Role

Timeline

Jan - March 2023

UX Designer & Researcher

Figma, FigJam, Teams

Prototyping, User Interviews, UI

Tools

Skills

Overview

Simplifying Expense Management for Teams ✨

RoundTable Expenses is a mobile application designed to simplify group expense tracking and management for collaborative teams and shared projects. Inspired by the challenges faced during group activities, this app provides a seamless solution for organizing finances and maintaining transparency within teams.

The project was developed as part of an academic design challenge and involved research, ideation, prototyping, and usability testing over a span of 10 weeks. It was built by a team of three designers using Figma, FigJam, and Notion as our primary tools.

Problem

Managing group expenses is messy, causing confusion and delays 💸

When collaborating on group projects, my team and I experienced firsthand how difficult it can be to track shared expenses, divide costs, and keep everyone accountable. Most existing tools lacked the flexibility and ease-of-use needed for managing group budgets effectively. We saw an opportunity to design a centralized solution that simplifies expense tracking, improves transparency, and reduces stress for teams working together. Our goal was to build a platform that eliminates the frustration of managing group finances and makes splitting costs as seamless as possible.

Design Method

Goal-Directed Design

We followed a Goal-Directed Design (GDD) process to develop RoundTable Expenses. We chose GDD because it focuses on designing with the end-user's goals and behaviors in mind, making it particularly effective for solving practical problems. Given the complex nature of group expense tracking, we wanted a framework that would allow us to deeply understand user needs, prioritize usability, and create a product that aligns with real-world scenarios.

Market Research

60% of adults find managing shared expenses stressful 😓

Literature Review

To better understand the challenges and needs related to expense tracking, we researched the financial management industry and user behavior concerning budgeting and expense sharing. Studies showed that 60% of adults report stress when managing shared finances, especially in group settings.

Competitive Analysis

Our research encompassed a detailed analysis of several key players in the personal finance and group expense management space, including Tricount, Rego Payments (Mazoola), Splitwise, Honeydue, and Goodbudget.

Research Goals

  • Understand Popularity: Explore the reasons these tools are widely adopted.

  • Analyze Strengths and Weaknesses: Identify what users appreciate and dislike about existing solutions.

  • Discover Opportunities: Pinpoint potential areas where RoundTable Expenses could offer unique value.

User Research Interviews

Expense tracking must be simple and stress-free 💬

We wanted to understand how individuals and businesses handle shared expenses and track budgets. Our goal was to identify pain points, priorities, and expectations from financial management tools. By focusing on participants who had direct experience managing expenses, we gained insights into both professional and personal financial tracking methods. These conversations highlighted the need for efficiency, accountability, and automation in group expense management.

Personal Hypothesis

  1. We hypothesized that our primary users would include small business owners, accountants, and freelancers who frequently manage shared expenses and budgets. These users often face challenges with accountability, time management, and staying organized.

  2. We also anticipated secondary users such as students, roommates, and travel groups, who need simpler solutions for managing shared costs. This hypothesis guided the creation of detailed personas to capture the needs, goals, and pain points of these user groups.

Interview Sessions

To better understand user behavior and expectations, we conducted 6 interviews with individuals who work closely with finances, including accountants, business owners, and bookkeepers. These participants provided valuable insights into how they manage expenses, track payments, and organize financial data in professional and personal settings.

Affinity Maps

After each interview, our team spent 10 minutes individually writing down observations from the sessions. We then came together to group these insights into patterns and themes, organizing key points. Discussions followed to highlight recurring pain points, feature requests, and behavioral patterns. This process was essential for identifying trends across participants and ensuring the design decisions aligned with user expectations and priorities.

Observations

All six interviewees valued customization and personalization to help them stay organized and motivated. Many participants emphasized the importance of progress tracking, reminders, and visual analytics to streamline financial planning and keep tasks on track. Additionally, several interviewees highlighted the value of collaborative features, such as shared reports and group access, to ensure transparency and accountability among team members.

These insights reinforced our focus on creating a tool that supports flexibility, engagement, and collaboration.

Persona Development

The Detail-Oriented Planner & The Flexible Tracker

Behavioral Variables

Our team compiled data from our six interviews and analyzed responses to identify patterns of behavior. Using affinity maps, notes, and observations, we recognized several behavioral variables shared by our participants:

  • Financial Knowledge: Varied from minimal to extensive.

  • Error Detection Frequency: Some identified errors quickly, others rarely noticed.

