I led the design of an in-branch account-opening platform that helped bankers manage multiple customers, products, documents, and signatures within a single workflow.
The solution integrated Woodforest’s existing ID scanners and reused patterns from Savana’s online account-opening platform where they supported the needs of branch bankers.
Please note that certain details and information have been omitted or altered to protect the privacy and confidentiality of the organizations involved.*
THE CHALLENGE
One Workflow Had to Support Many Banking Scenarios
Woodforest operates more than 760 branches. Its bankers needed to open different combinations of accounts for individuals, families, joint owners, and minors, at times within the same session.
The platform also needed to support customer search, ID capture, ownership assignments, document acknowledgments, signatures, and federal regulatory requirements without forcing bankers to repeat information across disconnected processes.
We Focused on Three goals
01
Efficiency
Reduce repetitive data entry and automate manual steps where possible.
02
Accuracy and Compliance
Help bankers collect the correct information while reducing duplicate customer profiles and entry errors.
03
Flexibility
Support different client requirements and account structures without forcing every scenario through the same rigid path.
UNDERSTANDING THE WORKFLOW
Designing Around How Bankers Work
Access to comparable enterprise banking platforms was limited, so I built my understanding through ongoing collaboration with people who knew the branch workflow directly.
We met with the Woodforest team multiple times to understand how accounts were opened, where bankers encountered friction, and what the new platform needed to support. I also worked closely with a banking subject-matter expert with more than 15 years of industry and branch-management experience. A second expert joined in November 2023, adding further expertise and a new perspective on the requirements and proposed flows.
These conversations revealed that the experience needed to manage relationships across multiple customers, products, ownership structures, and documents while keeping them visible and helping bankers complete familiar tasks efficiently.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Multi-customer relationships
One application could include several customers with different roles.
Connected products and documents
Bankers needed to coordinate products, documents, and signatures in one workflow.
Familiar branch tasks
The experience needed to support existing banker habits and tools.
KEY INSIGHT
The goal was not to reproduce the online flow inside a branch. It was to reuse its strongest foundations while adapting the workflow to how bankers work.
MY ROLE
Leading Design Across Complex Constraints
MY DIRECT CONTRIBUTION
Account-opening flows
Concept exploration
Presented concepts
Production-ready designs
COLLABORATIVE INPUT
Client + regulatory requirements
Banking + operational constraints
UX, product + architecture
Implementation constraints
KEY DECISION
THE FINAL SOLUTION
The final experience connected the major parts of branch account opening. Bankers could identify customers, build the account structure, reuse available information, and manage documentation without restarting the process for every person or product.
01
Customer search before account creation
Bankers searched for existing customers first, helping prevent duplicate profiles and allowing available information to be reused.
02
Multi-titling within one flow
Bankers could open multiple accounts for the same group of customers within one session. For example, a family could open individual, joint, and minor accounts without repeatedly entering the same information.
03
Capture and Review Customer Information
Woodforest’s existing ID scanners captured customer details while keeping correction, rescanning, and manual entry available.
CARRY THE WORK FORWARD
04
Reuse of previously entered information
For applications involving multiple customers, previously entered information, such as a shared primary address, could be prepopulated for subsequent customers.
05
Consolidated documents and signatures
Acknowledgments and signature-required documents were brought into a unified view. Bankers could establish customers and account ownership earlier, then manage printing, emailing, acknowledgments, and signatures together later in the process.
SYSTEMS THINKING
Savana’s online-account-opening platform provided an established component library and interaction logic. Reusing those foundations supported consistency and a faster design turnaround, but branch bankers had different priorities from customers completing an application independently.
OUTCOME
Production-Ready Designs Delivered for Development
We completed the happy-path flows for Woodforest’s personal finance products and delivered the production-ready designs for development before implementation began.
Early collaboration with the system architect helped the team account for technical constraints and minimize avoidable redesigns. Reusing appropriate components and interaction logic from Savana’s online platform also supported a rapid design turnaround while maintaining consistency across the product ecosystem.
REFLECTION
Adapting an Existing Product in a New Context
This project gave me a unique opportunity to explore how an existing product’s foundations could be adapted for a new platform and audience.
WHAT I LEARNED
01
Early technical collaboration makes complex constraints easier to manage.
Working with a system architect from the beginning helped us identify hardware and feasibility concerns earlier, minimize redesigns, and move toward production-ready flows more efficiently.
02
Consistency does not require every product to follow the same workflow.
We preserved the foundations of Savana’s online platform while adapting the experience to the people, tools, and account structures found inside a branch.
OTHER CASE STUDIES
