The design team captures and showcases the Meraki spirit in multifarious, and sometimes unexpected, ways. No matter what they’re designing, efficient simplicity has always been the number one thing for the team to keep in mind. Within Meraki, the team has the opportunity to work on a wide variety of projects, “from hardware packaging, product photography, print collateral, event spaces, the Meraki website & mobile app, Meraki schwag – the list goes on,” Elizabeth shared.
When asked to describe the essence of the Cisco Meraki style, the team unanimously said, “simple, clean, and smart. These are the core themes we always strive for.” Simplifying networking has been a central value within Meraki since the beginning, and the clean, user-friendly design throughout the entire user experience has played a big part in this initiative.
“At Meraki, what we do and what we make is pretty complicated,” the team explained. “Our job is to make it as easy as possible for customers to use and understand.”
Noah, Elizabeth, and Mariel in the Meraki office in San Francisco
“The goal is to not introduce anything that doesn’t need to be there,” said Noah, the design team lead. “We try to foresee any possible confusion or misinterpretations and work around them. We’re always trying to look at our designs from a user’s perspective, to put ourselves in their shoes and see what they see. There’s a lot of empathy that goes into designing. For instance, how would you feel if you got a particular error message? Does this seem like the user is being considered?”
A glimpse into the Meraki website
Most design projects are highly collaborative. The team makes sure to work closely with the engineers, developers, marketing team, and any other involved parties at Meraki to make sure that each design is serving its intended function in the best possible way. One ongoing example of this is the mobile app. The designers meet with the developers behind the Meraki app every week to ensure that form and function are always in alignment.
“We’re continually refining the app, taking the most important components of Dashboard, reshaping them, and making them work in mobile form,” Mariel said.
Dashboard, in the palm of your hand with the mobile app
Although perhaps not overtly obvious, design touches every part of the end user experience. “We want your experience to improve the whole time moving forward – from when you first hear about Meraki, through the learning phase, the trial, setting up your first AP, reminder emails, everything – we’re always asking ourselves, ‘What does that next step look like?’,” Noah explained.
One of the tradeshow booths designed by Elizabeth
Check out our website and mobile app to take a look at some of the great things our design team has put into production!