Modernizing the user experience of first fully digital end-to-end lending platform for both borrowers and loan officers

Needed to refine the user experience and user interface (UX/UI) of their digital lending platform prior to building and launching it

Wanted to employ user research to validate key workflows in the product before moving forward into development

Worried the platform’s outdated user interface would cause users to question its security

Had engaged a long-term development partner that did not have UI experience, so additional design support was critical

Needed to build trust among users who were being asked to supply sensitive financial information to the platform

User Interface Design

Creation of digital style guide

Application of style guide to high-fidelity wireframes

Wireframes used to create mockups

Quality Assurance

Conducting a daily bug triage with the client’s backend team and outsourced QA team to help expedite the feedback loop and provide more visibility about where bugs were coming from

Staff Augmentation

Providing expert full-time support and took on leadership roles in design, engineering, and project management to help guide the client team to a successful product release

Project Management

Helping the client refine their processes, making sure that they were developing the right features and getting feedback from the right teams

Redesigned the user experience and user interface for the client’s digital lending platform

Enabled borrowers to submit a loan application loan officer to manage the entire loan process digitally

Comprehensive and seamless knowledge transfer allowed for release of an MVP for the borrower application within six months

Collaborating closely with the client’s design team throughout the project: one of the Praxent designers acted as the design lead and helped delegate different parts of the application to each of the client’s two designers

Conducting a UX Audit (heuristic evaluation) and interviews with internal users, leveraging existing designs

Defining the overall visual brand language in a digital UI design style guide

Designing high-fidelity sales prototype covering a single “happy path” borrower workflow and development prototype including primary designed borrower application screens

Designing medium-fidelity wireframes of primary flows for both borrower and lender applications

Performing usability testing of the lender application wireframes with target users and preparing design recommendations based on user feedback

Creating visual designs of key screens required for implementation for both borrower and lender applications, on desktop and mobile

Leading frontend development for 10 sprints, or 20 weeks

Engaging a cross-functional team, including two full-time Praxent engineers, the client’s internal frontend developers, and outsourced frontend developers.

Recommending Vue.JS framework, because it would enable the client to gradually implement the new frontend technology page by page. It also blends well within the model view controller architecture the client already had.

Implementing the frontend, leveraging Vue.js to fully optimize the mobile- responsive and ADA compliant experience. 

Performing end-to-end testing with each sprint to ensure high-quality code delivery

Leveraging Vue.JS to enable a phased-release approach and tackling the most difficult and complex screens first, providing the client with reusable components they could copy paste and build out for some of the simpler screens

Refining the sitemap

Embedding quality assurance: a designer was embedded within the agile process to provide support and feedback to developers to ensure final product matched approved specifications

Facilitating daily bug triages with outsourced QA team and backend team to expedite feedback loop provide more visibility 

Phased-release planning

Consulting on both sides of the project

Weekly-status reporting of budget, scope, and timeline progress

Implementing and facilitating weekly technical strategy sessions between Praxent, the client, and external development and QA teams to align on decisions that needed to be made and agreed on to ensure success

In the final month of the project, setting up a number of knowledge transfer meetings to review all of the raw design files and assets with the client

Gradually transitioning more design tasks to the client’s designer, so she became lead and Praxent provided support

Packaging all relevant design assets—raw files, icons, etc. and sharing it with the client’s designer so she could expand on the design foundation Praxent provided

Delivering a framework that provided a strategy for iterative development and iterative releases and offering ongoing training, support, and mentoring to the client’s engineers

During the last two sprints, conducting knowledge transfer meetings with the client’s tech leads to review the architecture, code, and technical process

Helping the client’s team get up to speed on Vue.JS and supporting them as they took on small tickets throughout the transition 

By the end of the project, ensuring the client’s team was set up to continue frontend development in Vue.JS