The Connections Center
The Project
The Connections Center was born from an innovation team that I was a part of within a large financial institution. The concept was to make investing more casual and approachable by allowing the general public to interact with licensed financial advisors in a street-level retail space.
Skillz
- Concept Design
- Full-Scale Prototyping
- Business Case Creation
- Way-finding and Interaction
- UI Design
- Visitor Interviews
An innovation initiative
The Connections Center was a multi-year effort that underwent rigorous discovery, human-centered research, prototyping, and testing. We leveraged business stakeholders and clients to help us design this concept through numerous in-person sessions. We even built a full-scale prototype to test how people would interact within the physical space!


Enabling conversations
The success of this retail space was dependent on creating relationships between the financial advisors and the visitors. The space was designed and staffed to create a welcoming and safe environment to enable conversations around sensitive topics.
Street level storefront
Located in the Financial District of San Francisco, The Connections Center’s street-level storefront allowed visitors to casually engage with the business on their time. This allowed more potential clients to experience the benefits without the barriers.
