Why this matters
Scheduling is a key part of a provider’s workflow, but we gave them little to no control over it
UpLift displayed the provider’s calendar but they could only view their sessions or cancel them. They couldn’t directly modify their availability—only an admin could.
MVP calendar showing scheduled clients and available blocks
This setup led to several issues:
Providers had to contact CX to update their schedules, creating unnecessary friction and time-sensitive updates often couldn’t be made quickly
Providers often felt confused and unclear about what their calendar was showing, struggling to understand it at a glance
CX, Product, and Ops teams had limited visibility into a provider’s availability and had to rely on Acuity’s platform due to it’s closed ecosystem
Acuity’s technical limitations prevented calendar-related enhancements, such as deeper integrations or behavioral insights
exploring solutions
Gathering ideas and having some fun before diving in
I facilitated a Crazy 8s session with the product team to generate as many ideas as possible, knowing the calendar would be a critical daily tool for providers—and getting it right was essential to their success and satisfaction.
Getting humbled by the amount of artistic talent in one team
Designing the provider calendar
Giving providers full control over their default availability
Providers could now independently view and edit their default weekly availability—the set hours clients see when browsing their profiles and booking sessions—giving them full control to update them whenever needed.
Adding flexibility with one-time date overrides
One-time overrides gave providers the flexibility to adjust their availability as real-life changes came up—a critical upgrade from the rigid, limited system they had before.
Calendar enhancements
To make the calendar even more useful day-to-day, I designed a set of supportive features that gave providers better visibility, flexibility, and control over their schedules.
Time Zone Support: Enabled providers to update their time zone easily for travel or multi-region care, keeping availability accurate no matter where they were
Ideal Caseload Tool: Helped providers set personal goals by suggesting how many hours of weekly availability they might need to meet their desired caseload
Calendar Key: A quick-reference guide within the calendar to help providers understand availability indicators at a glance
Weekly Caseload Summary: Provided a snapshot of their current booked sessions versus open availability to encourage schedule optimization
Supporting both new and existing providers
Because the new calendar would impact all providers, I had to design for two very different experiences:
New Providers: These providers were joining UpLift for the first time and would encounter the new calendar right from the start. They needed a clear, intuitive onboarding experience to set up their availability from scratch, with built-in guidance at every step.
Step by step guidance for new providers
Existing Providers: These providers had already set up their availability in the old system and needed a supportive introduction to the new calendar to know what changed and how to use the new features.
I collaborated with our content strategist and pm to create an in-product video tutorial, email outreach, and new to do items on their dashboard.
Introduction to new features for current providers
Purposeful mobile design for on-the-go management
While everything in the product was designed to be responsive, mobile needed a more intentional approach.
On mobile, providers mainly needed quick access to view sessions, make session updates, or add overrides—so I streamlined the layout to prioritize fast, efficient actions over replicating the full desktop experience.
Google Calendar integration
Google Calendar integration had been one of the most requested features even before the new calendar work began, so we knew it was important. As a team, we prioritized getting the core calendar experience right first—validating its performance and balancing limited engineering resources.
Once the foundation was stable, I designed a GCal import, allowing providers to sync their calendars into UpLift and reduce double-booking risks. Exporting back to GCal was deferred, given additional scoping, sensitive data considerations, and resource constraints.
The product also got a slick new navigation by the time GCal came around
OUtcomes & impact
On top of the amazing quantitative results, we saw—
Providers reported greater confidence and ease in managing their schedules. The new calendar also unlocked granular availability data for product and ops teams — from weekly trends and scheduling behaviors to provider responsiveness to new features.
With this new visibility, product and CX teams could offer more targeted support and strategic suggestions to providers, especially when helping them optimize their schedules to reach their ideal caseload goals.
