Apple · Talent Engagement · Artist 360
Artist 360.One directory,zero detours.
A desktop-first rebuild of an internal artist directory: helping admins find artists, understand ownership, review bookings and open complete profiles, without losing their place.
- Role
- Product Designer
- Platform
- Desktop web, responsive to tablet and mobile
- Outcomes
25% faster artist search
40% fewer clicks per routine task
27% lower operational costs
Contribution, Workflow design, search and filtering, information architecture, table systems, time-zone handling, accessibility. Timeline, Aug 2020 - Jan 2021
Artist 360
Find artists, review bookings, and manage relationships.
| Favorite | Booking preview | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| art-009 | Music | Recording artist | Tomás Iglesias | Documentary | ||
| art-014 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Pop | ||
| art-018 | Author | Fiction | Dana Whitfield | Pop | ||
| art-029 | Sport | Athlete | Priya Anand | Pop | ||
| art-027 | Author | Nonfiction | Marcus Reyes | Documentary | ||
| art-056 | Podcast | Host | Marcus Reyes | Comedy | ||
| art-034 | Film and TV | Director | Ruth Ashcombe | Rock | ||
| art-044 | Podcast | Host | Kenji Nakamura | Country | ||
| art-071 | Film and TV | Showrunner | Tomás Iglesias | Pop | ||
| art-016 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Comedy | ||
| art-080 | Film and TV | Showrunner | Marcus Reyes | Documentary | ||
| art-008 | Podcast | Producer | Tomás Iglesias | Documentary | ||
| art-045 | Podcast | Host | Tomás Iglesias | Hip-hop | ||
| art-052 | Sport | Commentator | Marcus Reyes | Jazz | ||
| art-043 | Film and TV | Director | Dana Whitfield | Classical | ||
| art-059 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Jazz | ||
| art-074 | Music | Producer | Dana Whitfield | Country | ||
| art-063 | Podcast | Host | Priya Anand | Documentary | ||
| art-058 | Author | Fiction | Dana Whitfield | Drama | ||
| art-062 | Sport | Commentator | Kenji Nakamura | Alternative |
1 to 20 of 84 artists
Interface recreated for portfolio presentation to protect confidential product information. Demo data is fictional.
Executive summary
The directory is the workspace.
Artist 360 is the working surface inside Talent Engagement where admins spend their day: a directory of 84 artists with saved views, search, filters, sortable columns, booking previews and complete profiles. The redesign treats the directory as the workspace, previews, edits and reviews happen beside the results, so context is never lost to navigation.
My role
Product Designer. I owned the end-to-end directory experience: research synthesis, workflow and interaction design, the table and filtering system, and the working prototypes used to align product and engineering.
Research findings
Five things that changed the design.
01
The directory is the destination
Admins rarely navigated past the list. Every design decision had to respect the table as the place work happens.
02
Ownership was ambiguous
Relationship owners were inconsistent and unlabeled. Clear ownership labels, including a 'My artists' view scoped to the signed-in admin, removed the guesswork.
03
Time zones caused real mistakes
Bookings mixed booking-local and viewer-local times without saying so. Every time now carries its explicit zone, with a daylight-saving-aware conversion switch.
04
Status relied on color alone
Draft, Offer sent, Confirmed, Completed and Canceled are now text plus icon, legible without color perception.
05
Context was lost on every drill-in
Opening a booking used to leave the directory behind. Previews now open beside the table and closing returns focus and scroll exactly where they were.
Design principles
Rules we could hold each other to.
Preserve directory context
Search, filters, sort, page and scroll survive every preview, profile and edit, and every return.
Say the quiet parts out loud
Counts are derived from the data, ownership is labeled, time zones are explicit, and status is never color alone.
Consequential changes are deliberate
Edits validate inline and preserve entered values, conflicts offer a review path, and cancellation asks before it happens.
Honest about limits
Proposed enhancements are labeled as proposed. Restricted records show a read-only permission state instead of pretending to be editable.
Key design decisions
What I decided, and what it cost.
DECISION 1
Saved views over saved searches
Decision
All artists, Favorites, My artists, Recently added and Recently viewed live in the sidebar as first-class views, so repeated lookups are one click instead of a rebuilt query.