  • Trust Levels: Ranged from strong reliance on financial tools to skepticism.

  • Motivation Levels: Spanned from highly proactive to more reactive approaches.

Personas

Because we identified two main patterns, we created two personas to represent our users: a primary persona and a secondary persona. The primary persona, Ignacio Singleton, represents highly organized and detail-oriented users who prioritize structure, security, and automation to manage finances effectively. The secondary persona, Wendy Mcgee, embodies more casual and flexible users who value simplicity, quick access, and ease of use. These personas highlight distinct approaches to expense management, allowing us to design RoundTable Expenses as a versatile and user-friendly solution that accommodates both structured planners and those seeking efficiency without complexity.

Designing

Wireframing First, Refining Later

Low-Fidelity

We began the design process by creating low-fidelity wireframes directly in Figma. This approach allowed us to quickly visualize layouts, experiment with navigation, and establish the overall structure of the app. The four main frames we created were the dashboard, accounts page, settings, and goals/organization frame. These low-fidelity wireframes helped us focus on functionality, user flow, and layout while keeping the design flexible for further iterations. Using Figma enabled seamless collaboration, where we refined ideas in real time based on user needs and initial feedback. These prototypes provided a solid foundation for transitioning into high-fidelity designs.

Style Guide

We crafted a color system to maintain consistency and vibrancy across various contexts. The palette spans from white at 100 to black at 0, ensuring harmony and clarity in every visual element. Each color step was strategically assigned semantic roles, such as surface and system colors, to guide design consistency and accessibility.

Designers have access to 43 semantic colors, providing flexibility while maintaining visual coherence. Primitive colors were excluded from direct use in components to preserve systematic alignment.

Typography was selected to balance clarity and professionalism with modernity. We incorporated Poppins for headings, offering a bold and structured look, and Source Sans Pro for body text, ensuring readability and approachability. Sizes were carefully adjusted across display, headline, and body styles to support hierarchy and usability.

The style guide established clear rules for spacing, grids, and button styles, ensuring a cohesive visual language throughout the app. This structured approach allowed us to create an interface that is not only functional but also visually engaging and accessible.

Usability Testing

Enhancing Functionality Through Testing

Testing Process

Following the first iteration of RoundTable Expenses, we conducted usability tests to evaluate the app’s functionality and user flow. Two participants from our earlier interviews were selected to provide feedback. Testing sessions were conducted remotely via Microsoft Teams, where participants were given predefined tasks to complete, such as logging expenses, organizing payments, and navigating account settings.

We implemented the Think Aloud Protocol (TAP) to gather insights into participants' thought processes as they interacted with the app. This method allowed us to pinpoint areas where users encountered friction, experienced confusion, or struggled with specific features. Observations focused on navigation patterns, task completion rates, and visual clarity. The results guided us in refining the design, ensuring the interface became more intuitive, and addressing any usability gaps that surfaced during testing.

Findings

  • Users wanted more customization options for account settings and organizational features.

  • The home screen lacked a focal point, leading to an overwhelming and cluttered experience.

  • Button labels were unclear, resulting in confusion during navigation.

  • Tracking expenses and switching between categories felt unintuitive and required extra steps.

Refinement

Based on participant feedback, we revisited the design in Figma and implemented the following changes:

  • Expanded customization features for categories, accounts, and organizational tools to increase personalization.

  • Redesigned the home screen to include a more welcoming layout with clear sections for categories and recent activities.

  • Updated button labels and added visual cues to make navigation more intuitive.

  • Simplified the process for switching between expense categories and added quick-access options for frequently used features.

Final Prototype

Optimizing Expense Management for Collaborative Teams

After completing rounds of research, user interviews, usability tests, and iterative refinements, we developed RoundTable Expenses—a collaborative app designed to simplify group expense tracking and organization. The app allows users to manage accounts, track payments, and set financial goals while maintaining transparency within teams.

Reflection

Key Takeaways and Growth 🌱

Learnings

  1. Collaboration is crucial—Working closely with my team allowed us to leverage each member’s strengths, ensuring that every aspect of the app was carefully considered and refined.

  2. Style guides matter—Establishing clear guidelines for typography, colors, and spacing early in the process kept our designs cohesive and professional throughout development.

  3. Research drives success—The data gathered from interviews and usability testing shaped our design decisions, proving that user feedback is essential for creating intuitive experiences.

  4. Testing is key—Conducting usability tests revealed design flaws we hadn’t anticipated and gave us the opportunity to improve functionality before finalizing the app.