# Manikandan Somasundaram > UX Strategist | UX & Product Design Expert Location: Pleasanton, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/manikandansomasundaram * Manikandan Somasundaram worked as a Lead User Experience Consultant at PNC, a leading financial services company. * With over 13 years of experience in user experience design, he holds multiple credentials, including Salesforce Certified User Experience Designer, Foundations of User Experience Design, and Certified Usability Analyst. * He specializes in applying human-centered design methodologies and techniques to create intuitive and engaging digital solutions that meet user needs and business goals. * He have hands-on creating UI components using HTML, CSS and ReactJS ## Work Experience ### UX Manager @ Cognizant Jan 2024 – Present | Pleasanton, California, United States Risant Health(Kaiser Permanente) * Developed a robust and accessible Design system for Risant, incorporating typography, color variables, styles, and reusable UI components to ensure inclusivity and usability across diverse needs of its vendors. * Delivered UI components to the development team, validated them in Storybook for UX design and accessibility compliance, reported bugs, and worked with developers to fix issues. ### Senior User Experience Designer @ Ancile Inc Jan 2024 – Jan 2024 | United States * Developing a robust and reusable design system for Ancile which can be used for different vendor needs * User testing UI components with internal users * Integrating the design system to storybook ### Senior Lead User Experience Designer @ Virtusa Jan 2022 – Jan 2024 | Bentonville, Arkansas, United States PNC Bank: * Contributed to the development of 4 lending products catering to both internal and end users. * Facilitating User Interviews, User testing, creating Personas and Task flow diagrams. * Crafting High-fidelity prototypes for finalized Task flow, refining them based on feedback from both users and stakeholders. * Creating Design system components using HTML, CSS, ReactJS. * Generating UX Audit and Accessibility Audit reports. * Achieved SUS scores of 92 and 88 for different product designs. ### Senior User Experience Consultant @ Cognizant Jan 2018 – Jan 2022 | Bentonville, Arkansas, United States J.B.Hunt: * During his time at J.B. Hunt, he spearheaded projects such as Consolidation 360, Final Mile Services, and Transit Guide 360. * Additionally, he worked as a team member on Carrier 360, Draynet 360 and Final Mile International products. * Annually, he presents hackathon ideas, with some being recognized and developed. Furthermore, he played a key role in creating clickable mobile prototypes for events like GATS (Great American Truck Show) and MATS (Mid-American Truck Show). * His contributions extend to the enhancement of the J.B.Hunt design system library, where he introduced numerous new UI components and UI patterns using HTML, CSS and ReactJS. * His exceptional work has earned him the recognition of Best Designer of the Quarter at J.B.Hunt on three occasions. * Creating Task Flow Diagram, Design gap analysis, UX Audit and Accessibility Audit documents. * Crafting High-fidelity prototypes using Adobe XD, Figma for finalized Task flow and iterated for Users and Stakeholders feedback. * Assisting Research team to facilitate user interviews and user testing. User testing yielded 96 SUS score. ### Senior User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2017 – Jan 2018 | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India Best Price(Walmart India) * I played a key role in redesigning legacy Best Price’s applications for Walmart India, transitioning them to the modernized SAP Fiori/UI5 platform. * I re-designed applications for booking appointments, delivering goods, capturing goods received notes, counting stocks with handheld devices, breaking bulk articles, creating labels for damaged articles, stock adjustment, test scanning, returning damaged articles to supplies, creating rejected material notes, managing inventory, updating member details in real-time, handling inbound warehouse movements and digitizing the complete invoice process totally 15 applications. * Furthermore, I contributed to creating a Bot application for internal associates to obtain HR related clarifications from the Best Price HR portal. * I crafted Persona, Task Analysis document and Task flow diagram, UX Audit document. * I created high-fidelity HTML prototypes with Axure RP, reviewed with business stakeholders, iterated, and finalized for approved task flows. * I assisted Walmart design peer to conduct user testing. The testing yielded an average SUS score of 88 across various applications. ### Senior User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2016 – Jan 2017 | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India PayPal: * I contributed to the enhancement of several B2C applications, revamping existing workflows by introducing new features and redesigning them to align with the latest design standards. * One notable project is the Global Offer portal, a responsive web portal utilized by PayPal customers to discover enticing offers. * I created a conversion rate analysis document and facilitated a design session with product owners from different geographics for global offer portal. * I crafted High-fidelity Experience design prototypes using Sketch app, Adobe Illustrator and get it reviewed with product owners and Engineering team. * The Google Analytics report indicated that the new designs significantly increased the conversion rate of a global offer portal from 35% to 78%. ### Senior User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2015 – Jan 2016 | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India