Design Systems

TSHR goes beyond standard solutions, developing innovative design methodologies tailored to each user’s needs. We build custom design systems for both expert users with advanced domain knowledge and users with limited technical experience or language proficiency.

Our Approach

• Assessment & Strategy: We conduct extensive user testing across organizations, industries, and user bases, publishing insights privately or publicly to inform tool development.

• Innovative: All solutions are practical and innovative. For example, TSHR produced the world’s tool that identifies whether a user’s rights have been violated. TSHR has also created the only public tool that makes a legal database substnatively accessible.

• Accessible: For public-facing tools, TSHR ensures meaningful accessibility in content (clear language), display (for users with visual impairments), and navigation (intuitive design). For internal tools, TSHR addresses underlying design challenges through thorough user research and iterative development.

• Decolonial Approaches to Design: Our human rights tools integrate decolonial principles, recognizing that marginalized populations, who often lack technical resources, are the primary victims of rights violations. We design accessible tools to empower these users, promoting autonomy over their rights.

Examples

• Human Rights Violation Prediction Tool: This tool allows non-experts to explore legal issues without requiring technical, legal, or language skills—or significant financial resources. Users input questions (even with typos), which the tool translates into legal terms, applies a classifier to detect rights violations, and presents relevant case law.

• Data Visualation of Document Databases: TSHR applies advanced search and visualization techniques to make complex document databases more usable and insightful. For instance, we developed a tool that lets users navigate document databases through interrelated data visualizations, allowing simultaneous trend analysis and document discovery. This approach helps users see overarching patterns within the database, then drill down to specific documents related to those trends, making complex data landscapes accessible and actionable.

• Semantic Search Functions: TSHR’s search tools provide transparent, relevant results to help users conduct efficient and trustworthy research. We design ranking systems to be fully visible to users, displaying essential document summaries in search lists. This approach reduces the need to open each document, allowing users to quickly assess relevance and streamline their research process.