At Booking Experts, Product Designers, Engineers and Product Managers work together to build one platform for the recreation industry. In the cloud, they develop a SaaS platform that hundreds of recreation businesses use every day to run their operations and serve their guests.

Harold works as a Product Designer within Team Product. In this interview, he shares what it’s like to work here, how the team collaborates and why working on a single product is such an interesting challenge.

Meet Harold

Harold is 35 years old and lives in Wierden with his wife and their two children, Sepp and Norah.

Before joining Booking Experts, he worked as a designer at 12Build, another SaaS platform. Before that, he worked at several agencies as a UX/UI designer. 🎨

“At an agency you often work for multiple clients at the same time, which means you stay quite broad in what you do. In SaaS you can go much deeper. You work on the same product for a longer period of time and immediately see how your design decisions improve the product. That focus really appealed to me.”

What does your role as a Product Designer look like?

As a Product Designer, Harold focuses on designing interfaces and interactions for the platform.“You translate complex problems into a clear and logical interface,” he explains. “At the same time, you're constantly thinking about what the best solution is for the user.”

Because the platform contains many different features, a lot of the work comes down to logical thinking.

“It’s not just about how something looks,” Harold says. “It mainly needs to work well. In SaaS there’s often a lot of logic behind a design.”

What attracted you to this role before you joined?

During the application process, Harold first spoke with Mustafa for an introduction. He remembers that conversation as approachable and relaxed. “It felt like an open conversation where we simply got to know each other and talked about how we think about product development.”

After that, he completed an assignment and had a final conversation with Ali, the CEO. “That stood out to me as well: the communication lines are short. You can easily talk to people and the atmosphere is very informal. Everyone is approachable and it doesn’t feel hierarchical.”

Besides the culture, the role itself also appealed to him. The recreation industry wasn’t necessarily the deciding factor for Harold, but the fact that Booking Experts is a growing SaaS company where the product is constantly evolving.

For Harold, the culture and the way of working were just as important as the role itself.“It wasn’t only about what I can already do, but mainly about how I could contribute and think along with the team.”

What a typical day looks like as a Product Designer

A typical day for Harold often starts with a short daily check-in, followed by focused work in the morning. 🧑‍💻 He spends a lot of time working in Figma and documenting work in GitHub.

“The projects we work on come from the product roadmap. Right now I’m working on a payment schedule and improvements to our design system. By improving the design system we create more consistency in the platform and make it easier for teams to design and build user-friendly solutions faster.”

Besides designing, there’s also time for research and improvements.“You’re constantly looking at how things can be better or more logical. There’s a lot of room for new ideas and features, and when a good idea comes up it can relatively quickly make its way onto the roadmap.”

Booking Experts also puts a lot of emphasis on flexibility and a healthy work-life balance. “Hybrid work is possible, as long as you let people know,” Harold says. “There’s flexibility in how you structure your day. You’re not sitting behind your desk all day: we often have lunch together or go for a walk. That really helps to stay sharp and balance work with personal life.”

What it’s like to work in Team Product

Harold says he quickly felt at home in the team. “The atmosphere is open and approachable. Colleagues are easy to talk to and everyone is open to questions or ideas.”

That openness is also visible in the way feedback is shared.“We’re quite direct with each other, but always with the goal of improving the product. Every Thursday we have a feedback moment where we review designs together.”

According to Harold, that keeps everyone sharp.“You get honest feedback and ask each other critical questions. That helps to continuously improve ideas and designs.”

For Harold, Team Product is mainly about responsibility and collaboration. “What we design determines how users experience the platform. That’s why the end user is always central and we take responsibility for the impact of our design decisions.”

The way of working supports that. Mornings are usually reserved for focused work, while afternoons are often used for discussions and alignment.“We don’t really have a heavy meeting culture. The meetings we do have are efficient and have a clear purpose, like design alignments where we challenge each other’s design decisions.” New colleagues also get the time to really understand the product.

“You can’t learn the entire product in a week, and you’re given the time to get familiar with it.” During his first weeks, Harold followed the Booking Experts Academy. “In the first two weeks you get a solid introduction to the platform and the recreation industry. That helped me a lot to understand the product.”

How do Designers work with Engineers and Product Managers?

Within Team Product, Product Designers work closely together with Product Managers and Engineers. “Product Managers are in close contact with users and often bring in the challenges,” Harold explains. “Together we look at how we can design the best possible solution.” Designers then work out the interfaces and interactions, after which they collaborate closely with Engineering.

“During the process we regularly align with Engineers to see what the best technical approach is. That way design and technology stay closely connected.” Even though Product Managers mainly guard the roadmap, there is a lot of room for discussion. “As a designer you really think along about how something should be solved. You look at the problem together and determine what the best solution is for the user.”

What gives you the most energy in your work?

For Harold, the most enjoyable part of the job is solving complex problems.

“What I like most is translating a complex problem into a clear UI. There are often multiple ways to implement something, so you really have to think about which solution works best for the user.”

Who would be a good fit for this role?

According to Harold, the role fits designers who look beyond just the visual side of design.“You should mainly be interested in how something works for the user.”

It’s also important to be comfortable working independently.“You get a lot of freedom here. That also means taking initiative and responsibility for your work. And of course you need to be open to feedback.”

Thinking about applying?

Harold has one final tip for designers who are curious about the role.“The application process is pretty relaxed. It often just starts with a coffee and getting to know each other. That already gives you a good sense of the team and how we work.”

And he finishes with a smile: “If you stop by on a Friday, there’s usually time for a beer as well.” 🍻

Work as a Product Designer at Booking Experts

Help build one scalable platform together with a team of specialists in Enschede and/or Zwolle. Check out our open positions for Medior Product Designer and Senior Product Designer.