I led the User Experience Design and Accessibility Initiatives as part of a multidisciplinary dev team responsible for decathlon.de. The German e-commerce chapter of the Global Sports conglomerate ‚Decathlon‘

I spearheaded accessibility initiatives, usability testing cycles, and design sprints to enhance the shopping experience. I thrive in collaborative, user-centric environments, helping organizations increase UX maturity, integrate accessibility best practices, and embed stronger user-focused strategies within Agile frameworks. An early adopter of trends like A11y, Conversational UI, and AI, I enjoy sharing real UX wins through bar camps, conferences, and podcasts while driving innovation and inclusivity in digital experiences.

Locations: Berlin and Bremen | Involvement with the Project: 2.5yrs.

1. Accessibility as a Competitive Differentiator

🚀 Transformed accessibility from a compliance requirement into a strategic advantage, aligning with Decathlon’s ‘Sports for All’ mission.

• Eliminated major accessibility barriers, making the website usable by 10% of Germany’s population who previously had no access.

• Established the company’s first-ever A11y Testing framework, setting new standards in North Germany’s e-commerce industry. Conducting, organising and analysing an Accessibility test with real users with legal visual impairments.

• Integrated accessibility into Agile development, ensuring it became a permanent part of quality assessment, refinements, and product roadmaps.

• Upskilled cross-functional teams (Developers, Product Owners, Scrum Masters) through targeted A11y training, ensuring long-term adoption.
  
  You can get a detailed look into my work in Accessibility testing here.

2. UX-Driven Business Growth & Conversion Optimization

📈 Reduced cart abandonment and increased conversion rates by driving a data-informed usability strategy.

• Revolutionized Decathlon’s UX research approach—moved the company from an A/B testing-only mindset to a holistic, mixed-method strategy(Quantitative and QUALITATIVE data).

• Led 12+ usability test cycles across critical touchpoints, optimizing:

  • Product Detail Pages, Checkout, Returns, Wishlist, Search Navigation & Delivery Methods

• Improved Content Design backed by Usability and a11y tests improving: CTA text, Error Messages, Semantic HTML, Alternative text.

• Boosted key business KPIs, including:

  • Cart abandonment rate ↓

  • Bounce rates ↓

  • Checkout conversions ↑ (Iterative Design improvements and testing)

  • Returns processing time ↓ (through UX-driven process and size guide improvements)

• Drove executive buy-in for UX investments by translating user research into business impact insights.

3. Scaling UX & Establishing a User-Centric Culture

🌍 Elevated UX maturity across teams, embedding UX into Decathlon’s Agile (LeSS) framework.

• Created a UX-first mindset across development teams, ensuring UX was no longer a silo but a core pillar of decision-making.

• Integrated UX processes into Agile rituals:

  • Refinement & planning – Ensured UX research influenced ticket creation.

  • Quality assessment – Introduced UX audits into QA cycles.

  • Pair programming with developers – Fostered deeper collaboration between design & engineering.

• Championed UX Roadmaps & Vision in collaboration with Product Owners, aligning UX goals with business strategy.

• Grew a team-wide UX competency, ensuring that all team members—not just designers—became UX advocates.

4. Driving Innovation & Future-Forward UX

🔮 Beyond optimization—pushed Decathlon’s UX into the future through AI & emerging tech.

• Partnered with the Future Commerce Unit to research & prototype AI-driven shopping experiences.

• Led cross-country research collaborations, bringing best UX practices from Decathlon’s DACH region into Germany’s e-commerce strategy.

• Facilitated 6+ strategic design workshops to envision the next evolution of:

  • Checkout Experience, Wishlist, Third-Party Integrations, and Returns Management.

• Moderated high-impact design sprints, leading to a complete overhaul of the checkout & returns experience.

5. Thought Leadership & Industry Recognition

Brought Decathlon’s accessibility and UX advancements into public conversations. Engaging audiences from both technical and non technical backgrounds in important conversations about Accessibility and UX.

• Presented at UX Barcamp Europe, conferences, and World Usability Day, raising awareness on the work done on accessibility & usability at Decathlon.