Cisco: * The project's scope involves enhancing an existing admin application by incorporating features for Customer Health Monitoring and Network Resource Monitoring. One module is dedicated to aiding Cisco admins in monitoring customer health support across all regions. The second module assists tenant admins in real-time monitoring of network load, aiming to minimize cloud service usage. * The project also entails the creation of modernized UI components and workflows to accurately reflect Power BI data. * Conducted User Interviews, creating user personas, Heuristic evaluation and UX Audit report. * Created both Low and High-fidelity prototypes, reviewed them with stakeholders, Business Analyst and iterated as necessary. * Facilitated remote user testing sessions with 6 Cisco admins, yielded an 76 SUS score. ### Senior User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2014 – Jan 2015 | London Area, United Kingdom Unilever, UK: * The goal of this project is to digitalizing the existing gatekeeper process for approving new product ideas, leveraging the Salesforce platform. Application was created using completely customized Lightning Web Components(LWC). * Conducting Joint Application Design (JAD) sessions with stakeholders across regions, collaborating with Business Analysts and Technical Architects to develop task flows and high-level information architecture documents, ensuring comprehensive coverage of use cases for the current sprint. * Crafting low-fidelity prototypes for internal design discussions and advancing to high-fidelity HTML prototypes using Axure RP. * Presenting prototypes to stakeholders, Business Analysts, and the Engineering team for insightful feedback collection. * Facilitating user testing sessions with clickable prototypes, capturing user feedback, and iteratively refining the design based on user insights, leveraging the latest usability testing techniques which yielded SUS score of 98. * Conducting thorough walkthroughs of the final design with Visual Designers (Onsite + Offshore) and the offshore Engineering team. * Generating UX audit reports and raised UI bugs. ### User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2014 – Jan 2014 | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield: * The CareFirst Employer portal functions as a self-service tool for employers and benefit managers, enabling them to perform administrative tasks and access product/program information. * This project aims to enhance the portal by introducing account-specific, customized "dashboards," datasets, and flags. It will also showcase the impact of programs like Tool care and Cost Improvement. * The Technology CoE Center of the company will collaborate with enterprise architecture to develop the technology enterprise strategy and planning. * Facilitated design workshops, creating task flow diagrams and Information Architecture (IA), UX Audit Report. * Developed wireframes and collaborating with business stakeholders for review and iterations. * Facilitated remote user testing with 8 users yielded 96 SUS score. ### User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2014 – Jan 2014 | Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India Apple: *Apple's Global Business Intelligence (GBI) group focuses on deploying critical business intelligence solutions for all business areas, includes direct interaction with key business customers and ownership of multiple strategic and high visibility initiatives aimed at improving Apple’s reporting strategy while addressing our constantly changing business needs and maintaining the integrity of for all geographic regions within Apple. * Engaging in detailed discussions with the onsite delivery manager, Analyzing the identified problem statements and crafting essential UX artifacts, including Task Flow documents, Information Architecture (IA), and conducting a Competitor Analysis. Subsequently, translating insights into wireframe designs using OmniGraffle. * Facilitating design workshops and creating Task flow diagram, Information Architecture (IA), Competitor Analysis document. * Crafting High-fidelity prototypes using OmniGraffle, reviewed with Business stakeholders and iterated. * Reviewing designs with Design peers and iterate. ### User Experience Designer @ Cognizant Jan 2011 – Jan 2013 | Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India Cognizant Technology Solutions, Internal: * In Jan,2011 I joined as a trainee and started working on real time projects from Mar,2011 onwards. * I worked on redesigning Cognizant Application Services(CAS), Cognizant ITIS business management application, Cognizant BPO leadership dashboard and internal HR portal. * Conducted design workshops, user interviews, created personas, performed competitor analysis, storyboarding, and Heuristic evaluation document, User Journey Map. * Developed both low and high-fidelity prototypes using MS PowerPoint and Adobe Photoshop, reviewed and iterated with business stakeholders. * Facilitated A/B testing with HR users to finalize the design concept. * Facilitated user testing sessions for the ITIS application, achieving a SUS score of 76. ## Education ### Bachelor of Engineering (BE) in Computer Science Anna University Chennai ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/yesmanikandan - Portfolio: https://www.figma.com/proto/tMKjlKJ5i1M4DILnebOqQt/Manikandan-UX-Portfolio?type=design&node-id=232-2&viewport=372,345,0.16&t=LO95Sw2QHOtZLLIV-0&scaling=scale-down-width&starting-point-node-id=232:2&hide-ui=1 --- Source: https://flows.cv/manikandansomasundaram JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/manikandansomasundaram/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-13