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Visit more pages:

Go to the Work page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/work

Go to the About page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/about

Read Brendan’s Cisco Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/cisco-case-study

Read Brendan’s ExxonMobil Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/exxonmobil-case-study

Read Brendan’s Panasonic Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/panasonic-case-study

Read Brendan’s Verizon Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/verizon-case-study

Read Brendan’s RWJF Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/rwjf-case-study

Client

Panasonic Connect logo

Architecting a user-centric IA that reshaped Panasonic Connect’s business strategy

35%

less navigation complexity

"Brilliant thinking... the most exciting thing I've seen work-related in a really, really long time."

5

business units aligned with one IA

+200%

earned scope expansion

What I contributed:

DISCOVERY

Found the problem behind the brief

My audit showed that users were already confused by the navigation; adding something new to something already broken wasn’t going to work.

RESEARCH

Proved the problem with data

I analyzed existing research and created journey maps to show where Panasonic's internal structure was failing customers.

ARCHITECTURE

Designed a customer-first IA

Reorganized the experience around what Panasonic offered, using Products, Services, and Solutions within that structure.

IMPACT

Turned a nav change into a strategy change

My recommendation convinced business owners to expand the work beyond the original navigation request.

The Situation

Panasonic Connect brought me in with a narrow question: where should its newest business unit, MSG, live in the navigation? Looking for the answer exposed a much larger problem. The IA hadn't kept pace with the business, and customers were struggling to make sense of it.

Why the current IA didn’t work for customers

Products, Services, and Solutions made sense internally, but meant very little to customers trying to understand what Panasonic could actually do for them. Adding another business unit to the same structure would only make the problem worse.

Users were showing us where the IA broke down

An end-to-end audit revealed where customers lost their bearings, misunderstood how offerings related, or couldn't find a clear path forward. The problem wasn't where to put MSG. It was the structure MSG was being added to.

Timeline

2025 Q2 - 2025 Q3

Stakeholders

Agency: MRM

Client: Panasonic Connect

Associate Director of Marketing

Senior Marketing Specialist

Digital Marketing Manager at Panasonic

Process

My Process

User-centric design thinking always begins with empathy.

Recognizing the problem was organizational, not technical, my approach was diplomatic and insight-led:

  1. Diagnosed Core Misalignment: Used taxonomy audit and semantic modeling (including LLM analysis) to prove the singular truth: Users already think in product lines. This insight reframed the debate from "where to put MSG" to "how the entire organization should communicate value."
  2. Facilitated Change Management: I did not tell the client the answer. I used tactful facilitation, asking stakeholders "what if...?" to invite them to share a transformative, product-first vision. This skirted political landmines and allowed them to own the solution.  
  3. Delivered Scalable Governance: The final solution was a product-first navigation system, transforming the IA into a scalable, user-centered framework that directly reflected actual customer mental models and paved the way for future M&A or new offerings.

Why this approach

When I dug into the ask to find a place for MSG, it became clear that the current system wouldn’t work. I needed to find a way to carefully bring that to our clients, knowing that this could be interpreted as an overstep of the ask. The argument needed to be bulletproof and I needed to be convincing.

Outcomes

I’m proud of this work because it was a risk to stick my neck out and deliver something other than what the client asked for. I discovered an underlying issue that needed to be fixed and my goal was to illuminate it and offer a solution. This client was known for being difficult and hard-to-please which is why the immediate trust earned felt like a gold medal to me. The client got more than what they paid for and we earned more business because of it.

“I gotta tell ya, usually by this point in the afternoon I’m exhausted and I cant even think straight. Today, I have jet lag and I have a headache from watching people scrolling too fast and I was just dreading this meeting....but I am so excited about this I can’t even tell you....Just, really really incredible. I mean: brilliant thinking, very well delivered, documented so that even the simplest minds could follow. I mean...just....wow. This is the most exciting thing I’ve seen work-related in a really really long time.”

- Associate Director of Marketing, Panasonic Connect North America

The client changed course. What began as a navigation placement request became a broader rethink of Panasonic Connect's IA and digital strategy.

The work generated two follow-on engagements. The initial recommendation expanded into additional paid work for the agency.

The strategy made it into production. Panasonic later implemented the recommended IA and navigation model across its live experience.

The retrospective chair

Retrospective

Looking back, what worked was resisting the urge to fix the navigation and instead earning the patience to solve the structural problem underneath it. By slowing the organization down just enough to agree on a shared experience model, the work gained durability.

​

If I could relive it, I would have pushed even earlier for formal ownership of taxonomy and governance, before momentum made certain decisions harder to revisit. Systems want stewards as much as they want designers, and that lesson only becomes obvious once you have watched a good structure begin to age.

Ready to talk?