• Voiced my opinions on Accessibility and UX as a guest on the podcast ‘Aus UX und Dollerei’

6. Mentorship

🎤 Shaping the next generation of UX professionals & making Decathlon a recognized name in UX accessibility.

• Mentored junior UX designers & developers, fostering a culture of user empathy across disciplines.

• Enabled UX researchers to work independently, developing structured methodologies for theme identification & usability testing.

Bottom Navigation Bar: Enhancing One-Handed Usability

Project Overview

This case study illustrates how I led the redesign of Decathlon’s mobile website navigation to improve one-handed usability.

User Story

As a user, I want to navigate the Decathlon Mobile Website efficiently using only one hand, leveraging the thumb zone effectively.
#OneHandUse

Initial Enquiry

We assessed key interactive elements to evaluate their usability for one-handed navigation. While improvements were needed across multiple pages—such as the Product Listing Page, Checkout, and Product Details Page—the most pressing usability issues were found in the recurring elements of the header and footer.

With increasing mobile screen sizes, reaching the top diagonal end of the screen with one hand is challenging. Key observations included:

1. The header was cluttered, containing tightly spaced interactive elements: Hamburger Menu, Logo (leading to the homepage), Help, Store Finder, Account, Cart, and Wishlist—none of which were within the thumb zone.

2. The Hamburger Menu presented usability issues:

   • The long list of categories (Men, Women, Children, Sports, etc.) made it difficult to access frequently used options.

   • Data indicated that users primarily navigated via the existing navigation bar, making the Hamburger Menu more suited for desktop.

   • The menu had poor visual design, with inconsistent spacing and an unintuitive order of icons.

   • Closing the Hamburger Menu reduced space for the navigation list, shrinking text size significantly.

3. Lack of interactive elements at the bottom of the screen made navigation cumbersome.

4. No persistent (sticky) elements remained accessible throughout the site.

5. Accidental taps on the chatbot and issues with the ‘Back to Top’ button indicated poor interaction design.

Timebox Workshop

To explore potential solutions, we conducted a timeboxed session with key stakeholders:

• Participants: UX Lead/Moderator(Me), 1 Product Owner, 1 Product Manager, 1 Data Analyst, 1 Front-end Developer, 1 Full Stack Developer, 1 Jr. UX Designer

• Objective: Identify usability problems, opportunities, and possible solutions.

• Outcome: Two potential directions emerged:

  • A. Remove the Hamburger Menu entirely and introduce a Bottom Navigation Bar.

  • B. Improve visual design and spacing within the existing layout (a safer approach).

Prototyping & Development

Two teams built prototypes directly in code to increase testability and reduce resource wastage in case the solution passed validation testing.

User Testing

We tested the prototypes with five users to gather real-world feedback. To minimize bias, three users started with Prototype A, while two began with Prototype B.

Findings:

• Prototype A (Bottom Navigation Bar) was overwhelmingly preferred.

• Users found the bottom navigation intuitive, efficient, and significantly improved single-handed usability.

• Sticky navigation bar was considered ingenious and highly appreciated.

• Prototype B (refined Hamburger Menu design) still struggled with one-hand usability.

• Micro-interactions and visual feedback were added to refine Prototype A:

  • Primary CTA (Cart) highlighted in yellow.

  • Active navigation icons highlighted in blue (e.g., Search, My Store).

Iterated Version After User Testing

Based on feedback, we refined the Bottom Navigation feature and conducted A/B testing against the original version.

Final Version & A/B Testing Results

After two rounds of A/B testing, the Bottom Navigation Bar outperformed the original layout across key metrics:

• Lower drop-off rates

• Reduced cart abandonment

• Increased overall purchases

To further optimize engagement, we introduced two versions of microinteractions (e.g., animations when adding items to the cart or wishlist, and active state visualizations). Another round of A/B testing determined the final implementation, which was successfully deployed.

Conclusion

By replacing the outdated Hamburger Menu with a Sticky Bottom Navigation Bar, we improved usability, accessibility, and user satisfaction. This project highlights how data-driven design decisions and iterative testing can lead to significant enhancements in mobile UX.