Sales Boomerang
Becoming the first UX designer for the nation's first borrower intelligence system.
Product Overview
Our product is a system to connect borrowers with lenders. Generally when a borrower is seeking a loan and is denied by a lender, bank or credit union, it's the end of the road. But with out system, the lender would be notified once the borrower fixes whatever they were denied for. That can be credit score, Loan to Volume equity, etc. - the lender can also be notified if they list their property, or give them a better rate. or even more products.
Our platform primarily manages who is on what product, criteria for the "watches", company hierarchy and more. It usually integrates to various CRMs such as Salesforce, Big Purple Dot, and Hubspot. Clients usually access our product through those, however, many of the Sales Boomerang employees rely on the client side platform in order to do their work. The platform was basically made by engineers so there was a ton of design work to be done.
Our platform primarily manages who is on what product, criteria for the "watches", company hierarchy and more. It usually integrates to various CRMs such as Salesforce, Big Purple Dot, and Hubspot. Clients usually access our product through those, however, many of the Sales Boomerang employees rely on the client side platform in order to do their work. The platform was basically made by engineers so there was a ton of design work to be done.
My Role
I was taken on as a junior level UX designer on the product team in the spring of 2020. I worked under the VP of product. I transitioned into a very fast paced environment where I got to collaborate with multiple stakeholders. My areas of focus is User Research as well as design. However, I was never responsible for high fidelity designs. My mockups and prototypes are primarily for mapping out and testing user flows. The process for rolling out features is roughly:
1. Brief by product manager - There is a backlog of items to be made or fixed and Product chooses what I'd be working on. I'd either get a run down by a product manager, go to the next stem, or view a video provided by someone from the Customer Success department. There could be various first touchpoints.
2. Initial sketches - pen on paper
1. Brief by product manager - There is a backlog of items to be made or fixed and Product chooses what I'd be working on. I'd either get a run down by a product manager, go to the next stem, or view a video provided by someone from the Customer Success department. There could be various first touchpoints.
2. Initial sketches - pen on paper
- Brief - There is a backlog of items to be made or fixed and Product chooses what I'd be working on. I'd either get a run down by a product manager, go to the next stem, or view a video provided by someone from the Customer Success department. First touchpoints could be in various formats.
- Initial Sketches - This is pen on paper. I'd ideate multiple solutions. Based on what my boss would advise, I'd either user test the sketches or turn them into low fidelity wireframes.
- User Testing - Testing is open to relevant stakeholders, usually customer success but I have conducted it with Sales once. I usually do three cycles of user testing making adjustments and going from sketches to low fidelity prototypes. Using insights from each round, I then ideate a solution. It's common to have the solution in phases based on time and resources.
- Release - Throughout steps 1 and 2, I'd confer with engineering to determine what is feasible. At this step I'd conduct the handoff. They have access to my documentation of the process, at the end of which is a solution with features defined. We either meet or I record a walkthrough of the prototype. I would also pass off the prototype as well as the Figma or XD files. This would be iterative though with improvements coming up and me having to make new prototypes and then redoing the walkthrough.
This is the process that we align to:
