U.S. Bank Pivot Case Study — 2023
Valuation Dashboard
Overview
Providing fund valuations, such as adding missing security prices, is a key use case for investment managers, but this functionality was only limited to internal employees. Just as internal fund accountants want to fulfill pricing, we want all global fund servicing clients to experience the same flexibility and control when it comes to accessing valuations. The Valuation Dashboard feature allows clients to access prices in minutes, so they can choose to review and provide pricing whenever they want on Pivot.
I was the main designer working on this new feature to the dashboard in Spring 2023. My mission was to optimize our feature rollout to all external clients, achieving wider adoption and improving operational workflows.
Scrum Team
Faisal Masood, Product Owner
Rigoberto Limas, Product Manager
Sivaraman Jeyamani, Dev Lead
Andre Crouch, UI Dev
Madesh Parthiban, UI Dev
Extended design team
Dallas Welsh, Content Designer
Jonathan Campbell, Accessibility
Barbara Wolff, UX Researcher
My Role
Lead designer—discovery, user research, design iterations, presentations, testing prototypes, delivering final hand-off
Timeline
Q2 2023 - Q2 2024
New Features 2024
View full text: To view complete text, users can hover over truncated content indicated by ellipses (...). A small window will appear with the full text when a cursor is positioned over it.
Lock important labels in place: With fixed columns, users can scroll side-to-side without losing their spot, reducing the chance of errors.
The Problem
Giving users the ability to accurately and securely price assets within funds in real-time meant making fundamental changes to the way the current operational process flow worked since Pivot started.
Historically, resolving the security price was a cumbersome, time-consuming process. Users would open multiple windows, juggled data scattered across spreadsheets, relied on error-prone manual entries and overrides, and communicated updates through a chaotic mix of phone calls, texts, and emails. This daily scramble made it difficult to track progress, ensure accuracy, and meet deadlines. At the end of the day, users could not complete tasks within Pivot and thus were completing their workflows using workarounds.
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A fund's net asset value (NAV) represents a fund's per share market value.
It is the sum of all its assets (the value of its holdings in cash, shares, bonds, financial derivatives, and other securities) minus any liabilities, divided by the number of shares outstanding.
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To establish a daily NAV, the fund chooses a time, every day, at which to value its assets. For a traditional equity ETF, the NAV is calculated (or “struck”) once all the markets being tracked by the ETF’s index have closed at the end of the day.
The NAV can be calculated soon after the US market’s 4:00 p.m. ET close. At that time, the closing price of each of the fund’s assets is recorded as an indication of its current price/value. All these prices are then aggregated to arrive at the value of the fund’s entire portfolio.
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It helps fund managers determine the price at which they can buy and sell shares of the fund.
NAV is important for investors because it provides a way to compare the value of different investment funds and it tells us how much one share of the fund should be worth.
New process
Moving away from the current flow to pave the way for Valuation Dashboard required a ground-up rethinking of the way securities, funds, fund families, and pricing were organized and displayed on the platform.
Goals
User
Manage fund data with a self-service approach. By directly editing and saving changes within the dashboard, this eliminates the need for time-consuming back and forth communication.
Product
Deploy a global feature release according to new structure to facilitate efficient data management. Integrate the new communication portal with the Eagle system with seamless API data exchange.
Business
Increase client satisfaction and loyalty by reducing churn and strengthening our brand reputation.
Tackling technical constraints
Pricing is a crucial aspect of valuations but it can also be technically complex. One enormous challenge about designing this dashboard was overcoming technical constraints w/ API calls. Performance issues were always a concern and one challenge in particular resulted in all changes on the dashboard itself getting lost with any new version upload since the page refreshed.
To combat this, I addressed potential error states and edge cases that can occur during pricing uploads, repeated overrides, and abandonment. Users needed to trust the dashboard would not lose all of their work when submitting pricing before the NAV struck/closed. I worked with content teams to create concise labels and help users comprehend what was happening to guide them and resolve any errors.
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Abandonment of changes
Switching to a different section in the middle of a task will prompt a warning message and require confirmation to prevent data loss.
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Errors during upload
One of the twenty identified errors can occur when a user attempts to upload document(s) exceeding the system's file size limit.
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Prioritize essential information
Optimize space by displaying only supplementary details when users click on info icons, opening a tool tip (small window).
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Processing time (interstitial)
In anticipation of performance issues during API calls, a spinner appears when the user saves their changes to convey the notion of ongoing system processes.
Research
Determined to make the new proposed flow work the way accounting, portfolio managers and clients want, we conducted user testing with iterations based on feedback - and user expertise proved crucial as we conducted this testing.
More complex than it seems: More than one account manager can edit current prices even if someone else has already added a missing price, so the listed current price may be replaced throughout the day.
Difficult to track changes: Due to poor process control, there was too much back and forth communication. Because we want to give users visibility of who is editing pricing, we needed to allow users to leave a record (audit trail) of the last updated time stamp and names when they change pricing.
Display critical tasks first: Since users need as much time as possible to complete their highest priority, we needed to provide missing prices first and communicate to clients when available. Once the missing prices are resolved, they are sent to Eagle and sent confirmations to all parties.
Complex challenges like this were among several identified during user research sessions, and validating and other solutions before implementation was key to our short turnaround.
Opportunity
Not only was this project important because it was one of the top requests we continued to hear from clients, but it also provided tremendous value to the business. We saw editing and record keeping as a way to increase user engagement, keep work (and users) in Valuations, and to satisfy demand.
