BAŞAK ALTAN
Reimagining the future through design.

Product Transformation & Commercialization

REIMAGINING FINANCIAL SERVICES WITH MICROSOFT

Connecting Microsoft Cloud capabilities to customer, employee, and business needs in financial services

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Problem: Global economic pressure, increased competition, changing customer expectations, and evolving regulatory requirements were pushing financial services organizations to rethink how they served customers and supported employees. Customers expected more personalized products, financial insights, and guidance, while employees needed better connected tools and workflows. At the same time, organizations were navigating legacy systems and complex requirements around data, security, compliance, and interoperability. The challenge was not simply adopting new technology, but identifying where technology could create meaningful value and building a clear path from transformation ambition to implementation.

Role: Senior Creative Strategist at Indigo Slate’s Human Experience Innovation Studio. Partnered with the Microsoft Catalyst team to design and lead strategic envisioning engagements with financial services organizations, translating business needs, user workflows, and Microsoft Cloud capabilities into defined transformation opportunities.

Outcome: Created a repeatable approach for moving clients from broad transformation goals to prioritized opportunities, future-state experiences, and strategic roadmaps grounded in customer needs, business priorities, and technology capabilities.

Context

Financial services organizations were navigating changing customer expectations, increasing regulatory pressure, legacy systems, and the need to make better use of their data. Customers expected more personalized services and better tools to manage their financial lives. Employees needed more connected workflows and access to the right information to serve customers effectively.At the same time, any new experience needed to work within requirements for security, compliance, interoperability, and the organization's existing technology environment.Working with the Microsoft Catalyst team, I helped clients explore where Microsoft Cloud capabilities could support meaningful business and experience transformation.

Impact

As a direct result of these collaborations we are able to:

  • Helped financial services organizations move from broad transformation goals to prioritized opportunities and clearer product direction

  • Connected customer and employee needs with Microsoft technology capabilities, business priorities, and industry constraints

  • Mapped current and future workflows to identify where data, automation, and connected systems could improve the experience

  • Built alignment across business, technology, customer experience, and leadership teams around a shared transformation direction

  • Translated envisioning work into strategic roadmaps that clients could use to guide further product definition and investment decisions

Approach

Worked with Microsoft and client teams to understand business priorities, customer needs, existing workflows, and technology constraints

  • Mapped customer and employee journeys to identify breakdowns, dependencies, and opportunities for improvement

  • Connected priority opportunities to relevant Microsoft Cloud capabilities, including data, automation, security, compliance, and interoperability

  • Led cross-functional teams through concept development and prioritization based on customer value, business value, and feasibility

  • Translated the work into future-state experiences, prioritized opportunities, and strategic roadmaps for continued development

What I’d Do Next

Move the highest-priority opportunities into deeper product and technical definition. This would include validating the workflows with customers and employees, identifying system and data dependencies, defining integration requirements, and establishing success measures for an initial pilot.

Basak Altan