Translating Research Into a Defensible Design Direction
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| 📅 Project | OmniRisk · Financial Workflow Dashboard |
| 🔖 Phase | Define |
| 🧩 Input | Four findings · Four themes · Four design principles from Discover |
| 🗂️ Output | Problem statement · 5 POVs · 17 HMWs · 2 personas · 5-phase journey map |
The Discover phase produced four findings about how skeptical operators in institutional finance would adopt AI-augmented workflow tools, along with four design principles that emerged from synthesis. The Define phase took that material and turned it into something the design could be built against: a sharpened problem statement, five POVs anchored to specific users, seventeen HMW questions opening the design space, two operator personas grounded in research, and a journey map showing where the design had to intervene.
Define answered three questions:
The output is the design brief that Ideate and Design build from.
Middle office analysts running FX repatriation operate as the integration layer between systems that don't communicate, making trade timing decisions on delayed data, under regulatory pressure to document every step. Existing platforms address parts of the workflow but not the integration gaps where most failures occur. AI could help close those gaps — but only if it is explainable, controllable, and auditable as conditions for adoption. The design's answer: rules trigger the recommendation; the AI narrates the reasoning; every action logs to an audit trail.
This statement is the source the design decisions trace back to. Every design choice in the Design phase resolves some tension named here.