Design
May 5, 2025
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Find the Cognitive Leaks
Design is not decoration. It is cognitive engineering.
Most teams say they are designing for humans, then accidentally ship interfaces that tax attention, memory, and motivation. Users pay that tax as hesitation, confusion, second guessing, and drop off.
I call those moments cognitive leaks. They are the places where an experience loses momentum because the UI asks the brain to do extra work it did not sign up for.
This framework is how I find and fix those leaks. It is structured enough to be repeatable, but human enough to work in the real world where messy constraints exist. This is part one of a three-part series where I dive into how to identify, diagnose, and fix those leaks to leave users feeling delighted, empowered, and understood instead.
The framework in one sentence
I define who we are designing for and what success should feel like, then I diagnose the experience through five specific lenses, and I translate every issue into a clear psychological root cause and an equally clear fix.
What this series covers
This is a three part process:
Step 1: Audit Framework (this article)
Define who you are designing for, what they are trying to achieve, and what the experience should feel like.Step 2: C.L.E.A.R. Diagnostic
Identify exactly where the interface is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation. Based on growth.design framework.Step 3: Mapping and Synthesis
Translate findings into psychological root causes, then into precise, testable fixes.
This first post is all about Step 1, because if you skip it, everything downstream becomes guesswork.
Step 1: The Audit Framework
Before I critique any UI, I establish three anchors:
Persona rung
Dream outcome
Emotional contract
These sound simple, but they eliminate most design confusion before it starts.
1) Persona as a ladder, not a label
“Beginner” and “expert” are not categories. They are different cognitive states.
The same interface can be empowering to an expert and overwhelming to a novice. Dense information can feel efficient to one user and impossible to another.
So I treat persona as a ladder:
Novice
No context. Needs explicit signposts, plain language, and reassurance that they are doing it right.Advanced beginner
Recognizes patterns sometimes, still needs guidance and examples.Competent
Understands the system. Wants structure, consistency, and speed.Expert
Runs on pattern recognition. Wants density and control, and has low patience for friction disguised as simplicity.
This matters because every good UX decision depends on which rung you are designing for right now.
A tooltip might be essential for a novice and insulting for an expert. A detailed setup screen might be comforting to a competent user and a dropout cliff for a beginner. Without this clarity, teams debate design based on preference instead of reality.
The Dream Outcome
Next, I define the job we are optimizing for.
Not “engagement.” Not “time on site.” The actual thing the user came to do. If value is determined by how compelling a dream outcome is, plus the likelihood of achieving it, divided by the time and effort required to achieve it, then this step is critical. People gravitate towards high value options subconsciously.
Most visits collapse into a handful of human motives:
Solve a problem now (speed, relief, “get me unstuck”)
Reduce uncertainty (is this right, safe, legit, worth it?)
Make a decision (choose the best option with minimal regret)
Create something (output, artifact, progress, momentum)
Get oriented (what is this, can it help me, what do I do next?)
Prove capability (can it actually do what it claims?)
Feel in control (I can steer this; I won’t get trapped)
If the dream outcome is unclear, the interface tries to do everything at once. That is how you get multiple competing calls to action, bloated pages, and users who feel like they are being pitched to instead of guided.
A simple rule helps:
One primary job per surface.
Everything else should support that job.
The Emotional Contract
The last anchor is the emotional contract, which is the intended feeling of the experience.
Do we want this to feel:
calm
confident
premium
playful
intense
safe
rebellious
precise
inviting
Emotion is not “branding fluff.” It is a trust signal.
If a product promises calm confidence but the UI feels frantic, crowded, or loud, users feel that mismatch. They might not name it, but they will hesitate. They will doubt. They will leave.
When I define the emotional contract, I check whether the tone is consistent across:
typography and spacing
visual hierarchy
copy voice
feedback and motion
trust signals and clarity at commitment moments
What Step 1 produces
By the end of Step 1, I want a short brief that anyone can repeat:
Who is this for, specifically?
What do they need to achieve?
What should it feel like to succeed?
This becomes the standard of judgment for the rest of the work.
When a design decision comes up, we do not ask, “Do we like it?”
We ask, “Does it help this persona reach the dream outcome while matching the emotional contract?”
That one shift is how you stop debating and start designing.
A quick way to apply this today
Pick one key page in your product, like a landing page or onboarding step, and answer these in one paragraph each:
Who is the user rung here?
What is the dream outcome on this page?
What should it feel like while completing it?
If you cannot answer those quickly, you have found your first cognitive leak. The team is designing without a shared target.
Coming next in Part 2
Now that the standard is set, the next step is diagnosis. In Part 2, I will break down the five lens system I use to find exactly where a UI is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation, without turning critique into a debate about taste.
Sources:
Credit to Alex Hormozi for the formula on creating unbeatable value. I highly recommend checking out his thinking on how to create offers you would feel foolish to say no to.
Stay Inspired
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Latest Blogs
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Get fresh design insights, articles, and resources delivered straight to your inbox.
Design
May 5, 2025
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Find the Cognitive Leaks
Design is not decoration. It is cognitive engineering.
