Gus Lamounier is a creative interdisciplinary UX designer, with a background in both Graphic and Digital, who dreams of a world where technology adapts to users’ needs (and not the other way around). Experienced in balancing research and empirical foundations with creative thinking and new media. Obsessed with bridging the communication gap across disciplinary domains, and finding ways for people to share, collaborate, and transform ideas and knowledge.

Project

Invesco Vision
 

Delivering custom investment solutions with an outcomes-based focus
 

vision

In brief

- Staff Product Designer;
- From September 2019 until today;
- Boston, Massachusetts;
- Leading end-to-end design work, from 0-1 until current expansions of the product;
- Used complex prototypes to help the organization understand an ambiguous problem space and make software decisions;
- Shipped dozens of tools under the Invesco Vision umbrella;
- Designed for both business and consumers;
- Designing proprietary, web-based software;
- Created and fulfilled a four-year-long strategy for design.
- Team structure was me as the single Designer (with the help of a UX Researcher/Strategist for the first 3 months), 8 Front End Developers, 4 Back End developers, 5 Business API developers, 1 Product Manager, and 4 Subject Matter Experts acting as Product Owners.

Challenge

Creating Invesco Vision, a cloud-based portfolio research and analytics platform, presented various UX/UI Design challenges. One of the main obstacles was ensuring consistent approaches and data across different problem-solving scenarios for institutional and retail clients globally. Additionally, the platform had to handle different economic and regulatory factors while incorporating advanced analytics, portfolio construction algorithms, and third-party data. The objective was to provide a comprehensive platform with impactful visualizations that could efficiently present fundamental decision tradeoffs directly to clients. Lastly, we had to prioritize intuitive usability and streamlined workflows to support interactive, on-the-spot portfolio analysis.

Approach

I performed a complete heuristic evaluation (including accessibility) of existing and planned feature use cases, identifying focus areas for improvement based on measurable experience criteria and metrics. I conducted a UI component audit, identified design system gaps, and worked with the design system team (UX and Engineering) on new components and pattern improvements to support product requirements. I was the key collaborator and UX/UI designer responsible for multiple design sprints for critical user journeys of data analytics personas. I produced low- and high-fidelity UX designs and prototypes to guide product definition, experience validation (rapid research, customer evaluation), and implementation activities. I leveraged the voice of the customer feedback to monitor, identify, and prioritize product experience improvements. I led a team culture initiative for a rapidly growing UX team to identify and operationalize team values and principles.

Solution

Our approach to tackling challenges involved putting the user first and working closely with the experienced practitioners behind Invesco Vision. Through extensive research, we gained a deep understanding of the needs and goals of investment professionals and clients using the platform. This research guided the development of a user-friendly interface that provided a consistent experience across different problem-solving scenarios. We also prioritized displaying complex data and analysis results in a clear and easy-to-understand visual format, using best practices for data visualization. We incorporated interactive elements and dynamic visualizations to support "what if" scenarios and portfolio stress testing. By blending user insights with design principles, we created a solution that enables users to analyze portfolios effectively, identify risk and return drivers, and make informed investment decisions.

Results

Our efforts for Invesco Vision had a highly successful impact. The platform's comprehensive and intuitive nature significantly increased user productivity and efficiency. Investment professionals could easily navigate different problem-solving scenarios, leveraging the platform's consistent approach and underlying data. The platform's powerful visualizations and interactive elements allowed for in-depth portfolio analysis and easy risk and return driver identification. Clients also benefited from the seamless presentation of fundamental decision tradeoffs, clearly understanding the impact of different variables on investment outcomes. The user-centric design approach, combined with collaboration with experienced practitioners, resulted in a user interface that met the needs of both experts and clients. This led to improved decision-making and optimal investment strategies. In summary, Invesco Vision's design successfully addressed the challenges, resulting in a sophisticated and user-friendly platform revolutionizing portfolio research and analytics.

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