Creating an easy, accessible, and efficient digital borrowing experience with a human touch.
Help Me Borrow team is on a mission to revolutionize the digital borrowing journey for our small business clients. Our goal is to reimagine and enhance the digital borrowing experience, ensuring operational efficiency, improved customer experiences, and adaptability to the ever-changing market landscape.
My role | Service Designer
As a service designer in the team, I focused on co-defining and designing the future of small business clients' digital lending experience from 0-1, from research and problem identification to design and handoff for implementation.
My responsibilities included conducting research activities, synthesizing research data into service blueprint maps & customer journey maps, facilitating workshops and focus group activities, prioritizing outcomes, wireframing design concepts, and managing expectations across multidiscipline teams.
Company
Truist Financial Corporation
Time & phase
August 2022 - February 2023
Discovery & Define Phases
Core Team Structure
Project Manager *1
Service Design Director *1
Service Designer *1
Context
background
Accelerating digital transformation after a merger during the pandemic.
Since 2020, digital transformation has become a crucial strategic initiative at Truist Bank, prompted by the pandemic and the merger with BB&T and SunTrust.
The challenge
Integrating the two large and legacy bank systems into the cloud.
After the merger, Truist became the 7th largest bank in the United States, facing the significant challenge of tech integrating two banking systems into the cloud, coupled with sequential adjustments to its operating model.
The goals
Developing system integration across diverse channels to build a seamless end-to-end digital lending experience.
As part of Truist's digital transformation, we are developing an all-in-one digital banking platform for small businesses to achieve technology integration, streamlining the end-to-end lending experience through cross-platform integration
dESIGN GOAL
Discover necessary key features for achieving technology integration
Discover, define, and evaluate the key features for achieving new system integration across loan origination, management and servicing platforms.
Design initiatives to ensure a seamless transition for clients and employees
Collaborate with cross-functional teams to design the necessary initiatives to ensure a seamless transition for both clients, supporting technology integration
Final OUTCOME
Reimagining an end-to-end seamless lending experience for small businesses and employees, fostering digital banking initiatives.
01
Delivered 16 features to achieve loan origination system technology integration
Over 6 months, we identified, prioritized, and documented 16 features and updates aligned with our digital transformation initiative, guided by a scoring model assessing desirability, viability, and feasibility.
02
Supported cross-functional collaboration in shaping a seamless lending experience
Supported cross-functional teams in creating a cohesive vision for the digital lending experience for clients and employees, crafting new and assessing existing initiatives across the organization to drive digital transformation.
03
Designed the customer-facing small business lending platform
We conceptualized the pre-approval experience, aiming to remove potential roadblocks during the process to provide a simple, accessible, and efficient borrowing experience. This concept successfully received buy-in and was transferred to product development teams.
Match client's needs
Personalized loan options with simple application structures to meet client’s business needs.
The website is crafted to offer personalized loan application options with minimal client information. Clients are empowered to review and customize their loan terms, tailoring them to their specific needs.
Easy application
A tailored application process by leveraging client information, eliminating extensive paperwork.
The website is designed to provide tailored guidance based on the information small business clients input, guiding them through the process step-by-step.
Fast decisions. Fast funding
Incorporated AI technology to quickly provide application decisions and funds
We enable clients to easily apply, receive, and manage funds. With the help of automation technology, the system can rapidly decide whether to approve or reject requests based on applicant's credit scores, even with limited information, which enhances both the lender's efficiency and the client's experience.
So... How we got there / dESIGN rESEARCH
Starting from a tech-based integration request, we collaborated with cross-functional teams to put people's needs at the center of the design process.
Set the table
First, we drafted a stakeholder map to understand the team structure
We drafted the stakeholder map to understand better current team structures, interactions across multidisciplinary teams, and their respective needs and pain points.
Connect the dot
Learned from the stakeholder map, we conducted research activities with different stakeholders to identify customer pain points, business goals, and technical difficulties in building a seamless lending experience.
Synthesized all research data on the Miro board, which enabled us to visualize the current state of the lending experience.
1-Day Shadowing
We met with local branch lender and underwriters to hear their stories about navigation diverse systems
500+ Secondary
Research Review
We conducted an extensive secondary research effort, reviewing various resources, including previous research studies, customer surveys, system onboarding documents, market research materials, and more.
20+ Stakeholder Interview /
Group Discussion
We talked with frontline branch leaders, backstage underwriters, business partners, and other related key stakeholders to understand their day-to-day pain points, unmet needs & wish lists.
Early Insights
After the merger, complicated and redundant systems and processes, along with unclear roles and responsibilities, pose obstacles to understanding the current state of the lending experience.
During the initial research phase, we encountered the following research challenges
People
Limited understanding of cross-functional team connections due to the recent company merger and restructuring.
pROCESS
Confusion surrounding the intricate and overlapping loan application, management, and servicing processes.