Most teams say they are designing for humans, then accidentally ship interfaces that tax attention, memory, and motivation. Users pay that tax as hesitation, confusion, second guessing, and drop off.
I call those moments cognitive leaks. They are the places where an experience loses momentum because the UI asks the brain to do extra work it did not sign up for.
This framework is how I find and fix those leaks. It is structured enough to be repeatable, but human enough to work in the real world where messy constraints exist. This is part one of a three-part series where I dive into how to identify, diagnose, and fix those leaks to leave users feeling delighted, empowered, and understood instead.
The framework in one sentence
I define who we are designing for and what success should feel like, then I diagnose the experience through five specific lenses, and I translate every issue into a clear psychological root cause and an equally clear fix.
What this series covers
This is a three part process:
Step 1: Audit Framework (this article)
Define who you are designing for, what they are trying to achieve, and what the experience should feel like.Step 2: C.L.E.A.R. Diagnostic
Identify exactly where the interface is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation. Based on growth.design framework.Step 3: Mapping and Synthesis
Translate findings into psychological root causes, then into precise, testable fixes.
This first post is all about Step 1, because if you skip it, everything downstream becomes guesswork.
Step 1: The Audit Framework
Before I critique any UI, I establish three anchors:
Persona rung
Dream outcome
Emotional contract
These sound simple, but they eliminate most design confusion before it starts.
1) Persona as a ladder, not a label
“Beginner” and “expert” are not categories. They are different cognitive states.
The same interface can be empowering to an expert and overwhelming to a novice. Dense information can feel efficient to one user and impossible to another.
So I treat persona as a ladder:
Novice
No context. Needs explicit signposts, plain language, and reassurance that they are doing it right.Advanced beginner
Recognizes patterns sometimes, still needs guidance and examples.Competent
Understands the system. Wants structure, consistency, and speed.Expert
Runs on pattern recognition. Wants density and control, and has low patience for friction disguised as simplicity.
This matters because every good UX decision depends on which rung you are designing for right now.
A tooltip might be essential for a novice and insulting for an expert. A detailed setup screen might be comforting to a competent user and a dropout cliff for a beginner. Without this clarity, teams debate design based on preference instead of reality.
The Dream Outcome
Next, I define the job we are optimizing for.
Not “engagement.” Not “time on site.” The actual thing the user came to do. If value is determined by how compelling a dream outcome is, plus the likelihood of achieving it, divided by the time and effort required to achieve it, then this step is critical. People gravitate towards high value options subconsciously.
Most visits collapse into a handful of human motives:
Solve a problem now (speed, relief, “get me unstuck”)
Reduce uncertainty (is this right, safe, legit, worth it?)
Make a decision (choose the best option with minimal regret)
Create something (output, artifact, progress, momentum)
Get oriented (what is this, can it help me, what do I do next?)
Prove capability (can it actually do what it claims?)
Feel in control (I can steer this; I won’t get trapped)
If the dream outcome is unclear, the interface tries to do everything at once. That is how you get multiple competing calls to action, bloated pages, and users who feel like they are being pitched to instead of guided.
A simple rule helps:
One primary job per surface.
Everything else should support that job.
The Emotional Contract
The last anchor is the emotional contract, which is the intended feeling of the experience.
Do we want this to feel:
calm
confident
premium
playful
intense
safe
rebellious
precise
inviting
Emotion is not “branding fluff.” It is a trust signal.
If a product promises calm confidence but the UI feels frantic, crowded, or loud, users feel that mismatch. They might not name it, but they will hesitate. They will doubt. They will leave.
When I define the emotional contract, I check whether the tone is consistent across:
typography and spacing
visual hierarchy
copy voice
feedback and motion
trust signals and clarity at commitment moments
What Step 1 produces
By the end of Step 1, I want a short brief that anyone can repeat:
Who is this for, specifically?
What do they need to achieve?
What should it feel like to succeed?
This becomes the standard of judgment for the rest of the work.
When a design decision comes up, we do not ask, “Do we like it?”
We ask, “Does it help this persona reach the dream outcome while matching the emotional contract?”
That one shift is how you stop debating and start designing.
A quick way to apply this today
Pick one key page in your product, like a landing page or onboarding step, and answer these in one paragraph each:
Who is the user rung here?
What is the dream outcome on this page?
What should it feel like while completing it?
If you cannot answer those quickly, you have found your first cognitive leak. The team is designing without a shared target.
Coming next in Part 2
Now that the standard is set, the next step is diagnosis. In Part 2, I will break down the five lens system I use to find exactly where a UI is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation, without turning critique into a debate about taste.
Sources:
Credit to Alex Hormozi for the formula on creating unbeatable value. I highly recommend checking out his thinking on how to create offers you would feel foolish to say no to.
Stay Inspired
Get fresh design insights, articles, and resources delivered straight to your inbox.
Latest Blogs
Stay Inspired
Get fresh design insights, articles, and resources delivered straight to your inbox.
Design
May 5, 2025
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Find the Cognitive Leaks (Part 1: The Audit Framework)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Step 1 of My 3-Step UI/UX Design Framework (with Behavioral Psychology Built In)
Find the Cognitive Leaks
Design is not decoration. It is cognitive engineering.
