Leading digital design at a.s.r.
At a.s.r. - one of the major insurance companies in the Netherlands - I have coached and directed a team of 23 UX designers, visual designers and UX researchers and I was responsible for the creative policy for all communication digital.
At a.s.r., my main focus was building, strengthening, and improving the design team. In total, 23 UX designers, visual designers, and UX researchers worked across more than 10 multi-disciplinary scrum teams. To support them, I introduced a shared way of working.
During my time there, I initiated a design system, helped mature UX research within the organisation, and reorganised our design toolkit to raise the overall design maturity.
Just as important, I worked on creating an open and inspiring environment where designers and researchers could do what they do best: create outstanding digital experiences for a.s.r.’s (potential) customers.
Alongside growing the team, I set the right standards together with them, introduced discovery and design thinking into processes, organised design sprints, and embedded research throughout the design process.
Photo: Michael van Oosten
THE DESIGN SYSTEM BY A.S.R.
Scaling up design
The number of multi-disciplinary teams grew steadily - and so did the design team. We began initiating a design system for a.s.r. early 2020 in order to keep up with this growth. It all started with gaining support from the organisation, setting up the right processes and teams and reevaluating the design toolkit. Today, the design system is up and running and adopted organisation-wide.
UX RESEARCH
Knowing what your users need
When I started at a.s.r. one of my main objectives was incorporating research in all design processes. As we all tend to tackle problems from an inside-out perspective, it is essential to really know and breathe what needs, comforts, gains, motivations and problems the customers - and future customers - are dealing with.
Within the design chapter I build a strong team of UX researchers, so we were capable to incorporate research in the earliest stages of the design proposals. Cutting out assumptions, reducing overhead and most of all, designing with the knowledge that these are the functionalities users really need.
SCHAAL+
Masterclass 'UX design & Agile / Scrum'
In March 2020, I was invited by Schaal+ to give a masterclass about UX design and agile / scrum.
© Remco Homberg 2001 — 2025