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Built to bank

Designed 18 journeys and steered the design side of Alliant’s new banking app.

2.26 to 4.13
confidence picking the right IRA (1-5), 25 testers
Paper to digital
Moving an IRA, after a decade on paper
Q1 2027
Launch. Metrics come after.

Project brief

A full rebuild of Alliant's online banking: new designs on a new platform, all at once.

Role
Product designer
Timeline
18 months, in progress
Scope
New online banking for 1M+ members, on web, iOS and Android
Team
2 Alliant designers, 2 from Backbase (the platform vendor)Developers, 2 POs and a BA

From 10,000 feet to the first screen.

Before any design, I took the team up to 10,000 feet. The metrics we set there decided which journeys to redesign first.

  1. 10,000 ft

    Strategy

    Modernize the legacy system

    I started by zooming out with the team. Before anyone drew a screen, we agreed on the goal and on how we’d measure it.

  2. 5,000 ft

    Success metrics

    How we’d know it worked

    Business

    • Application completion rate
    • Funnel drop-off rate

    Legacy IRA opening: 45% dropped off at selection. 15.7% finished.

    Usability

    • System Usability Scale (SUS)
    • Net Promoter Score (NPS)

    Top 3 complaints

    1. Complaint 1 (to come)
    2. Complaint 2 (to come)
    3. Complaint 3 (to come)

    About the legacy system, from members.

  3. Ground

    Journeys

    Fewer steps, product opening first

    • CD opening 5 to 4 steps
    • IRA opening 4 to 3 steps

18 journeys, phase by phase.

Most journeys were designed twice, once for the mobile app and once for web. Smaller features went into existing screens along the way.

  1. Phase 0

    Design system theming

  2. Phase 1

    Ready-made journeys

    11 came ready-made from Backbase. 9 only needed Alliant’s look, these 2 needed custom work.

    • Dashboard: accounts and quick actions on a phone

      Dashboard

    • Account Details: balance, payments, and transactions on a phone

      Account Details

  3. Phase 2

    Custom journeys design 6 of my 13

    51 custom journeys. UX history decided who took each one, size decided how long.

    Phase 2 triage: who took each journey, and how long it got One question sorted 51 custom journeys: was the UX redesigned by Alliant in the past 3 years? If yes, the Backbase design team migrated it onto the new design system, 2 of 5 time for a small project and 4 of 5 for a big one. If no, the UX was poor and the Alliant design team rethought the flow end to end, 3 of 5 for a small project and 5 of 5 for a big one. Yes No, poor UX UX redesigned in the past 3 years? Backbase migrates Onto the new design system. TIME Small project Big project Alliant rethinks The flow, end to end. TIME Small project Big project Phase 2 triage: who took each journey, and how long it got One question sorted 51 custom journeys: UX redesigned in the past 3 years? Yes: Backbase migrates, small 2 of 5 time, big 4 of 5. No, poor UX: Alliant rethinks end to end, small 3 of 5, big 5 of 5. Yes No UX redesigned in the past 3 years? Backbase migrates Onto the new design system. TIME Small project Big project Alliant rethinks The flow, end to end. TIME Small project Big project
    • Credit Score: score gauge and the factors affecting it

      Credit Score

    • Certificate management: choosing a maturity date to renew a certificate

      Certificate management

    • Balance transfer: moving a balance onto an Alliant credit card

      Balance transfer

    • Cash advance: entering a cash advance amount

      Cash advance

    • Card Ordering: reviewing a new card order

      Card Ordering

    • Withdrawal by Check: choosing an account and amount, then the confirmation

      Withdrawal by Check

  4. Phase 3In progress

    Banking product opening journeys 3 of my 5

    No Backbase support from here. Every journey was ours.

    • IRA opening: the IRA recommendation screen on a laptop

      IRA opening

    • CD opening: choosing a certificate on a laptop

      CD opening

    • Product Explore: comparing checking and savings products on a laptop

      Product Explore

Highlighted journey

IRA opening. Most members who started never finished. What went wrong?

Problem 1
“Don’t know what IRA is best for me”
45% of members dropped off at the IRA selection page. Most couldn’t tell a Traditional from a Roth or SEP IRA.
Fix 1

Guided selection. A few plain-language questions point each member to the right IRA.

IRA product page with Traditional, Roth, and SEP IRA cards and a Help me choose an IRA link
After
Each IRA type in plain language, plus a guided path for anyone unsure.
I built the decision tree from scratch, translating IRS rules and Alliant’s disclosures into plain-language questions.
2-5
questions to a recommendation
2.26 to 4.13
confidence picking the right IRA (1-5), 25 testers
Problem 2
The hardest step sat in the middle.
Members had to fund the IRA before it existed. Moving an existing IRA meant a PDF form to print, fill in by hand and mail.
Fix 2a

Open first. Fund later. Funding no longer blocks the new account.

Open IRA
Account opened
Fund IRA
Fix 2b

Paper forms, digitized. Take the rollover: one dense form became three short screens.

Before. Paper form
After. Online
Challenge

The unexpected challenge. Not design or research, but operations.

Digitizing IRA rollovers meant changing a workflow operations had run for over a decade.

Operations workflow. Before: member paperwork, a paper form and a check, arrives together in one envelope by mail and is matched by hand at Alliant operations. After, the paperwork is digitized into two paths: a digital form with a wire transfer, or a digital form with a check.

Strictly speaking, that’s beyond UX. But someone had to start it, or nothing would change. I pitched it in each team’s terms: deposit growth for the product owner, less manual work for operations. Alliant’s decision to assign IRA account numbers up front made wire transfers possible.

Outcome

Launching Q1 2027. What’s done so far.

56

custom journeys shipped by the UX team in 18 months.

18

of them designed by me.

2.26 to 4.13

confidence picking the right IRA (1-5), 25 testers

What this project taught me

Decide where not to go deep. 51 journeys, two Alliant designers: size and UX decided which ones got a full rethink.

A vendor’s designers are capacity. Backbase migrated what we’d already redesigned, which freed us for the rest.

Spend research where it changes minds. Some journeys shipped without research. IRA opening needed data before internal teams would agree to change it.

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