PROGRAM SNAPSHOT VALUES
Company: Workiva
Project: Program Snapshot Valuels
Role: Lead designer, Foundational Systems Architecture
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The Challenge: Data Integrity Risk
The ESG program relied on Connected Values that updated live from external sources. Users were completing tasks as an official sign-off, but the source data remained mutable — leading to changes after completion that compromised audit trails and accountability.
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The goal: create a reliable, auditable source of truth that preserved compliance and user trust.
Staff Leadership & Strategy
I led the product vision and aligned cross-functional teams to design a solution around a non-negotiable technical constraint: locking the external source wasn’t possible. Instead, I drove the strategy to capture values at completion, creating a new architectural layer to ensure integrity.
Designing the Snapshot Value Entity
The solution was to create the Immutable Snapshot Value:
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When a task is completed, the program takes a snapshot of the value, aligning it with the approval timestamp.
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This freezes the data and establishes the program itself as the Source of Truth.
This approach restores the user’s expectation that task completion equals official sign-off, while bypassing technical limitations.
UX Governance: Making Trust Visible
The architecture alone wasn’t enough — users needed to understand what had changed. I designed a multi-platform alert system (Email, Task Panel, Sustainability Panel, Program) to proactively communicate any divergence between the immutable snapshot and the live external source.
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This visual, actionable system of alerts reinforces trust and ensures compliance without overwhelming users.
Foundational Framework: Immutable Snapshot value
Working with Product and Engineering, I designed the Snapshot Value entity to bypass a non-negotiable constraint: external sources couldn’t be locked. Upon task completion, the value is captured and frozen, creating an auditable, immutable Source of Truth that preserves compliance and trust.
UX Governance: Communicating State and Trust
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The architectural solution alone wasn’t enough — users needed to understand and trust the system.
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The challenge: the source data could change after task completion, an invisible risk that could undermine confidence and compliance. I designed a multi-state alert system that clearly communicates when a Snapshot Value diverges from the live external source. Alerts appear in the Sustainability Panel and other key touchpoints, giving users actionable information and reinforcing confidence in the platform’s integrity.
Quantified Business Impact & Systemic Foresight
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Immediate impact: Mitigated a systemic data risk and restored client confidence in audit and compliance functions.
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Long-term impact: The Snapshot Value framework provides the foundation for future platform features, including high-level aggregation, visualization, and the Program Health Dashboard.
The Program Health Dashboard Concept Phase 1
Conclusion
This project demonstrates my ability to
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Diagnose complex, constraint-driven platform problems
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Lead cross-functional alignment to deliver systemic, architectural solutions
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Design governance and UX systems that ensure trust, integrity, and measurable business impact
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Lay the foundation for future strategic capabilities