Kauli & Matrix: two diagnostic products, one framework
Kauli and Matrix are two AI-native products I designed and built solo under Suluhu Studio, both using the Claude API. They look like separate tools, a decision diagnostic and an organizational maturity assessment, but they run on the same underlying frameworks pointed at two different targets: one decision at a time, or a whole design function at once.
The shared frameworks
Both products run on three diagnostic lenses I developed for Suluhu’s client work before either product existed. Build Threshold tests whether the conditions to proceed on a decision are actually met or only assumed. Friction Map locates where resistance is concentrated in something already underperforming. Signal Stack separates what is known from what is assumed when the data conflicts.
Kauli applies all three to a founder’s stated decision. Matrix uses Friction Map internally to decide which two interventions would move an organization’s design function the most. Reuse wasn’t the plan. Once Kauli was built and Matrix needed a way to prioritize interventions, Friction Map was already the right shape.
Kauli: diagnosing a single decision
Kauli is a 20-minute, no-login self-serve tool. A founder describes their organization and the decision in front of them, Kauli picks the framework that fits where the decision actually sits, and runs a structured interrogation, not a form. It won’t accept “we need to redesign our onboarding” as a decision brief, since that’s a solution wearing a problem’s clothes. The output names the real decision, the framework applied, why that one and not the other two, and the two structural findings a founder was least likely to have seen.
Try Kauli for your organization
A sample Kauli brief for Shamba Credit, a fictional agritech company.
From Figma to code with the Figma MCP
I designed Kauli’s interface in Figma, then used the Figma MCP to build it in code. Components, variables and layout were read straight from the design file instead of being re-described in a prompt or redrawn from screenshots, so what shipped matched what I’d designed.
Matrix: diagnosing a whole design function
Matrix asks whether a design function is built to last and actually shapes what an organization decides. Most design maturity models, including the well-known Western ones, measure process sophistication as a stand-in for organizational value. I built Matrix on two separate conditions instead: whether practices are documented and would survive a key person leaving, and whether design changes the decisions the organization makes, not just how they are executed. A team can be highly disciplined and still be organizationally invisible, or have real influence and be one departure away from losing it.
The assessment scores five dimensions: process architecture, research and evidence, business articulation, organizational integration, and scalability and succession. It returns one of four named outcomes (Engine, Oracle, Factory or Ghost) describing the structural condition the function is in and what kind of intervention it needs, not a generic maturity score.
A sample result, for a fictional fintech: The Factory, with Practice Maturity 3.1 and Decision Influence 1.8.
Matrix runs in two modes: a self-serve AI-scored version, and a fuller version I administer personally as part of Suluhu’s Design Intelligence in Residence engagement. It’s now on its second version.
Try Matrix with a three-question read
A quick read on your own design function, using Matrix's two axes: Practice Maturity and Decision Influence. It's a teaser, not the full 15-question assessment. Nothing you pick leaves this page.