June 2014 – June 2016
The brief
HSBC was building a new global online banking experience and brought my in agency, Heathwallace, to take over from a previous partner. The work spanned logged-in journeys across markets, with tight timelines, a large budget, and complex delivery structures.
My role
Representing UX in requirements and scoping sessions
Providing annotated UX specifications
Overseeing the IA and navigation
Partnering with research agencies on lab-based usability testing in three regions
Leading a team of six UX and UI designers
Reviewing all team outputs to ensure consistency and quality
The challenge
HSBC was by far the most valuable account within my agency. The client had high expectations and wasn’t shy about critique.
Design delivery was waterfall in nature: documentation-heavy and structured for a distributed global dev model. We’d receive detailed requirements authored by HSBC’s business analysts. From there, the design team would deliver UX specifications and UI comps, regularly presenting our work to the client for sign-off and then handing off to development teams in either India, Hong Kong or Canada.
What we delivered
Our team was responsible for:
the logged-in banking homepage, surfacing key actions and contextual navigation
forms and flows for tasks like sending payments, applying for products, account management and secure messaging
site navigation, balancing consistency with per-locality needs
updating the designs to HSBC’s new Global UI Standards
Improving the process
Despite the production-line setup, I saw opportunities to improve the process and elevate the work.
To avoid downstream design constraints, I advocated for earlier UX involvement. As a result, I was invited to join requirements definition sessions to influence the requirements, preventing design assumptions from being baked into the acceptance criteria.
I also helped secure dedicated time for usability testing before UX delivery – something that was totally absent in the initial pipeline. I collaborated with research partners to run moderated studies in the UK, US, and Hong Kong.
We demonstrated the value of usability testing straight away: early sessions uncovered a serious flaw with the ‘overview’ and ‘account details’ pages – they contained so much overlap that users got confused about which page they were on and struggled to understand the difference. These screens had already been built (presumably without being validated with users) but we convinced HSBC to revisit and merge them into a single page. It was a simple, elegant fix that proved the value of user research.
Building trust and leading the team
As a result of these successes, HSBC asked me to step in as the main design contact and to take a 'helicopter view' of the design delivery process. From that point on, I assumed the a lead role for both UX and UI. This included:
driving improvements to documentation and presentation standards across the team
mentoring junior designers and coaching teammates on navigating high-stakes client reviews
acting as the final reviewer on all outputs, ensuring cohesion and quality across deliverables
“Robin is a great UX-er and helped design a great customer experience for HSBC's new online banking service. He held firm against pressure from stakeholders who wanted to preserve the status quo. His calm manner with stakeholders is brilliant. I'd happily work with him again any time.”
— Head of Digital Programme Development, HSBC
Results
The new online banking experience was successfully rolled out one market at a time
Our agency was retained as HSBC’s lead design partner throughout the engagement, fending off competition
I was promoted to Senior UX Designer, continuing to work on the HSBC account until I moved onto my next role
Follow-on: HSBC Neighbourhoods
Having been impressed with our performance, HSBC invited me and a colleague to pitch for a new piece of work
We reviewed a dormant idea that aimed to improve the reputation of the client as a mortgage lender. We presented an updated version of the concept, demonstrating how it could address unmet user needs and how it could practically be delivered. This secured the work for my agency.
From there I recruited a user researcher, helped set up an agile development team to build a minimum viable product, and led the UX vision. The ‘HSBC Neighbourhoods’ concept became an internal innovation showcase.
Reflections
My time on the HSBC account gave me the opportunity to lead a design team in a pressured environment with demanding stakeholders. Rather than just creating UX deliverables to strict requirements, I was able to influence the process to give the team the space and resources to do better work. I won a promotion for my performance and my agency benefited by securing more work with its most important client.