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Redefining Access: In Conversation with Tej Kalianda
A Techronicler interview with Tej Kalianda, Lead UX Designer and Systems Architect
When you open Google Search, you expect it to just work. It’s simple, fast, and clean. But what if that simplicity was an illusion? For years, for over 10% of desktop users, the world’s most-viewed webpage was a broken, frustrating, and often inaccessible experience.
This wasn’t a problem that could be solved with a simple patch. It required a foundational re-architecture of Google’s most valuable digital real estate. We sat down with Tej Kalianda, the Lead UX Designer and Systems Architect who led this multi-year initiative, to talk about how she fixed Google Search for hundreds of millions of users.
Techronicler:
Welcome, Tej. It’s great to have you. Let’s start with the scale of this. What was the “desktop responsiveness initiative”?
Tej Kalianda:
Thank you for having me. This was a multi-year effort to fix a fundamental, systemic flaw in the Google Search results page. The page was not fully responsive. It was built on an old assumption that everyone was on a standard, full-screen desktop. The reality is a chaotic mix of screen sizes, resolutions, and user behaviors, and our page was “breaking” for over 10% of our users—a staggering number at Google’s scale.
Techronicler:
What did that “breaking” actually look like for users?
Tej Kalianda:
For many, it meant they’d see cropped content modules or a frustrating horizontal scroll bar. But the problem was far more severe for users with disabilities. We were failing to meet critical WCAG 2.2 accessibility criteria.
For example, users with low vision who rely on screen magnification—say, 200% or even 400% zoom—would find the page completely unusable. The layout would shatter, forcing them into a disorienting loop of horizontal scrolling just to read a single line of text. For users with motor disabilities, like hand tremors, the layout would unpredictably shift, forcing them to “chase” buttons and links across the screen, which is exhausting and demoralizing.
Techronicler:
So this was a foundational accessibility problem. How did you even begin to fix something that complex?
Tej Kalianda:
You can’t just patch a problem like that; you have to redesign the foundation. As the sole lead designer for this, my job was to create a new, unified framework. We had to define the logic for how every single component on the page—from the search bar to the Knowledge Panel, news carousels, shopping results, and all the ad formats—would “resize, reflow, and re-stack” seamlessly and logically.
We created new standards and a codified grid logic that could function at every possible breakpoint, ensuring the page is perfectly usable from a tiny window all the way up to a 400% zoom level.
Techronicler:
You mentioned you were the “sole lead designer,” but Google Search has dozens of teams—Ads, Shopping, Flights, Weather—all plugging into that one page. How did you manage that?
Tej Kalianda:
That’s exactly why my role was less of a “designer” and more of a “systems architect.” I was serving as the Central Design Authority for the Search Design Systems team.
My work was to create the “guiding standard” or the “law of the land” that all those other product teams had to follow. This framework prevents a team from launching a new feature that breaks the layout for everyone else. It ensures that no matter what new module is added, it will be responsive, accessible, and consistent.
Techronicler:
So you were balancing the needs of all these internal teams while also protecting the user experience?
Tej Kalianda:
Exactly. And protecting the business. A single error in this logic—a bug that crops a critical ad slot on one specific laptop size, for example—could have direct and significant revenue implications. My framework had to ensure the experience was usable, legible, and reliable for all users, while also safeguarding the core business and revenue models.
Techronicler:
The portfolio also mentions you had to solve for international users?
Tej Kalianda:
Yes, that was a huge part of it. For complex scenarios like right-to-left (RTL) languages, such as Arabic and Hebrew, it is essential for the entire layout to be perfectly mirrored. We built these new internationalization standards directly into the framework.
In fact, to help manage this at scale, I pitched and helped define an AI-driven tool that could automatically detect these layout errors, allowing us to flag and fix hundreds of issues before they ever reached the public.
Techronicler:
After this multi-year effort, what do you see as the lasting impact?
Tej Kalianda:
The immediate impact was that we fixed numerous, critical accessibility problems for users who rely on zoom, keyboard navigation, and screen readers. But the long-term impact is systemic. The design patterns and logic we created were integrated into Google’s core design system, essentially raising the quality benchmark for all future projects. We proved that it is possible to balance accessibility, complex business needs, and performance at the scale of 8 billion searches a day. We set a new, more inclusive standard for the entire web.
Design as a System
Tej’s work is a powerful reminder that the most impactful design isn’t always a flashy new feature. Sometimes, it’s the “invisible” work of re-architecting the foundation. By creating a single, scalable, and accessible system for the world’s most-viewed page, this initiative has created a more equitable and usable web for billions of people—whether they’re on a laptop, a wide-screen monitor, or using assistive technology.
Tej Kalianda is a leading UX designer and pioneering voice at the intersection of emerging technology and human-centered design. With 15 years of experience shaping products for millions of users at global technology leaders like Google, PayPal, and Citrix, she has established a reputation for her original contributions to inclusive and responsible AI systems. Her unique systems-thinking approach, blending environmental engineering and design, has had a significant impact on how the industry builds more thoughtful and accessible technology.