Access Edge

Access Edge
Applying a Single Design System to a multiple legacy Clearance & Collateral products

Role: UX Design Director | Team : Myself, India resources | Tools: Sketch, Figma, Miro | 2023+

🏦 Business Context

BNY Mellon processes more than $6.5 trillion in Clearance & Collateral Management daily. Historically, operations teams were forced to navigate 24 separate API sources across three different systems to handle:

Outsource Clearing
International Clearance
Fed-Eligible Clearance

Each line of business had its own fragmented interface. This made even basic client onboarding and trade monitoring inefficient, error-prone, and slow to scale.

🧭 Challenge

The previous Access Edge platform was fragmented across five legacy UI frameworks. This caused:

Lack of design alignment — Different teams saw different layouts, colors, and navigation depending on their function.
No reusable templates or dashboards — Managers could not distribute curated views or standardized workflows.
Cognitive overload — Data was scattered across multiple grids with no hierarchy or prioritization.
High training overhead — New users required weeks to onboard.

The core challenge:
Implement a version of the internal Universum Design System that would unify the experience for Clearance & Collateral within a 4-month delivery window — without disrupting existing operational process

Rebuilding and reorganizing components for all types of users.

🔬 Research & Discovery

Our UX process began with stakeholder and end-user interviews across Operations, Technology, and Product teams in New York, Pittsburgh, Brussels, and India. Key insights:

Traders and Ops needed fast status visibility (pending, approved, rejected).
Managers wanted template-driven workspaces for repeatable oversight.
Developers needed consistent UI patterns to reduce code overhead.
International desks required language and data handling parity.

We performed:

Current state mapping of 5 legacy workflows
Data inventory & system analysis of 24 APIs
Competitive benchmarking (internal systems + peer institutions)
User journey mapping to identify pain points and quick wins.

Ensuring that the main grids were customized to include all data from all the legacy systems

Worked with friendly users to establish pain points of existing products to build better integration

🧰 Process & Design Approach

Introduced standardized navigation, workspace templates, and consistent filter logic.
Consolidated multiple legacy tables into a single modular grid system with role-based permissions.
Defined color-coded status indicators (Draft, Pending, Approved, Rejected) to reduce scan time.
Created Figma component libraries for both domestic and international clearance flows.
Introduced bulk upload and quick action controls to reduce multi-step workflows.

We validated each flow with rapid prototyping and iterative stakeholder reviews, ensuring alignment with compliance and operational needs.

🚀 Implementation & Outcomes

In partnership with Product and Engineering:

Deployed Access Edge 2.0 as a single entry point for all clearance operations.
Replaced 5 legacy UIs with one responsive interface.
Reduced average user task time from 7 steps to 2 steps.
Cut cognitive load through structured visual hierarchy and alert prioritization.
Enabled managers to curate workspaces and push layouts to their teams.
Created a unified Figma library synced with Universum for future scalability.

Impact: The modernization improved user satisfaction, increased adoption globally, and reduced training time by 40%.

🖼️ UX Deliverables

Information Architecture & User Flows
High-Fidelity Prototypes in Figma
UI Component Library aligned with Universum DS
Bulk upload workflow
Role-based dashboards (Domestic & International Clearance)
Approval/Rejection & workflow status management screens

Click screen to view Figma Prototype

Customer ID list for Domestic and International had to have specific filters and datasets

Audit Trails for My Profile, Click Screen to view prototype

✨ Key Takeaways

Design alignment at scale is transformative — One system replaced five.
Status clarity = speed — Visual patterns accelerated decisions.
Templating empowers managers — Curated workspaces improved operational control.
Design systems enable velocity — Using Universum DS allowed rapid implementation without sacrificing quality.