Design Thinking and Finance: The Power of the Design Sprint
Context: We have created a new User Experience and Service Design for one of the leading institutions in Italian finance sector.
Outcome: A digital user interface and a more efficient service system design
Methods: Google Design Sprint workshops, User personas, Use Case Scenarios, Service Blueprint diagram, Product Backlog, User review.
THE STORY
Ever imagined a digital product that embraces a huge amount of financial data, operates on a large scale, even across the globe, while still being intuitive and simple to use? We did. It was in fact a collective imagination where we guided users to unleash their creativity and express their needs as they guided us to innovation and solution.
Our digital product’s story started with exploration of the existing digital platform. We’ve made an in-depth discovery of the existing user experience and based on our analysis. Through the input we’ve collected from clients, we have prepared use cases for Design Sprint and collected further feedback from the client, including evaluation of task priorities and new suggestions. Analysing all the input, we have created a new service design that embodies a new experience, across all the touchpoints and interactions within different stakeholders.
The end result was a new User Experience; a digital Client Portal, detailed business analysis and an enhanced service scenario.
In this article we will take you through the story of this product and our approach throughout the process.
DESIGN THINKING IN FINANCE
There’s an increasing amount of demand towards Design Thinking methodologies in Finance sector, where there’s an undeniable need of user friendliness to ensure a smooth experience. As working with huge data archive can be challenging, especially considering the cultural way of handling operations across countries, it becomes even more crucial to put emphasis on intuitiveness of a digital product. Choosing the right strategy to approach clients is as important as the process itself. Users need to feel comfortable and not intimidated while they approach design tasks.
We have started off with Design thinking methods to understand the needs and problematic parts of the existing platform and come up with solutions in a bottom up manner. Since we did not have an option of having the Design Sprint in a physical space, we carried it out remotely. We have utilised 3D method, that we explained in more detail in our previous article, which takes its name from Discover, Design and Deliver phases.
DESIGN THINKING WORKSHOP FROM REMOTE
Remote work seems more convenient as it eliminates the effort to bring together everyone in a physical space but it brings its challenges. Users may be from different age groups, not familiar with digital tools or might even simply have connection problems. There were some key points to make remote workshops easier while working with different client profiles.
Step 1: Giving priority to client needs
The world is going through a tough period and in times like this, empathy and flexibility are more fundamental than ever in carrying out a digital transformation process. We can make use of a tailor made adaptation of the methods in order to respond better to client’s needs.
We have prioritized our client’s needs throughout the process. Being one of the leading institutions in Italian finance sector, our client was not able to dedicate a full one week for workshop due to the nature of the fast paced work they are occupied with, so we mapped out a different agenda for them. We divided the tasks of Google Design sprint into small chunks and based on the client’s calendar, executed these micro activities in various days.
Step 2: Dedicating enough time to make a thorough discovery phase
Understanding financial systems requires respecting the own methodologies of this discipline and being well informed before proceeding with design phase. Since financial systems are complex scenarios that involve data flow amongst various actors, dedicating sufficient time to task analysis at the discovery phase will make the following steps more rapid, as there would be less clarifications to be made by the client’s end. We have planned series of online interviews in which we made an in depth task analysis and defined the pain points of the existing financial ecosystem, and thanks to these insights, moved on to the digital service innovation phase with a better vision.
Step 3: Introducing the tools and timing
We have used Miro during our Design Sprint workshops. Since it was a new tool for the client, we started off by informing them about the format of workshop, pre requisites and a brief introduction to the platform.
Creative flows can get longer than expected, and in order to use the limited time that the clients can dedicate for the Design Sprint, it is convenient to talk about the timings for each step before hand.
Step 4: Agile working throughout the next steps
Design Sprint is our starting point to create a new user experience, but digital transformation is a continuous cycle in which iterations are made, tested and approved by being in contact with the client. Agile method saves us time and cost, and helps us define the challenging parts of the new user experience at an early stage. Our approach to agile method consists of organising tailor made Design Sprints based on the micro tasks of user testing and remote interviews with clients in which we introduce the new service blueprint and gather feedback.
Conclusions
Design thinking is still a new approach in Italian financial ecosystem, but institutions are starting to adopt it and observing concrete benefits. At ITVP, we consider the business needs as priority, just like in Design Thinking methods where the user is at the centre of innovation. While we worked with one of the biggest institutions in Italian finance sector and through a Design Thinking approach, we utilised Google’s Design Sprint on a remote basis and gained valuable insight about the sector, user needs and their ecosystem before proceeding into design and development. There’s an IT transformation strategy that can take any organisation at a further level and at ITVP, we have the right tools and knowledge to work across these instruments.
