Dan Olsavsky

Designing a Secure Legal Data Request Platform for T-Mobile

Lead UI Designer | ProKarma for T-Mobile (2017-2018)

Context

Sentinel was a secure internal platform built for law enforcement agencies to submit and manage legal data requests. The existing process relied heavily on fax machines, manual approvals, and fragmented tools, resulting in delays and inconsistent handling of sensitive information.

I joined as Lead UI Designer to help modernize the experience, align with T-Mobile’s GLUE design system, and create intuitive workflows that could be adopted by users with varying levels of technical proficiency.

Caption: The redesigned workflow reduced approval times by approximately 33%, eliminated fax-based processes, and increased adoption across rural agencies.

Challenge

As the platform scaled across agencies and jurisdictions, several issues emerged:

  • Heavy reliance on paper and fax-based workflows
  • Long approval turnaround times
  • Fragmented digital tools and inconsistent processes
  • Low adoption among rural and less technical users
  • Strict legal and compliance constraints

Responsibility

  • Led UI design and workflow strategy across the product
  • Partnered with legal, compliance, product, and engineering teams
  • Contributed to the GLUE design system and extended it with Sentinel-specific components
  • Created high-fidelity prototypes and visual specifications
  • Supported developer handoff and QA validation

Systems Architecture & Implementation

Phase 1: Discovery & Audit

  • Conducted stakeholder and user interviews
  • Mapped current workflows and bottlenecks
  • Identified gaps between legal requirements and digital execution

Phase 2: Design & Token Alignment

  • Leveraged GLUE components for consistency and brand alignment
  • Built a supplemental component layer for Sentinel-specific needs
  • Established accessibility and responsive standards

Phase 3: Adoption & Delivery

  • Created interactive prototypes for stakeholder validation
  • Partnered closely with engineering through build and QA
  • Introduced documentation and usage patterns for long-term scalability

Caption: Example of a production-ready UI built on the shared G.L.U.E. design system, demonstrating consistency across components, states, and interactions.

Governance & Collaboration Model

  • Twice-weekly stakeholder reviews and user demos
  • Cross-functional sprint planning and retrospectives
  • Versioned design specifications for incremental improvement without disruption

Impact

  • Reduced request turnaround time by ~33%
  • Eliminated dependence on fax-based processes
  • Improved accessibility and usability for non-technical users
  • Increased adoption across law enforcement agencies
  • Established a scalable UI foundation aligned with T-Mobile standards

Design System Outcome

  • Shared component library aligned with GLUE
  • Supplemental extensible components for Sentinel-specific workflows
  • Faster iteration cycles between design and engineering
  • Clear governance for long-term sustainability

Caption: Example of a shared component that was implemented across design and production.

Key Learning

Designing for high-stakes legal workflows requires more than visual polish. Clarity, accessibility, and close collaboration with engineering and compliance teams are what build trust and enable adoption. Reducing friction in complex systems often has the greatest real-world impact.

Confidentiality Note

Portions of this case study have been generalized or omitted to respect client confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements. The information presented reflects work I am authorized to share publicly while preserving the integrity of proprietary data, internal processes, and sensitive business details.