Next-Gen Privacy Tools

Why this mattered

This was as much a leadership problem as a design one. Three challenges made it critical:

• The strategy was ambiguous and the stakes were high. Customer attitudes about data sharing were shifting just as Chase doubled down on data-driven products. Leadership needed someone to set direction, frame the bet, and defend it with evidence, not just run studies.
• Legacy banking platforms created hard constraints. Architectural limitations made modern privacy protections difficult to ship, risking both customer trust and significant financial exposure. Someone had to surface those limits before the bank over-invested.
• The work lived or died on cross-functional alignment. New privacy tools required coordination across C-suite, engineering, product, marketing, and design. Without a shared vision and a leader to hold it, the effort would fragment.

How I led

1. I built and ran the design team

I managed a pod of 5 - 2 designers, 1 researcher, and 1 content strategist - inside a 15-person stealth team, and led design across the broader cross-functional group. My job was to set the bar, distribute the work, and develop the people:

• Growing the team: hired one designer, coached design team through ambiguous, high-stakes work, and gave them ownership of design streams so they grew faster than the timeline would normally allow.
• Raising the floor: recruited design, product, and engineering to interview customers together, a deliberate management choice that expedited team learning and built early customer empathy across functions, not just within design.

2. I drove the decisions under ambiguity

With research in hand, the hardest call was where to place the bet. I led the team to focus on a single primary segment — the high-tech, high-exposure "Carefree Cavalier" — and reframed the entire strategy around them.

• The call: I prioritized this segment because it made up a large share of Chase's customers and, given their heavy technology use, needed protection the most, even as they worried about it the least. Choosing one segment over hedging across five mindsets focused the roadmap and gave every team a clear target.
• The evidence: I directed an adaptive conjoint study (with a vendor) that confirmed the segment's preferred feature bundles and price points, converting a judgment call into a defensible, data-backed decision.
• Selling it: I built the narrative, presented it to C-suite, and enabled teams to reframe their own projects through a privacy and security lens.

3. I built process and principles that outlasted the project

Beyond shipping, I left the org with reusable ways of working:

• Design principles I created to guide privacy and security decisions org-wide, so teams could make consistent calls without me in the room.
• Storytelling frameworks and segmentation tools that educated teams across Chase — including feature teams like the Security Center — and became shared reference material long after the pilot.

4. I led the pilot and supported the pivot

I led a delivery team of 2 designers, 1 contetn strategist, and 2 developers to build and run a live-data pilot with 100 internal participants over three weeks, then guided leadership through what it revealed.

• What worked: the privacy and security technologies performed as designed and showed real-world promise.
• What didn't: mobile app performance suffered once new features were integrated with legacy systems.
• The blocker: legacy platforms created architectural bottlenecks that would cost $10M+ to resolve.
• The pivot: I prepared evidence to support leadership in pivoting the build to Chase's modern digital banking platform in London — saving $10M+ — and ship select tools there.

Findings & insights

Chase's privacy and security experience spans many touchpoints across channels; customers navigate complex data-sharing decisions throughout their journey. My team and I envisioned tools that proactively protect customers as they live digital lives, not just react to threats. Connecting sentiment to business and behavioral risk surfaced impacts to growth and engagement, and the frameworks we produced helped teams across the org reframe their work through privacy and security.

Our research pointed to a bolder opportunity than the one the bank ultimately took: consumer-facing tools that visibly protect customers and build trust in the moment. In practice, Chase leaned into back-of-house security hardening, which was safer, but a missed chance to turn protection into a differentiating, visible customer experience. As a leader, my take stands: the most durable trust is the kind customers can see.

Results

• Patent awarded for AI-managed privacy policies (July 2024) — a novel, durable contribution to how the bank manages customer privacy.
• Focused the strategy on a single primary segment and backed it with conjoint data, giving the org a clear, defensible bet.
• Saved Chase $10M+ in prospective costs by pressure-testing the platform and surfacing legacy limits early.
• Shipped select privacy and security tools on Chase's UK digital banking platform.
• Left behind design principles and frameworks that educated data-driven feature teams like Chase's Security Center.

My role

Design Lead — Privacy & Experience Strategy

• Managed a design pod of 5; led design across the broader cross-functional stealth team.
• Set direction and made the primary-segment call, reframing the strategy around the "Carefree Cavalier."
• Directed conjoint analysis to validate segment, feature priorities, and price points.
• Created design principles and visual frameworks that guided and educated teams across Chase.
• Partnered with C-suite on vision, narrative, and investment decisions.
• Led the delivery team for the 100-person live-data pilot and guided the $10M+ platform pivot.

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