Mascot Design Case Studies
Why Mascots? Because systems don't earn trust — characters do. Learning and compliance content at scale tends to feel cold, dense, and forgettable. A well-designed mascot turns abstract systems into a relationship — a guide the user recognizes, trusts, and actually remembers. This project produced two mascots for two distinct learning problems at Eli Lilly: DIGIT for data integrity, and Luma for the broader learning ecosystem. Both required tight prompt engineering to land the right visual, and tight context engineering to land the right voice across very different touchpoints.
Two case studies in this set. One technical, one cultural. Both built character into systems that didn't have one.
Meet Digit
Data Integrity & Governance Integration Trainer.
I show up wherever ALCOA+ shows up. SOP refreshers, governance trainings, regulated-role onboarding, daily compliance nudges. I keep the principles short, the consequences clear, and the why never out of sight. I was iteratively prompted into being — fifty variations across pose, expression, accessory, and context — until trustworthy and approachable lived in the same character.
Compliance training that's high-stakes and forgettable.
Data integrity training in pharma — particularly around ALCOA+ principles — is unforgiving. A single bad data entry can compromise patient safety, product quality, and regulatory standing. But the training itself? Dense, procedural, and easy to forget the moment the module closes.
Four moves that built Digit.
From abstract compliance topic to companion who shows up across the workflow.
DIGIT's job isn't to lecture — it's to make ALCOA+ feel like a daily practice, not a checkbox. Every interaction grounds back to: why does this matter to a patient downstream?
Iterative prompting to land trustworthy (lab coat), scientific (instruments visible), friendly (rounded silhouette), tech-forward (visor screen). Fifty rejections before five finals.
Direct, practical, lightly playful — but always credible. Always explains the why. Never punishes the mistake. "Let's catch this before audit" not "You forgot to log this."
SOP refreshers, governance trainings, ALCOA+ nudges, regulated-role onboarding. The mascot becomes the mnemonic; the principles become the habit.
Thirty-plus poses, one character.
Each variation is the same DIGIT — different stance, expression, or context. Iterative prompting kept the silhouette consistent while flexing emotion and use case.
How Digit talks.
Direct. Practical. Lightly playful. Never punishes the mistake — always explains the why.
"Let's catch this before audit. Add the timestamp and you're set."
"You forgot to log this. Errors will be reported."
"Quick refresh on ALCOA+? It's been 90 days. Two minutes, then back to it."
"Your SOP refresher is overdue. Please complete this module."
"Clean run. All nine principles hit. Audit-ready."
"Module completed. Score: 100%."
Where Digit shows up.
Five places across the learner's workflow. Same character, different moment.
Quarterly nudges with a 2-minute refresh module
Lead instructor presence in interactive modules
Single-tap reminders inside data-entry tools
First face new compliance hires meet
Pre-audit walkthrough and confidence checks
Every decision is only as good as the data behind it.
Meet Luma
The digital voice of learning at Lilly.
Hi, I'm Luma. I'm the warm, approachable mascot for learning at Lilly. I show up wherever training, onboarding, and continuous learning happens — designed for inclusion, gender-neutral in tone, high-contrast for visibility, globally resonant. Five personality traits, deliberately balanced. The same Luma whether you're meeting me on day one of onboarding or in your tenth compliance refresher.
Learning lived in silos. Each one had a different voice.
Learning at a global pharmaceutical company spans frontline manufacturing, lab science, corporate functions, and onboarding journeys across geographies. Without a unifying presence, every training feels like it lives in its own silo — different tones, different formats, no continuity. Employees needed a single human face of learning that felt supportive, not corporate.
Four traits, deliberately balanced.
Designed to flex across modalities while staying recognizably her. Each trait checked against the others — no trait dominates, no trait disappears.
Wherever learning happens.
Designed for inclusion: gender-neutral in tone, high-contrast for accessibility, globally resonant.
Day-one greeting, navigation guide, role-specific paths.
Interactive course narrator and progression coach.
Inline tooltip explainer and section-end recap voice.
Lab-simulation companion for procedural micro-learning.
Animated presence in explainer and walkthrough videos.
Daily 30-second reminders embedded in workflows.
From icon to culture carrier.
Luma became a culture carrier, not just an icon. She represents Lilly's commitment to people-first learning, giving every training touchpoint a consistent face, voice, and emotional register. The result: learning that feels less like an obligation and more like a conversation.
What I learned designing two characters.
Mascots are scaffolding for trust, not just personality.
Both DIGIT and Luma succeeded because their visual decisions traced back to a trust problem (compliance / cultural continuity), not a stylistic preference.
Prompt engineering ≠ prompt typing.
Fifty rejected variations to land five finals. The work wasn't in writing prompts — it was in defining the rejection criteria before generating anything.
Voice is harder than visual.
The mascot art was solved in 3 weeks. The voice took 6. Tone-of-voice testing across modalities is where the real product work lives.