A digital bank set to disrupt the South African mass market by building a simple banking app that guides and educates the customer on the best possible way to manage their money.
OM Bank was launched as a digital-first bank with ambitious delivery goals and multiple product streams running in parallel. The organisation operated within a tightly regulated financial environment, with strong delivery pressure and evolving product requirements.
When I joined:
UX maturity was still in it’s infancy
Design work was agency supplied and largely delivery-led
There was no shared UX language, system, or governance
There was no internal UX design team
The challenge was not only to design product experiences, but to build a sustainable UX capability that could scale alongside the organisation.
I was responsible for establishing UX as a strategic function within the bank. This included:
Building and leading the internal UX team
Creating a design system from scratch aligned to a new brand CI
Defining UX principles, standards, and quality benchmarks
Supporting delivery across 8 agile squads
Managing a full rebrand mid-build without slowing delivery
Hiring, mentoring, and growing designers across seniority levels
Creating a safe, high-performing team culture
Building the UX team and culture
A key focus of my role was building a strong, confident UX team that could operate independently while staying aligned.Team growth
Hired and onboarded designers across multiple levels
Reduced reliance on external agencies by building internal capability
Structured teams to support both autonomy and consistency
Culture
Created a psychologically safe environment with clear expectations
Encouraged strong opinions backed by evidence
Normalised critique, learning, and shared ownership
Balanced delivery pressure with craft quality
Outcome
A collaborative, resilient UX team trusted by stakeholders and confident in its decision-making.
Design system and brand foundations
I led the creation of a design system from the ground up to support scale, consistency, and speed.What was delivered
A design system aligned to a new brand CI
Core components, patterns, and foundations
Clear documentation to support adoption across squads
Mid-build rebrand
Midway through delivery, the bank underwent a full rebrand. UX played a central role in:
Reworking system foundations without disrupting delivery
Maintaining experience consistency during transition
Supporting squads through change without slowing momentum
Outcome
A scalable design foundation that reduced rework, improved consistency, and supported faster, more confident delivery.
What I built
A design system created from scratch
Components, patterns, and tokens aligned to a new brand CI
Clear documentation to support scale and consistency
Mid-build rebrand
Led UX through a full rebrand while product delivery continued
Re-aligned system foundations without disrupting squads
Maintained experience consistency across old and new surfaces
Outcome
A scalable design foundation that reduced rework, improved consistency, and supported faster delivery across teams.
UX principles and ways of working
To support consistent decision-making, I introduced a clear UX framework grounded in shared principles and practical ways of working.UX principles
Defined principles based on user behaviour, accessibility, and banking context
Used principles as decision-making tools rather than abstract guidelines
Ways of work
Embedded UX into agile delivery without introducing unnecessary friction
Introduced lightweight governance and regular design reviews
Clarified ownership, expectations, and decision points across teams
Outcome
Stronger alignment between UX, Product, and Engineering, with fewer late-stage issues and clearer shared understanding.
Results:
Organisational
UX positioned as a strategic partner rather than a delivery service
Improved trust and collaboration across disciplines
Team
Designers grew in confidence, ownership, and craft
Clear expectations and growth paths across seniority levels
Product
More consistent customer journeys
Stronger accessibility and usability foundations
Reduced fragmentation across experiences
Let’s build something that moves your business forward
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