Design Tool: Visualization

CHALLENGE

There are a number of processes that we do on a daily basis as portfolio managers of the bank. One of  our main functions is to management the bank’s investments, making sure that we maximize profit out  of the residual funds. As we may know, investing isn’t always as simple as buying a security and just  waiting for it to generate profit. Investing involves a lot of processes and decision making from the  generation of strategy down to the monitoring of the portfolios. As managers, we are expected to  perform these processes with due care and prudence and assure that what we do day in, day out  adheres to the bank’s regulations and policies. The lack of a written and documented process flow was a  challenge for the team since we don’t have any reference that can be used as a guide when we perform  such activities. Having a document that lists down all the relevant processes reduces our exposure to  various risks as well.

SELECTION

Visualization is a great design tool to use to address our team’s challenge given that in visualizing, you  can lay out the processes like a map that leads you from point A to point Z, which is from strategy  generation to monitoring in our team’s case.

APPLICATION

To standardize our investing activity processes, we created a process flow that visualizes everything that  we do from start to finish. We first listed all the relevant processes and responsible units and arranged  them accordingly. By doing so, we were able to get a better picture of how each process was connected  to each other, but just by simply listing them was not enough and it still created confusion. For people to  better understand the workflow, we used Microsoft Visio to create a flowchart that maps all the  procedures using diagrams and connectors to show the movements from one process to another. Given  that an investment activity doesn’t just involve one unit, we have incorporated all the processes  involved from different units as well and made one flowchart that covers everything from end to end.  The flowchart was an easier way for us to check on whether we have done all the necessary processes  or not, or if we complied with the regulations and policies set by the bank.

INSIGHT & APPROACH

Using the visualization design tool was a great idea for the team. We were not only able to put our  processes into writing, but we were also able to visualize the workflow making it a more convenient and  effective way in conveying the procedures that need to be done. It was not only helpful to us as the  current users of the document, but also to the future readers. We had one new member in the team  read the document as reference and the feedback that we got from her was that the flowchart was  really helpful in making her understand what we do as portfolio managers. Seeing the relevance of using  the visualization approach in our business, our team is leaning towards using this tool again for other  pertinent areas.