Most teams say they are designing for humans, then accidentally ship interfaces that tax attention, memory, and motivation. Users pay that tax as hesitation, confusion, second guessing, and drop off.
I call those moments cognitive leaks. They are the places where an experience loses momentum because the UI asks the brain to do extra work it did not sign up for.
This framework is how I find and fix those leaks. It is structured enough to be repeatable, but human enough to work in the real world where messy constraints exist. This is part one of a three-part series where I dive into how to identify, diagnose, and fix those leaks to leave users feeling delighted, empowered, and understood instead.
The framework in one sentence
I define who we are designing for and what success should feel like, then I diagnose the experience through five specific lenses, and I translate every issue into a clear psychological root cause and an equally clear fix.
What this series covers
This is a three part process:
Step 1: Audit Framework (this article)
Define who you are designing for, what they are trying to achieve, and what the experience should feel like.Step 2: C.L.E.A.R. Diagnostic
Identify exactly where the interface is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation. Based on growth.design framework.Step 3: Mapping and Synthesis
Translate findings into psychological root causes, then into precise, testable fixes.
This first post is all about Step 1, because if you skip it, everything downstream becomes guesswork.
Step 1: The Audit Framework
Before I critique any UI, I establish three anchors:
Persona rung
Dream outcome
Emotional contract
These sound simple, but they eliminate most design confusion before it starts.
1) Persona as a ladder, not a label
“Beginner” and “expert” are not categories. They are different cognitive states.
The same interface can be empowering to an expert and overwhelming to a novice. Dense information can feel efficient to one user and impossible to another.
So I treat persona as a ladder:
Novice
No context. Needs explicit signposts, plain language, and reassurance that they are doing it right.Advanced beginner
Recognizes patterns sometimes, still needs guidance and examples.Competent
Understands the system. Wants structure, consistency, and speed.Expert
Runs on pattern recognition. Wants density and control, and has low patience for friction disguised as simplicity.
This matters because every good UX decision depends on which rung you are designing for right now.
A tooltip might be essential for a novice and insulting for an expert. A detailed setup screen might be comforting to a competent user and a dropout cliff for a beginner. Without this clarity, teams debate design based on preference instead of reality.
The Dream Outcome
Next, I define the job we are optimizing for.
Not “engagement.” Not “time on site.” The actual thing the user came to do. If value is determined by how compelling a dream outcome is, plus the likelihood of achieving it, divided by the time and effort required to achieve it, then this step is critical. People gravitate towards high value options subconsciously.
Most visits collapse into a handful of human motives:
Solve a problem now (speed, relief, “get me unstuck”)
Reduce uncertainty (is this right, safe, legit, worth it?)
Make a decision (choose the best option with minimal regret)
Create something (output, artifact, progress, momentum)
Get oriented (what is this, can it help me, what do I do next?)
Prove capability (can it actually do what it claims?)
Feel in control (I can steer this; I won’t get trapped)
If the dream outcome is unclear, the interface tries to do everything at once. That is how you get multiple competing calls to action, bloated pages, and users who feel like they are being pitched to instead of guided.
A simple rule helps:
One primary job per surface.
Everything else should support that job.
The Emotional Contract
The last anchor is the emotional contract, which is the intended feeling of the experience.
Do we want this to feel:
calm
confident
premium
playful
intense
safe
rebellious
precise
inviting
Emotion is not “branding fluff.” It is a trust signal.
If a product promises calm confidence but the UI feels frantic, crowded, or loud, users feel that mismatch. They might not name it, but they will hesitate. They will doubt. They will leave.
When I define the emotional contract, I check whether the tone is consistent across:
typography and spacing
visual hierarchy
copy voice
feedback and motion
trust signals and clarity at commitment moments
What Step 1 produces
By the end of Step 1, I want a short brief that anyone can repeat:
Who is this for, specifically?
What do they need to achieve?
What should it feel like to succeed?
This becomes the standard of judgment for the rest of the work.
When a design decision comes up, we do not ask, “Do we like it?”
We ask, “Does it help this persona reach the dream outcome while matching the emotional contract?”
That one shift is how you stop debating and start designing.
A quick way to apply this today
Pick one key page in your product, like a landing page or onboarding step, and answer these in one paragraph each:
Who is the user rung here?
What is the dream outcome on this page?
What should it feel like while completing it?
If you cannot answer those quickly, you have found your first cognitive leak. The team is designing without a shared target.
Coming next in Part 2
Now that the standard is set, the next step is diagnosis. In Part 2, I will break down the five lens system I use to find exactly where a UI is leaking attention, understanding, and motivation, without turning critique into a debate about taste.
Sources:
Credit to Alex Hormozi for the formula on creating unbeatable value. I highly recommend checking out his thinking on how to create offers you would feel foolish to say no to.
Stay Inspired
Get fresh design insights, articles, and resources delivered straight to your inbox.
Latest Blogs
Stay Inspired
Get fresh design insights, articles, and resources delivered straight to your inbox.