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PROJECT: Manage
ROLE: UX Design, UI Design
DURATION: 2 Months
Manage is a personal finance app experience that primarily helps young income earners manage & control their spending with the aim of preventing overspending & broke-ness. A budgeting app/feature that actually works.
The need for Manage?
According to several statistics, the bottom 2-3 items on Maslow's pyramid make up about 50% of the average monthly disposable income in Africa. The amount left after savings might have been accounted is usually used to meet other needs such as data, black tax, and other impromptu financial needs.
The amount left usually manifests a rapid burn-through rate, rendering young income earners broke just halfway through the month. This underwhelming situation exposes them to short-term depressing states and unethical lending platforms with disturbing underbelly practices.
Manage is an experience that'll curb the underlying root cause of these personal finance challenge.
To be up to speed, I used the Lean UX design approach to navigate this challenge.
Think
A couple of iterative brainstorming session with my informal team resulted in some intuitive ideas & solutions.
Idea 1
Set a periodic limit on traditional banks' debit card.
Idea 4
Limit cash access & allow only trusted individuals give extra cash permission access.
Idea 2
Allow users Freeze traditional bank cards at will for a period of time.
Idea 5
Setup periodic cash spending limit reminder.
Idea 3
Allow users set a periodic cash access limit on a virtual debit card.
Make
Accounting for time & productivity constraint, I leveraged the ICE (Impact, Certainty, & Effort) model to prioritize the brainstormed ideas to select MVP features.
My Prioritization Decisions
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Leveraging the ICE model, I prioritized Idea 3 & Idea 4 as MVP features.
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Idea 1 & 2 are currently not desirable for an MVP. There's the need to partner with almost all traditional banks also considering CBN's unfriendly policies.
For the ICE Model, a combination of high Impact (the user experience or value), high Certainty (how actionable or doable is the feature), and low Effort (ease of implementation) is most desirable.
Lo-fi Mockup, Prototype, & 1st-Round Usability Testing
To quickly illustrate & test the prioritized features/experiences, I conducted a guerilla usability test on the low-fidelity prototype. Here are some key insights from the the test.
Insight 1
Users don't want to be primed to use another card if a spending limit has been reached.
Insight 2
Users would love the ability to also control their physical cash spending.
Insight 3
Users prefer having a more intuitive cue to top up their virtual cards - It seems hidden.
Check
For my hi-fi mockups and prototype, I took a mix of Apple's design system & Google's material design.
My choice of hue (color) was also informed by the decision to make the personal finance experience one where users are given the green light to control their finances and gradually build their wealth (green) as well as being creative with the options & experience (orange).
View Sticker Sheet & Style Guide >>.
2nd-Round Usability Testing
Overall feedback was positively skewed. Here are a couple of feedbacks I got from the 2nd round of unmoderated usability testing.
Key Takeaway
Manage made me realize the design thinking process isn't all there is to designing solution to challenges. Design approaches aren't also set in stone as teams and designers can make mild modifications to suit the nature of their challenge.
I was able to implement and design a bit-able solution (aka MVP) with the Lean UX approach and I look forward to working with other design approaches.
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