Let’s get connected

Contact Brendan

View more work

See another project

Let’s connect

LinkedIn
mail icon

Visit more pages:

Go to the Work page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/work

Go to the About page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/about

Read Brendan’s Cisco Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/cisco-case-study

Read Brendan’s ExxonMobil Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/exxonmobil-case-study

Read Brendan’s Panasonic Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/panasonic-case-study

Read Brendan’s Verizon Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/verizon-case-study

Read Brendan’s RWJF Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/rwjf-case-study
Brendan Kelly UX Site Logo

Let’s Connect

Client

Panasonic Connect logo

Architecting a user-centric IA that reshaped Panasonic Connect’s business strategy

35%

less navigation complexity

5

business units aligned with one IA

+200%

earned scope expansion

"Brilliant thinking... the most exciting thing I've seen work-related in a really, really long time."

What I contributed:

DISCOVERY

Found the problem behind the brief

My audit showed that users were already confused by the navigation; adding something new to something already broken wasn’t going to work.

RESEARCH

Proved the problem with data

I analyzed existing research and created journey maps to show where Panasonic's internal structure was failing customers.

ARCHITECTURE

Designed a customer-first IA

Reorganized the experience around what Panasonic offered, using Products, Services, and Solutions within that structure.

IMPACT

Turned a nav change into a strategy change

My recommendation convinced business owners to expand the work beyond the original navigation request.

The Situation

Panasonic Connect brought me in with a narrow question: where should its newest business unit, MSG, live in the navigation? Looking for the answer exposed a much larger problem. The IA hadn't kept pace with the business, and customers were struggling to make sense of it.

Why the current IA didn’t work for customers

Products, Services, and Solutions made sense internally, but meant very little to customers trying to understand what Panasonic could actually do for them. Adding another business unit to the same structure would only make the problem worse.

Users were showing us where the IA broke down

An end-to-end audit revealed where customers lost their bearings, misunderstood how offerings related, or couldn't find a clear path forward. The problem wasn't where to put MSG. It was the structure MSG was being added to.

Stakeholders

Agency: MRM

Client: Panasonic Connect

Associate Director of Marketing

Senior Marketing Specialist

Digital Marketing Manager at Panasonic

Timeline

2025 Q2 - 2025 Q3

Process

User-centric design thinking always begins with empathy.

My Process

Recognizing the problem was organizational, not technical, my approach was diplomatic and insight-led:

  1. Diagnosed Core Misalignment: Used taxonomy audit and semantic modeling (including LLM analysis) to prove the singular truth: Users already think in product lines. This insight reframed the debate from "where to put MSG" to "how the entire organization should communicate value."
  2. Facilitated Change Management: I did not tell the client the answer. I used tactful facilitation, asking stakeholders "what if...?" to invite them to share a transformative, product-first vision. This skirted political landmines and allowed them to own the solution.  
  3. Delivered Scalable Governance: The final solution was a product-first navigation system, transforming the IA into a scalable, user-centered framework that directly reflected actual customer mental models and paved the way for future M&A or new offerings.

Why this approach

When I dug into the ask to find a place for MSG, it became clear that the current system wouldn’t work. I needed to find a way to carefully bring that to our clients, knowing that this could be interpreted as an overstep of the ask. The argument needed to be bulletproof and I needed to be convincing.

Outcomes

I’m proud of this work because it was a risk to stick my neck out and deliver something other than what the client asked for. I discovered an underlying issue that needed to be fixed and my goal was to illuminate it and offer a solution. This client was known for being difficult and hard-to-please which is why the immediate trust earned felt like a gold medal to me. The client got more than what they paid for and we earned more business because of it.

“I gotta tell ya, usually by this point in the afternoon I’m exhausted and I cant even think straight. Today, I have jet lag and I have a headache from watching people scrolling too fast and I was just dreading this meeting....but I am so excited about this I can’t even tell you....Just, really really incredible. I mean: brilliant thinking, very well delivered, documented so that even the simplest minds could follow. I mean...just....wow. This is the most exciting thing I’ve seen work-related in a really really long time.”

- Associate Director of Marketing, Panasonic Connect North America

The client changed course. What began as a navigation placement request became a broader rethink of Panasonic Connect's IA and digital strategy.

The work generated two follow-on engagements. The initial recommendation expanded into additional paid work for the agency.

The strategy made it into production. Panasonic later implemented the recommended IA and navigation model across its live experience.

The retrospective chair

Retrospective

Looking back, what worked was resisting the urge to fix the navigation and instead earning the patience to solve the structural problem underneath it. By slowing the organization down just enough to agree on a shared experience model, the work gained durability.

​

If I could relive it, I would have pushed even earlier for formal ownership of taxonomy and governance, before momentum made certain decisions harder to revisit. Systems want stewards as much as they want designers, and that lesson only becomes obvious once you have watched a good structure begin to age.

Ready to talk?

Let’s get connected

Contact Brendan

View more work

See another project

Let’s connect

LinkedIn
mail icon

Visit more pages:

Go to the Work page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/work

Go to the About page for brendankelly:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/about

Read Brendan’s Cisco Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/cisco-case-study

Read Brendan’s ExxonMobil Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/exxonmobil-case-study

Read Brendan’s Panasonic Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/panasonic-case-study

Read Brendan’s Verizon Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/verizon-case-study

Read Brendan’s RWJF Case Study:

http://www.brendankellyux.com/rwjf-case-study
Brendan Kelly UX Site Logo

Let’s Connect

Client

Panasonic Connect logo

Architecting a user-centric IA that reshaped Panasonic Connect’s business strategy

35%

less navigation complexity

5

business units aligned with one IA

+200%

earned scope expansion

"Brilliant thinking... the most exciting thing I've seen work-related in a really, really long time."

What I contributed:

DISCOVERY

Found the problem behind the brief

My audit showed that users were already confused by the navigation; adding something new to something already broken wasn’t going to work.

RESEARCH

Proved the problem with data

I analyzed existing research and created journey maps to show where Panasonic's internal structure was failing customers.

ARCHITECTURE

Designed a customer-first IA

Reorganized the experience around what Panasonic offered, using Products, Services, and Solutions within that structure.

IMPACT

Turned a nav change into a strategy change

My recommendation convinced business owners to expand the work beyond the original navigation request.

The Situation

Panasonic Connect brought me in with a narrow question: where should its newest business unit, MSG, live in the navigation? Looking for the answer exposed a much larger problem. The IA hadn't kept pace with the business, and customers were struggling to make sense of it.

Why the current IA didn’t work for customers

Products, Services, and Solutions made sense internally, but meant very little to customers trying to understand what Panasonic could actually do for them. Adding another business unit to the same structure would only make the problem worse.

Users were showing us where the IA broke down

An end-to-end audit revealed where customers lost their bearings, misunderstood how offerings related, or couldn't find a clear path forward. The problem wasn't where to put MSG. It was the structure MSG was being added to.

Stakeholders

Agency: MRM

Client: Panasonic Connect

Associate Director of Marketing

Senior Marketing Specialist

Digital Marketing Manager at Panasonic

Timeline

2025 Q2 - 2025 Q3

Process

User-centric design thinking always begins with empathy.

My Process

Recognizing the problem was organizational, not technical, my approach was diplomatic and insight-led:

  1. Diagnosed Core Misalignment: Used taxonomy audit and semantic modeling (including LLM analysis) to prove the singular truth: Users already think in product lines. This insight reframed the debate from "where to put MSG" to "how the entire organization should communicate value."
  2. Facilitated Change Management: I did not tell the client the answer. I used tactful facilitation, asking stakeholders "what if...?" to invite them to share a transformative, product-first vision. This skirted political landmines and allowed them to own the solution.  
  3. Delivered Scalable Governance: The final solution was a product-first navigation system, transforming the IA into a scalable, user-centered framework that directly reflected actual customer mental models and paved the way for future M&A or new offerings.

Why this approach

When I dug into the ask to find a place for MSG, it became clear that the current system wouldn’t work. I needed to find a way to carefully bring that to our clients, knowing that this could be interpreted as an overstep of the ask. The argument needed to be bulletproof and I needed to be convincing.

Outcomes

I’m proud of this work because it was a risk to stick my neck out and deliver something other than what the client asked for. I discovered an underlying issue that needed to be fixed and my goal was to illuminate it and offer a solution. This client was known for being difficult and hard-to-please which is why the immediate trust earned felt like a gold medal to me. The client got more than what they paid for and we earned more business because of it.

“I gotta tell ya, usually by this point in the afternoon I’m exhausted and I cant even think straight. Today, I have jet lag and I have a headache from watching people scrolling too fast and I was just dreading this meeting....but I am so excited about this I can’t even tell you....Just, really really incredible. I mean: brilliant thinking, very well delivered, documented so that even the simplest minds could follow. I mean...just....wow. This is the most exciting thing I’ve seen work-related in a really really long time.”

- Associate Director of Marketing, Panasonic Connect North America

The client changed course. What began as a navigation placement request became a broader rethink of Panasonic Connect's IA and digital strategy.

The work generated two follow-on engagements. The initial recommendation expanded into additional paid work for the agency.

The strategy made it into production. Panasonic later implemented the recommended IA and navigation model across its live experience.

The retrospective chair

Retrospective

Looking back, what worked was resisting the urge to fix the navigation and instead earning the patience to solve the structural problem underneath it. By slowing the organization down just enough to agree on a shared experience model, the work gained durability.

​

If I could relive it, I would have pushed even earlier for formal ownership of taxonomy and governance, before momentum made certain decisions harder to revisit. Systems want stewards as much as they want designers, and that lesson only becomes obvious once you have watched a good structure begin to age.

Ready to talk?

Let’s get connected

Contact Brendan

View more work

See another project