BOSS academy: course topics grouped for founders
Course analytics: how founders like to learn
Accelerator prep collection icon

BOSS
Startup
Science

The only designer at an edtech startup for founders: the design system, the academy, and the admin tools.
RoleUX/UI designer
TimelineJul 2022 – Mar 2023
FocusDesign system, academy, admin + data
ToolsFigma, Adobe CC, Procreate, Jira

BOSS Startup Science pairs pre-accelerator courses for founders with a database where investors, accelerators, and incubators find startups to back. As the only designer, I built the design system first, then designed the academy, the data-heavy tables, and the admin tools for the MVP.

01

Design system

Engineers and I needed one reference before anything else, so the system came first: a purple-led palette with ready-made text and background pairs, a type scale, spacing, shape, and elevation tokens, and every button and input state.

Color scales: purple, grurple, blue, green, yellow, red
Accessible palette: text and background pairs
Filled, elevated, tonal, outlined, and text buttons
Type scale: display and headline styles with tokens
boss design system buttonsbuttonsbuttons
One reference
for devs
and design
Every text color
paired with
its background
02

Academy

The academy turns expert material into short courses founders can watch, listen to, or read. I designed the catalog, collections for each startup phase, and the progress and analytics views admins use to see what’s landing.

Collections for each startup phase: vision, product, go-to-market, accelerator prep
Admin view: member table with each founder’s course progress
Vision phase collection icon academy admin: course progress
Watch, listen,
or read: every
course three ways
Collections for
every startup
phase
03

Admin + data

Behind the courses sit the tools that run the business: filterable tables for startups and members, invites with roles explained in plain words, credits and deals for founders, and dashboards for admins.

Invite a member, with the chosen role explained
Pricing: one credit or a subscription
Analytics: average rating by course
admin portal
Roles explained
right where
you pick them
Credits or
a subscription,
side by side
Ratings by
course, any
time range

What changed

Design system firstEngineers and I shared one reference from day one, so fast MVP work still matched.
Learning, three waysCourses founders can watch, listen to, or read, with analytics showing which way they pick.
The whole MVPAcademy, founder profiles, chat, filterable tables, permissions, and dashboards.
Looking back

Midway through, the company pivoted. What started as a learning platform for startups quickly became a way to match startups with investors by stage and interest. Building the design system first is what made that pivot easy, for me and for the devs. Speed sometimes won over polish, but the system kept the fast work consistent, and it’s the first thing I’d build again.

Next projectGlassHive