EverBright PV System Design Tool

Reduced avg. design time 12 → 5 min and cut rework by 25% while modernizing the codebase to reduce tech debt by 70%.

UI Mockups based on guiding principles that mirror the real world as well as other widely used applications.

Overview

EverBright is a solar software and financing company. The PV system design tool enables sales reps to design, pitch, and sell residential PV systems to a homeowner; use of the system design tool is mandatory to sell our financing product.

Problem Statement

Five of six target sales organizations (representing ~93% of our sales volume) report that our system design tool is overly complex and lacks adequate guardrails, causing costly downstream mistakes. Consequently, sales directors say only 16% of junior reps sell our financing product because senior reps are less willing to train them and juniors avoid using the tool even when training is offered.

Design Problem

How might we simplify the system design tool so sales reps of varying skill levels can rapidly produce accurate Solar PV designs, maintain homeowner trust during demos, and reduce downstream business and safety risk?

Journey map created based on contextual research study, user interviews (12 installers) and stakeholder interviews (5 stakeholders).

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Team

My Role: Lead Technical Product Designer, owned design strategy, UX research, interaction and visual design, prototyping, and usability testing. I led cross‑functional alignment across sales, operations, engineering, and product leadership and drove design hand-off.

Team: PM (Lisa Notier), product designer (Arielle Schoen, assisted with small enhancements, UXR), 6 full-time engineers (fullstack, codebase, data model).

Deliverables

Usability research, journey maps, information architecture, high‑fidelity mockups, interactive states, design system components, handoff file.

High-fidelity designs and interactive states were developed in collaboration with cross-functional teams.

OKR

Objectives & Key Results

Manual calculations and a cluttered UI demanded domain expertise, causing long design times, high rework, and installation risk. The redesign simplified workflows, prioritized the design canvas, and automated error‑prone calculations while preserving expert overrides.

KEY RESULT

Increased design to signed contract

conversion rate by 34%

OBJECTIVE

Enable the completion of 95%+ installation milestones on time

EXECUTION

Provided a 3D model of the system to prioritize homeowner transparency and education.
Redesigned as a collaborative sales tool, focused on homeowner interaction.

3D designs, using 3JS code, enables homeowner transparency and education during the sales demo.

KEY RESULT

Reduced project change orders by 25%

OBJECTIVE

De-risked transactions by enabling accurate projections + tool to facilitate demos

EXECUTION

Implemented API integration to import unique data for accurate usage and system calculations.
Increased data visibility, faster calculations, improved modularity to compare and revise system design to meet homeowner needs.

New UI surfaced guardrails and enabled customization.

Usability testing revealed insights about the layers panel, confirming that it provided useful guidance while maintaining user control.

KEY RESULT

Reduced time‑per‑design 12 min → 5 min

OBJECTIVE

Improve user efficiency

EXECUTION

Minimized cognitive load by reducing peripheral noise - prioritize primary actions, grouping related actions and consolidating secondary actions in components like hidden context menus.
Implemented intuitive interactions within the canvas that mirror the real‑world, such as roof modeling and panel placement.
Improved interactive tools, such as obstruction drawing, panel placement, and setback to provide speed and consistency.

The properties panel is a scalable component, providing a space to grow and change with user needs and business requirements.

KEY RESULT

Reduced tech-debt by ~70%

OBJECTIVE

Reduce engineering maintenance and enable future growth

EXECUTION

Built design system and implemented reusable components throughout the platform.
Build a scalable platform for expanded offerings and future automation.
Converted platform from Angular to React, using design system components.

Next Steps

Trade‑offs & Constraints

Design and PM resources diverted to quick turn around and high-visibility projects, such as Beta Automated Proposal tool.
Engineering resources diverted to urgent platform issues required phased delivery.
Required ‘escape hatch’ to access legacy system for older designs, not yet installed.
Needed to balance guardrails with power‑user overrides, acknowledging that the system is not always smarter than the user.
Balanced guardrails for novices with override options for power users; acknowledged potential commission friction and managed via stakeholder alignment.

Future Road Map Recommendations

3-6 month

Extend auto‑stringing and equipment continuity automation.
A/B test flows and microcopy.
Expand 3D/3JS design functionality and interactions.

6-18 month

AI‑assisted layout suggestions with confidence scores/explainability.
Instrument event‑level analytics for conversion and error tracking.
Increase 3D/3JS design functionality and interactions, move towards demo mode to showcase seasonal PV production.
Gather feedback and preference test future iterations.