The problem

Amazon maintained two separate knowledge portals:

• an IT Portal where employees went for self-service support, and
• a KB Portal where IT Support Engineers (ITSEs) managed customer issues.

Running two systems meant duplicated content, inconsistent search experiences, and constant context-switching for the engineers who relied on both.

But the real challenge wasn’t merging two websites. We had to create one experience that served two very different audiences — while ensuring employees never became aware that internal-only knowledge existed at all.

My role

I owned the end-to-end UX for the unified knowledge experience — from validating the concept with users through designing the final interaction patterns:

• Planned and conducted usability testing with IT Support Engineers
• Designed the search experience and information architecture
• Created responsive experiences across desktop and mobile
• Defined permission-aware interactions for multiple user roles
• Collaborated closely with Product and Engineering through implementation

Design principles

Two principles anchored every decision.

Invisible boundaries

Employees should never feel like they’re using a restricted version of the platform. Rather than showing locked content or disabled filters, the interface adapts silently based on permissions. Each audience experiences a complete product tailored to their needs.

Minimize workflow disruption

IT Support Engineers work against strict response-time goals and rely heavily on muscle memory. Wherever possible, I preserved familiar interaction patterns and introduced improvements gradually — minimizing retraining during migration.

Designing the experience

Permission-aware search

The same search behaves differently depending on the user’s permissions — while remaining completely invisible to employees. An Amazonian and an ITSE can run the same query and each receives a complete, appropriate result set.

Knowledge articles

Articles support a copy-link action, embedded workflows, inline feedback, and KCS suggestions — so an engineer can act on, trust, and improve an article without ever leaving the page.

Walkthrough

Validating the design

Before committing to a unified experience, I wanted to understand whether IT Support Engineers could effectively do their work in a single portal without increasing search time or cognitive load.

I ran concept testing with five IT Support Engineers (2.5 to 11.5 years of experience — spanning remote support, on-site support, subject-matter experts, and L4 engineers). They worked through core support workflows: finding employee-facing knowledge, finding ITSE-only documentation, evaluating search relevance, navigating between article types, and suggesting improvements.

1. Search quality determines trust

Every participant agreed consolidating the portals would improve efficiency — but only if search quality improved.

“I was 100% sure there is an article… I gave up and asked my teammates because I couldn’t find it.”

— P1, IT Support Engineer (4 years)

2. Reducing tools reduces cognitive load

Support Engineers regularly moved between seven or more applications during a single customer interaction. Every context switch added load while the customer waited.

“If you’re having to do even a little bit of searching through IT portal or KB — you’ve got multiple windows open now if you’re helping two customers — it just adds to the confusion, adds to your time.”

— P3, IT Support Engineer (11.5 years)

3. Engineers need deeper technical documentation

Participants wanted command references, architecture explanations, log locations, and the “why” behind issues.

“Sometimes we get stuck and don’t know what’s going on. If we know the structure of this module, we can dive deep and help much more.”

— P1, IT Support Engineer (4 years)

4. ITSEs trust structured docs over AI

Engineers need a trustworthy, structured, officially maintained source they can rely on under pressure.

“I prefer to read a hard-written document… Sometimes [the AI assistant] combines multiple articles and creates confusion.”

— P5, IT Support Engineer (2.5 years)

Outcome

The unified knowledge experience launched, and we’re monitoring feedback and working on fast-follows.

Before implementation, concept testing validated strong support for consolidating the portals into a single experience, with search quality identified as the most critical success factor. The research directly shaped search ranking, filtering behavior, permission-aware rendering, and article structure before development was finalized. Beyond the product itself, the project established a more proactive UX partnership around future search initiatives.

Reflection

This project fundamentally changed how I think about enterprise design.

Initially, I saw the challenge as one of access control — making sure users only saw content they were authorized to view. Through research and design exploration, I realized the harder problem was designing for asymmetric awareness.

The project also reinforced that influence extends beyond interface design. When an unexpected product change disrupted the roadmap, success depended less on defending a design solution and more on building alignment across teams. By adapting quickly, validating decisions with users, and sharing evidence constructively, I helped improve both the product and the way the teams collaborated going forward.