Standing up the research practice behind an enrollment product

Problem

An enterprise banking enrollment product was making design decisions without real user input behind them. I took the research on alongside my design work and built the practice the product had never had.

Research

I planned and ran FIS's first user-interview study of its kind. I recruited and interviewed real users, worked the raw feedback into clear themes, built the personas, and turned the findings into recommendations the product team could act on. Then I presented them company-wide in a 45-minute solo readout, shaping messy input into a story each audience could use.

Design

The research fed straight back into the enrollment flow. I designed the error states for the cases that actually trip users up (an already-enrolled user, or one with invalid credentials) and partnered with compliance on the consent and account-selection screens, so the flow met regulatory requirements without reading like a legal form. Having done the research, I became the person teams brought their enrollment questions to.

Quality

I was the first designer to run a full usability-rubric study end to end: the study plan and script, the prototype, and the report. It set the benchmark other teams now follow. I am one of two people designated company-wide usability experts, and the only designer among them.

Outcome

The personas still calibrate work on adjacent products, and the research keeps informing decisions well past the study that produced it. It started as covering a cut role. It is now a standard the company kept.