Standardized System for a Bank’s Research Teams

Overview

After launching a redesigned mobile banking app, ttb, a leading commercial bank in Thailand, wanted to take the next step and enhance their wider mobile ecosystem. To do this, ttb needed to perform research into their ecosystem's usefulness and usability for customers.

However, the bank's in-house squads did not have a standardized research process, and ttb was not sure where to begin.

Our solution

To ensure that user experience within the bank’s infrastructure matched customer expectations, we worked closely with ttb to implement a research framework. This set up a way of work, and designed methodologies and protocols to be applied across the organization. 

Seven Peaks took a crucial role in helping transform ttb’s mobile ecosystem by co-creating a research workflow that can be iterated for multiple squads, 200+ staff, with their unique problem statements.

Our process

Stakeholder discussions → Workshops & brainstorming → Research framework ideation → Process and research system implementation → Iterative process improvement

In order to help ttb improve their mobile ecosystem, Seven Peaks needed to set up a usefulness and usability research framework. Once implemented, the framework guides, processes, and directions that all in-house squads could follow when carrying out research.

However, we needed to first standardize the inputs given from the squads to make this work. 

To do achieve standardized inputs, ttb’s in-house squads need to define clear objectives in their research plan before starting a research sprint. Without clear objectives, the research plan can’t deliver meaningful results. 

After standardizing their inputs, the teams will validate their usefulness with Seven Peaks’s help via in-depth interviews. Once the usefulness of each new feature is validated, squads can proceed with their usability testing. This creates a high quality process that captures user needs, and ultimately delivers valuable products. 

However, we didn’t just stop there. During implementation, we also improved the process iteratively. We encouraged squads to implement methodologies that fit the objectives of each stage of product development.

1. Foundational research : to understand pains and needs of users, while validating the usefulness of the concept.

• Example of UXR Methodology  : user interviews

2. Generational research : to make design more robust and find out user insights how it should be improved. 

• Example of UXR Methodology  : A/B testing, user interviews.

3. Evaluational research: to validate the frictions if products are ready for the market. 

• Example of UXR Methodology  : Moderated usability test

Challenges we overcame

1. Standardizing ttb’s way of work

Each squad had different factors to consider while working across teams, including different expectations, timelines, ways of work, and stages of product development. To resolve this, we prioritized clear communication from the beginning, especially during the briefing. This helped us formulate business objectives, outcomes, problem statements and assumptions, KPIs to define success, and target users.

As a result, squads were able to find consistent, high-value insights. We also helped ttb reduce their working time and increase efficiency across multiple squads, including UX/UI designers, tech, marketing, and product managers. 

2. Maintaining speed and high quality of research

We found the original timeline to be inefficient because it placed undue pressure on the recruitment process and the analysis process. We helped ttb devote more time to the recruitment process, including finding the right targets and verifying calls to ensure the process met research objectives. We also maintained a timeline of working days and speed for research deliverables. 

The impact of this time management helped squads improve their research and create useful and usable products that made ttb more competitive in the market and more attractive for users.

3. Increasing research literacy

While every in-house squad at ttb was an expert in their own product domain, not everyone had a background in usefulness or usability research. They often tried to fit in as many questions as possible into each research session. 

After speaking through each squad, we identified a pattern of answers each squad was looking for from their users. After briefing with ttb’s in-house squads, we confirmed our assumptions and aligned research objectives with them, which helped them understand the value of their work. We also offered training and knowledge sharing on UX research.

By devoting some time to aligning with each squad, Seven Peaks helped ttb improve their UX research knowledge, increase the competence of their teams, and gave them the skills they need to build valuable products for users. 

Working with a big organization with multiple stakeholders brought up many challenges. However, by maintaining a collaborative approach, we were able to standardize a complex research workflow, and help ttb use high value insights to drive business success.