions mean fewer policies moved and worse loss ratios. That was the framing that went to the product owner before any design began.
The constraints were tight. There was one sprint for discovery, React and Angular modules were already in production, and nothing could be rebuilt. The design had to fit the technical reality already in place.
WHAT I DID
I designed the workspace from the decision outward.
I was the Lead UX Designer on GENESIS G2, working with product and engineering on the underwriting workspace.
WHAT I OWNED
I owned discovery, the current-state journey map, information architecture, role-based access, and the design of the full underwriting workspace, from the activity dashboard to the triage view.
HOW I WORKED
I ran stakeholder interviews across four underwriting roles in a single sprint and worked within the React and Angular modules already in production. I iterated on density and layout with underwriters through three rounds on the triage view, calibrating against real submission volumes.
THE JUDGMENT CALL
When the product owner pushed to skip straight to wireframes, I ran a fifteen-minute working session with the current-state journey map instead. It showed where each decision broke down across the five tools, and it moved the conversation from screens to the decision the workspace had to support.
RESEARCH & DISCOVERY
The tools were built for data entry. Underwriters were using them to decide.
Each role hit the same wall from a different angle. Dana, the underwriting lead, had no real-time data at decision time. Marcus, a senior underwriter, navigated five tools to build one picture of a submission. Ellen, the underwriting manager, spent more time finding information than evaluating it. Every interview pointed to the same insight: the workspace had to be built from the decision outward.
DESIGN DECISIONS
The underwriting decision, mapped across five tools.
I mapped one submission from intake to decision. Underwriters opened it in the intake tool, re-keyed risk and loss data into a personal workbook, checked weather and market risk on outside websites, rated in a separate tool, switched systems to verify claims, and rebuilt the full picture from open tabs. Each step became a design opportunity, and together they defined the workspace: start in one place, no re-keying, context built in, rating from live data, connected claims, and one view.
Current-state journey. The underwriting decision across five tools. This is what the workspace replaced.
A dashboard built for reading data under pressure.
I tested two treatments of the Underwriter Activity dashboard. Treatment B scored higher on visual interest in early reviews, and it won because underwriters need to read data fast under time pressure. Its quieter filter bar keeps the data grid in focus. Branch, team, and hierarchy filters give managers oversight in one place.
Underwriter Activity dashboard. Treatment B's quieter filter bar keeps the data grid in focus.
A triage queue that shows state at a glance.
I designed the triage view on AG Grid, with status badges color-coded to underwriting state and the named insured visible on every row. Three rounds of iteration calibrated density against real submission volumes, so underwriters can scan the queue and act without opening each submission.
AG Grid triage view. Status badges color-coded to underwriting state. Named insured visible at every row. Three rounds of iteration calibrated density against real submission volumes.
Risk context, built into the workspace.
Underwriters were leaving mid-decision to check weather and market exposure on outside sites. I designed a widget that brings live NOAA data into the workspace, rendering seventeen weather states and nine market variants on one surface. No iframes and no link-outs, so the context sits next to the decision.
Weather and market data built native into the workspace. Underwriters stopped leaving mid-decision to check exposure risk. The widget renders seventeen weather states and nine market variants behind one surface, the landscape shifting with conditions. Live via NOAA. No iframes, no link-outs.
Each role sees what its job requires.
I mapped access explicitly across every role and surface: full, edit, view, or no access. The underwriting lead gets full control of submissions, rating, and triage. The claims reviewer gets full access to claims and view-only elsewhere. The whole system was built responsive, from laptops to the large 4K monitors underwriters actually work on.
| ROLE | Submissions | Rating Engine | AG Grid Triage | Claims & Loss | Reporting & Power BI | Portfolio Activity | Admin & Config |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Underwriting Lead Dana K. | Full | Full | Full | View | View | View | |
Senior Underwriter Marcus R. | Edit | Full | Full | View | View | ||
Claims Reviewer Priya S. | View | View | Full | View | |||
Underwriting Manager Ellen H. | View | View | View | View | Full | Full | Edit |
The final workspace: one place for every submission, every role, every decision.
The final GENESIS G2 workspace puts shortcuts, recent work, live weather, and market data on one dashboard. Claimant and renewal forms live in the same system and share one tokenized component library, so underwriters move from triage to decision without leaving the workspace.
Dashboard: G2 dashboard. Shortcuts, recent reports, live weather, and market data on one surface.
Claimant form: Claimant form. Policy, client, and submission details in one view, built on the shared component library.
Renewal form: Renewal submission. Broker, insured, and coverage details in one form, with section navigation on the right.
OUTCOMES
Five tools became one, and underwriters decide faster.
25% Faster Decisions
Underwriters went from assembling a picture across five screens to reading and acting on risk in one place.
0 Custom Workarounds
Five disconnected tools replaced by one role-based workspace. Nothing left to work around.
5 Tools Became 1
One workspace. Every submission, every role, every decision surface in one place.
4 Frameworks Unified
React, Angular, AG Grid, and Power BI on one tokenized component system.
WHAT I'D DO DIFFERENTLY
I'd bring underwriting leads into spec reviews, not just discovery. They were part of discovery but got cut from the spec reviews, and the density and disclosure calls that came back for revision were exactly the ones they would have settled in one pass.