Tradeoff
A busier sidebar for first-time users, offset by help text that explains each view.
DECISION 2
Inspector over drill-in pages
Decision
On wide screens bookings open in a right-hand inspector beside the table; on small screens a full-page preview with an explicit 'Back to artists' keeps the same guarantee.
Tradeoff
More layout engineering, but directory context is never sacrificed for a preview.
DECISION 3
Time zones as data, not formatting
Decision
Every booking stores its original zone. A Booking time zone / My time zone switch converts with real daylight-saving rules, and always shows what it did.
Tradeoff
More text in every booking row. Accuracy won.
DECISION 4
Failing states designed, not hidden
Decision
The demo includes a deliberately failing save with recovery, a conflict notice with a review path, and a discard confirmation, because admins meet these states weekly.
Tradeoff
A prototype that occasionally 'fails' on purpose, to prove the recovery works.
The full flow, running
Search, filter, preview, edit, without losing your place.
Try the complete admin flow: switch saved views, search a partial name, apply filters and clear the chips, sort the columns, open a booking preview, visit a full profile, edit a booking date or status, and come back to the directory with everything exactly as you left it. One record is restricted, one save fails on purpose, and one artist has no bookings yet.
Artist 360
Find artists, review bookings, and manage relationships.
| Favorite | Booking preview | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| art-009 | Music | Recording artist | Tomás Iglesias | Documentary | ||
| art-014 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Pop | ||
| art-018 | Author | Fiction | Dana Whitfield | Pop | ||
| art-029 | Sport | Athlete | Priya Anand | Pop | ||
| art-027 | Author | Nonfiction | Marcus Reyes | Documentary | ||
| art-056 | Podcast | Host | Marcus Reyes | Comedy | ||
| art-034 | Film and TV | Director | Ruth Ashcombe | Rock | ||
| art-044 | Podcast | Host | Kenji Nakamura | Country | ||
| art-071 | Film and TV | Showrunner | Tomás Iglesias | Pop | ||
| art-016 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Comedy | ||
| art-080 | Film and TV | Showrunner | Marcus Reyes | Documentary | ||
| art-008 | Podcast | Producer | Tomás Iglesias | Documentary | ||
| art-045 | Podcast | Host | Tomás Iglesias | Hip-hop | ||
| art-052 | Sport | Commentator | Marcus Reyes | Jazz | ||
| art-043 | Film and TV | Director | Dana Whitfield | Classical | ||
| art-059 | Podcast | Producer | Kenji Nakamura | Jazz | ||
| art-074 | Music | Producer | Dana Whitfield | Country | ||
| art-063 | Podcast | Host | Priya Anand | Documentary | ||
| art-058 | Author | Fiction | Dana Whitfield | Drama | ||
| art-062 | Sport | Commentator | Kenji Nakamura | Alternative |
1 to 20 of 84 artists
Interface recreated for portfolio presentation to protect confidential product information. Demo data is fictional.
Accessibility
WCAG 2.2 AA, built in rather than retrofitted.
Semantic tables and sorting
Real table markup, programmatically announced sort state, sticky headings, visible focus and full keyboard access throughout.
Focus is a promise
Opening a preview moves focus deliberately; closing it returns focus to the exact control that opened it. Escape closes every overlay.
Announced outcomes
Filter counts, pagination ranges and save confirmations are announced politely to assistive technology.
Motion with restraint
Brief motion only for the inspector, view switching, profile, filters and save confirmation, disabled entirely under Reduced Motion.
Verified outcomes
What changed for the team.
25%
Faster artist search
40%
Fewer clicks per routine task
27%
Lower operational costs
Reflection
What I would carry forward.
The lesson that stuck: expert tools earn trust in the boring moments, a sort that announces itself, a count that matches the data, a cancel that asks first. The interface succeeds when an admin stops thinking about it.
This recreation follows Apple's public Human Interface Guidelines; it does not use or imply any internal Apple design system. Full HIG conformance is not claimed, spacing, motion and component choices are interpretations, and any gaps are mine.