Stage One

14/10/2025

Heads of UX and Design, what’s your backup plan when projects spike?

Your team is talented. But even the best teams hit crunch points:
📈 Deadlines collide
🌀 New projects land suddenly
👥 Clients need deliverables faster than expected

Hiring isn’t an option; it’s too slow, tied up in HR, procurement, and IR35.

Freelancers can be hit-and-miss.

That’s exactly why we built Stage One.

We give design leaders instant, on-demand access to senior UX, UI, and user research professionals who can plug straight into your team:
✅ No contracts
✅ No HR or IR35 issues
✅ No hand-holding, our people are highly experienced and work independently

For context:
- We cut customer support calls by 86% for the Solicitors Regulation Authority
- A design we created was so well received, a client’s biggest customer said they’d roll it out to 47,000 staff worldwide if built that way
- And to keep it risk-free: if our work doesn’t save your team time, rework, or costs in the first month, you don’t pay.

So, what’s your backup plan the next time your team hits capacity?

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13/10/2025

Do you use AI to vet CVs?

Here’s a real example from a job ad I saw recently:

🔍 “Our AI evaluates your CV and LinkedIn profile thoroughly, analysing your skills, experience, and achievements.”
📊 “It compares your profile to the job’s requirements and past success factors to determine your match score.”
🎯 “We automatically shortlist the top 3 candidates for the role.”

Sounds smart, right?

Except… here’s what happens in reality:

❌ AI struggles to understand context
❌ Misses skills described in different wording
❌ Ignores important experience
❌ Sometimes even skips over entire CV sections

The result? Great candidates get filtered out, and companies waste time.
👉 And this isn’t just a recruitment problem.

Across projects, businesses lose time and money when bad systems make bad decisions.

That’s why we built Stage One.

With Stage One, there’s no need for screening or hiring delays. You get instant, on-demand UX, UI, and user research support from senior professionals:
✅ No HR
✅ No contracts
✅ No IR35
✅ Independent experts (no hand-holding needed)

And you can start risk-free: if our work doesn’t save your project development time, you don’t pay. Plus, you can scale up, down, or cancel anytime.

12/10/2025

Are you recruiting design professionals? Don’t rely on ATS checkers.

Yesterday, we tested ATS CV/resume reading tools.

It failed on every single CV:
❌ Couldn’t understand context
❌ Missed different wording for the same skills
❌ Couldn’t read PDFs properly
❌ Struggled with company names and links
❌ Even missed contact details

Basically, it was worse than useless.

And here’s the kicker: these CVs were well laid out, clear, and full of great experience.

The tool still got it wrong.

➡️ Which raises the bigger point: how many businesses are making decisions based on broken systems, wasting time, and filtering out the right people?

That’s exactly why we built Stage One.

Instead of relying on clunky processes or rushing to hire, we give software teams instant, on-demand access to senior UX, UI, and user research support, no contracts, no HR, no delays.

So your projects get done faster, with fewer errors, and without recruitment headaches.

Curious, have you ever lost a great candidate or wasted time because of a broken system like this?

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11/10/2025

🎯 Let Stage One be your UX team’s superpower

If you lead a UX or research team, you’ve probably faced one (or all) of these:
- More project demand than you have capacity for
- Specialists you need but can’t hire quickly
- Pressure to prove design decisions actually move the needle

That’s exactly why we built Stage One.

We’re a plug-and-play UX function you can activate whenever you need extra muscle:
⚡ Drop tasks into our portal → our vetted specialists execute → you sign off
⚡ Access researchers & designers with deep, practical experience
⚡ Scale up or down without IR35 headaches or long contracts

Some results we’ve delivered:
- Helped Capita design an employee system rolled out to 47,000 staff
- Cut support calls by 86% for the Solicitors Regulation Authority
- Fixed a major security flaw in a consumer alarm system while making it usable for everyday customers

With Stage One, your team gets the backup it needs, without the overhead.
And you get to stay focused on strategy and impact, not resource gaps.

👉 DM me “UX” if you’d like to see how this works in practice.

19/08/2025

🚨 The #1 hidden reason software projects fail (and it’s not bad code)

Most digital projects don’t fail because of tech. They fail because:
- Users weren’t involved early
- Research was rushed
- Teams guessed instead of testing

We helped the Solicitors Regulation Authority cut support calls by 86% by fixing this exact issue.

Curious, how does your team handle UX research today?

Comment below ⬇️ if you want to see a faster approach.

15/08/2025

🚨 Most digital projects fail for 1 of 3 reasons…

If you’re leading a software project, chances are one of these is biting you right now:
- Projects go over budget 📉
- You’re not building the right product ❌
- You’re unsure what users actually need 🤷‍♂️

I’m Steve, founder of Stage One.
We help PMs and UX leaders build the right thing, the first time, without the cost and hassle of extra hires.

Proven results:
✅ Designed an employee system that Capita’s client rolled out to 47,000 staff
✅ Cut support calls by 86% for the Solicitors Regulation Authority
✅ Fixed a major security flaw in a home alarm system while making it usable for non-tech-savvy customers

How it works:
- You drop tasks in our portal
- A vetted UX specialist picks it up and delivers it fast
- You review and approve, no contracts, no overhead, cancel anytime
Guarantee:

If we don’t meet 80% of user needs in 3 months, you get a full refund and keep the work.

📩 DM me “UX” if you want a plug-and-play UX function that delivers what users actually need.

12/08/2025

Great product managers don’t just ship fast. They make the right calls.
You already juggle stakeholder drama, sprint planning, and roadmap chaos.
But the PMs who stand out?

They bring real user insight into every meeting.

They never guess.

And they’re known for delivering products that land.

That’s why smart PMs use Stage One, on-demand user research & UX design that makes you look like a genius.

→ Validate ideas before you commit dev time
→ Prove your UX instincts with real user data
→ Ship confidently—and get credit for it

Your product wins.

Your team wins.

You win.

Want to future-proof your next roadmap presentation?
DM me “insight.”

https://www.wearestageone.com/

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On-demand UX Resource starting from as little as £1,500 per month. We can support your digital products or integrate with your existing UX team.

30/07/2025

Struggling to scale your UX projects without the overhead? Stage One delivers instant, on-demand user research and design expertise with no contracts, no hassle.

Submit requests via our sleek dashboard, work with top specialists, and launch your project to new heights.

Curious?

Discover how we’ve slashed customer calls by 86% and boosted sales by millions at www.wearestageone.com.

14/07/2025

Digital Product Managers: Struggling to nail the perfect design for your customers? Get 10 powerful user research & design tasks in just 30 days with our proven User-Centred Design approach. Deliver results that wow—or we refund you and you keep all the research and designs!

https://www.wearestageone.com/pricing

27/06/2025

Digital Product Managers: Need a reliable and successful way of getting the right design for your customers? We can help provide you with as little as 10 user research and design tasks in 30 days via the proven User-Centred Design approach, providing you with a clear path from research to results. If you’re not happy with our designs, we pay you back and you keep all the research and designs.

Book a call to find out more: https://www.wearestageone.com/book-a-consultation

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Book a consultation with one of our digital experts and learn how on-demand UX resources can support you and your business.