Fidelity Investments, Digital Workplace Modernization
Transforming the internal employee digital experience through generative research, story mapping, and service design across complex enterprise business units.
| Key Metadata | Details |
|---|---|
| My Role | Lead UX Researcher & Designer (Evolved from Senior UI/UX Designer) |
| Primary Impact | Modernized employee digital workflows across 6 major product verticals; introduced generative research protocols, archetypes, and story mapping to align cross-functional product owners; established a unified internal experience framework. |
| Enterprise Context | Internal workforce experience (Digital Workplace) serving tens of thousands of Fidelity associates. |
| Team | Design Director, Lead Researcher/Designer (myself), 6 Product Owners, 2 Junior Researchers, Front-End Developer. |
| Core Skills | Generative & Usability Research, Service Design, Information Architecture, Personas & Archetypes, Story Mapping (Donna Lichaw framework), HTML/CSS Prototyping, Cross-Functional Leadership, Junior Staff Mentorship. |
1. Situation & The Challenge
Internal enterprise tools often suffer from fragmented user experiences built up over years of siloed feature additions. At Fidelity Investments, the internal digital workplace ecosystem served a vast associate workforce managing complex financial workflows daily.
- The Fragmentation: Thousands of employees navigated disconnected tools, inconsistent information architecture, and disparate software interfaces across business units, leading to operational friction, training overhead, and cognitive fatigue.
- The Organizational Complexity: Bridging these silos required coordinating across 6 distinct Product Owners, each managing different business priorities and legacy workflows.
- The Mandate: Design and research a modernized, unified Digital Workplace Experience that streamlined associate tasks, reduced task completion times, and fostered internal workforce satisfaction.
2. My Evolving Role & Leadership
Hired initially as a Design Lead / Senior UI/UX Designer, my role quickly expanded to Lead Researcher and Designer as leadership recognized the need for deep, foundational user discovery before jumping to interface solutions.
In this dual capacity, I served as both strategic lead and hands-on mentor—guiding 2 junior researchers, establishing research rigor, and aligning 6 product owners around a single, human-centered vision for the internal workforce.
3. Strategic Interventions & Methodology
Generative Research & Ethnography
- Foundational Discovery: Authored and executed comprehensive generative research plans and protocols to observe associates in their daily work environments.
- Uncovering Root Friction Points: Conducted qualitative research and contextual inquiries to understand how employees actually navigated tools, bypassed system bottlenecks, and communicated across departments.
Archetypes
- Beyond Traditional Personas: Synthesized qualitative data into actionable behavioral archetypes that reflected real associate mindsets, goals, and technical environments rather than generic demographic profiles.
Story mapping used to map associate journeys across enterprise tools
- Story Mapping Framework: Leveraged narrative story mapping principles (inspired by Donna Lichaw’s framework) to map the narrative arc of employee tasks—identifying peak frustration points, operational pauses, and moments of resolution across digital touchpoints.
Rapid Prototyping & Co-Design
- Interactive HTML/CSS Wireframes: Built lo-fi to hi-fi responsive, accessible prototypes in code to quickly demonstrate fluid, task-focused interaction patterns to product owners.
- System Alignment: Facilitated regular outbriefs and interactive workshops with product owners to co-create information architecture and align cross-departmental roadmaps.
Usability Validation & Staff Mentorship
- Evaluative Testing: Designed usability test plans and protocols to validate prototypes with real internal associates on actual devices.
- Mentoring Junior Researchers: Mentored two junior researchers in moderation techniques, qualitative analysis, and executive outbrief presentation skills.
4. Key Tools & Deliverables
- Generative Research: Research plans, interview protocols, qualitative synthesis, and executive outbrief decks.
- Service Architecture: Behavioral archetypes, narrative story maps, cross-system journey maps, and comprehensive site information architecture (IA).
- Design & Code: HTML/CSS/JS responsive wireframes, visual design specs, and interactive production-ready prototypes.
- Evaluative Research: Usability testing protocols, task completion analysis, and iterative improvement roadmaps.
5. Results & Employee Impact
By shifting the internal product culture from fragmented feature delivery to narrative-driven service design, the project established a unified foundation for Fidelity’s Digital Workplace experience. Our key stakeholder was very pleased:
“Seriously, where were you guys years ago?!?!?! This is really great stuff that could have targeted product engagement to create a really happy customer.”
Core Outcomes
- Cross-Silo Alignment: Unified 6 product owner roadmaps under a single, cohesive human-centered information architecture and component strategy.
- Streamlined Employee Workflows: Reduced cognitive friction and task completion times for internal associates by replacing disconnected tools with intuitive, story-mapped task flows.
- Institutionalized Research Practice: Established reusable generative research protocols and archetype frameworks within the Digital Workplace organization, elevating internal UX maturity.