The opportunity for Valuations was specific: we could be a lightweight and ad-hoc tool for review and pricing. Our users were turning to Valuations to make small changes, and wanted to trust Pivot would be able to track the history of their work. We prioritized a few key features that would be most valuable and feasible, that would make the preview pricing actions dynamic.
Highlight high-priority tasks to capture all essential items on a daily basis.
Access past valuations to track the history of previous prices and percentage changes for comparison.
Receive relevant notifications to be informed and up to date on any new activity.
Initial Explorations
I explored the many different ways a user would be able to edit a price: from the table row, modal windows, and upload preview. I also considered different input types: current price, override reasons, price source, and upload templates. As part of my process, I detailed out every single flow and weighed the pros and cons of each.
Although the most intuitive method was from the table preview itself, this was technically not feasible in the time span that we had. I resorted to two different methods: the drawer and the upload in the side. We also settled on three different flag types (missing, exceptions, and done) which solved for our primary use cases: editing prices and uploading documents like homework of the day, and giving notifications/feedback from API calls on confirmations to exceptions that exceed a percentage.
Iterations
Round 1: Steppers and read-only data cards on a single, consolidated table.
Round 2 - Interactive (clickable) data cards of three separate tables.
Round 1 and 2 were critical iterations in developing the MVP, ultimately selected by leadership as the optimal solution.
The final design displayed just enough information to prospective users, automated audit trails through XLS exports, and centralized task management within the valuation dashboard.
This was considered the most promising, scalable option.
Interactive Card Design and Framework
Throughout the project, requirements changed and new constraints were uncovered. Early on, I learned that the number count could not be dynamic on the dashboard with each new price added, so I decided that each submission would update the count w/ another API call. The cards had be the source of truth with a record of all activity.
I explored different visual treatments within the card to communicate progress. Ultimately, I had to make two distinct designs for the cards, the MVP and final versions, based on constraints and phasing.
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Round 1
❌ Steppers were displayed to provide direction to users, but implies the user cannot go back or forward.
❌ Cards are not interactive, only read-only summaries of each status. During testing, most users clicked on these cards assuming these were buttons. -
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Round 2
❌ Dropdown of funds was too subtle and not noticeable. Most users paused when asked to change the fund type.
❌ Valuation status was too general and needed more context on open funds.
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MVP
❌ Can't have all funds dropdown to narrow down view by funds. due to api constraints and resourcing issues.
❌ Can't have valuation status and pricing files % due to more constraints, but plans are in place for phase 2.
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Final
How it works
Valuations made easy
A simple change that resulted in streamlined work processes. Previously, users could not upload prices to any asset or fund— they had to contact fund accounting at U.S. Bank to sort through their spreadsheet and track down the request.
Document uploads put the responsibility on external clients to complete their tasks, relieving communication between external and internal clients, especially at the end of the day (~5:30pm ET).
Upload XLS — Users can download a document for record keeping, but this also serves as a template to upload prices. When clicking on upload, users can select the file to update their document to the table. After review, users can submit to finalize their actions.
Input prices yourself
The central feature of this project was allowing the external clients to input prices one-by-one, in batches, and in bulk straight on the dashboard.
As a team, we landed two action types that fit within our scope: adding missing prices and overriding prices. These supported different use cases, for example, clients who wanted to add missing current prices and fund accountants who wanted to override current prices.
Manual input — Users can access the pricing tool on web or tablet and single-select by row or multi-select several assets to fulfill the prices. A drawer appears in the right side of the screen and displays crucial information that enables decisions.-
Before
Content has been blurred for privacy reasons.
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After
Supports quick price edits, historical data analysis, and bulk data uploads for streamlined workflow.
What Clients Are Saying
“That’s awesome. I can see the NAV data in the past. This will be useful.”
— Client A
“I think this is a step in the right direction. I’m excited to see what the future of Pivot will look like. I’m interested to see how Pivot will handle our specific needs.”
— Client B
Results
The feedback we received from FA managers and external clients were extremely positive, with many noting the convenience of having the ability to view changes in the past.
Beyond a boost in positive sentiment, we’ve also seen an interest in future enhancements and commitment to the platform. We are hoping for an increase in retention and engagement from users as a direct result of rolling out this feature.
Outcome
This was a really exciting and interesting project for me to work on as it provides real value, involved research w/ clients, and detailed interaction work. However, shifting priorities and changing roadmaps have delayed the launch of this feature. Still, I learned some important takeaways from this project related to product and critical business processes.
Next steps
The immediate next steps are to better grasp customer needs. After receiving feedback from more users, enhancements are scheduled to continue next Q1 2025. Additionally, we’re considering testing mobile design of the valuation dashboard w/ limited set of features for users who are on the go.
Key takeaways
How to adapt to changing requirements
New timelines, resourcing issues, and re-prioritization meant the scope of the project was constantly changing. I had to adapt to those changes and still deliver the best design in time with tight deadlines.
Always fight for good UX
I had to work under very strict technical constraints, but still fight for what I believe which is essential to having a good user experience.
Don’t over promise and under deliver
I learned how to define a true MVP vs. something that is simply not usable and therefore not shippable.
Choosing what we won’t do
There were many great use cases we could tackle with a rich feature set. However, every single one was costly or unrealistic. I had to determine where the real value was for valuations in Pivot so we did not spread ourselves too thin.