Technology
Outdated tech resources make it difficult to comprehend process interactions.
Therefore, we decided to organize a workshop with cross-functional teams to understand the interactions between people, processes, and technology, swiftly transitioning from chaos to a clearer path forward.
Together, co-create the future states / Research & Ideation woRKSHOP
Together, we untangled the questions we had and drove actionable solutions, aligned with people's needs, business objectives, and technical challenges.
Workshop gOAL
Workshop Preparation - Research Data systhesis & Visualization
Based on the workshop goal we set and to establish a simple and shared foundation for facilitating group discussion, I synthesized first-phrase research insights into 6 sets of service blueprint maps to visualize the current end-to-end lending experience from macro & micro perspectives.
Part 02: Future State Ideation
Opportunities: Brainstorm the future opportunities: connect the dots between the current pain points to the improvement space.
Customer’s wishlist: Enable customer wish-list items to inform our ideation process and enhance customer satisfaction.
Pain points: Locate current pain points in the lending process and assign specific actions for improvement.
Part 01: Current State Review
Stakeholder: Identify interactions between clients, front-line staff, and backstage staff
Technology Platform: Clarify how different systems operate throughout the process.
Communication Channel: Define channels for transparent information exchange.
Evidence: Attach key information documents as supplementary explanations.
wORKSHOP rESULT Synthsis
During the 2-day hybrid workshop with over 50 participants, we gathered hundreds of sticky notes to bridge gaps in creating a user-centered lending experience. To ensure inclusive stakeholder input, I organized the synthesis of these notes, moving from individual data points to overarching themes, thus enhancing information accessibility and usability.
Workshop Result
We've pinpointed 16 key features and updates aimed at creating a seamless end-to-end digital lending experience for our small business clients and assisting our vendor partner in the technical discovery process for a Loan Origination System.
To create a shared understanding of research results for an informed decision-making process, we prioritized and documented 16 features based on participants' votes.
design driven by evidence / reserch & ideation report
Compiles all findings into a cohesive report, addressing diverse stakeholder needs in technology, design, business, and vendors for future improvements.
Feature Priorization
16 Features are prioritized based on whether they involve people, processes, or technology, the business's consideration for release or target state enhancement, and their scope for technical discovery.
PEOPLE, PROCESS, TECHNOLOGY FRAMEWORK
Each feature was evaluated to determine where the scope of change would take place as a shift in who does the work (People), how that work can be done more efficiently (Process), or task automation that drives operational efficiencies (Technology).
STAKEHOLDER BENEFIT
Increase Revenue, Improve Client & Teammate Experience, Increase Efficiency, Reduce Risk
BUSINESS PRIORITIZATION
• Release 1: Meeting client experience expectations and maintaining current capabilities.
• Release 2: Focusing on competitive advantage and strategic priorities.
• Target State: Addressing lower-priority features or enhancements.
TECHNOLOGY SCOPE HYPOTHESIS
Initial determination if the feature can fit within the current system, requires new development or needs both internal and external implementation for a complete solution. These assessments will be confirmed with our business and technology partners.
Documented Research report
From this synthesis work, we created an outline that breaks down the topic into themes, topics, features, 'How Might We' (HMW) questions, improvement opportunities, and pain points that link to each. Therefore, We formulated 16 sets of sub-problem statements, 'How Might We' (HMW) questions, and design opportunities.
Workshop outcome
We shared the discovery phase readout report with our business partners, vendors, and team members, equipping us with well-informed research findings to promote data-driven decision-making, transparency, collaboration, and operational optimization, addressing pain points and enhancing the user experience
One feature received leadership buy-in and decided to move forward.
Next, we optimize the initial buy-in feature for future developments.
Improvement- Wireframing & pROTOTYPING
Communicating, evaluating, and iterating on the approved features to ensure a smooth transition to the product development team.
After receiving the decision from the leadership, we delved deeper to communicate, evaluate, and iterate on the approval features with business partners, technical vendors, UX designers, and other key stakeholders.
I was responsible for transforming the key concepts into features by creating mid-fidelity to high-fidelity wireframes that captured the interactions of both front-line clients and backstage lenders.
1
New Client
new application
New prospect without an account and wants to apply an loan a for their business
2
Existing client
new application
Existing client with an account who wants to apply for a loan for their business.
3
EXCITING CLIENT
ParTIALLY COMPLETED APPLICATION
Existing client with an account, and already started a loan application
While the details of the work I worked on are still under NDA,
I'd be happy to chat more deeply about my experience over a call.
nEXT sTEP
Continue to prototype, evaluate, and iterate design concepts with cross-functional teams.
Propose concepts for inclusion in delivery roadmaps and prioritization beyond MVP Design and evaluate new future-state concepts based on prioritized solution opportunities.
