Janie Sanchez
Hi there, I’m Janie, a design strategist turning complexity into clarity for people, teams, and futures.
Currently designing at Vanguard to help make financial goals feel actionable.
Wondering about the red underline? Ask me about it in computer class.
reach out: hello@janiesanchez.com
01. Vanguard Goals
Empowering everyday people to reach their financial goals.
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
Your full goals forecast
1 year
5 years
10 years
Lifetime
2020
2025
2030
2035
2040
2045
2050
2055
2060
2065
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
💰
Emergency fund reached
Growing at 3.7% interest
✏️
! Off track
Alex’s education
target is off track
Align your contributions to meet this goal
⛰️
Retirement fund half-funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds at 6%
Display:
All goals
⛰️
Retirement
💰
Emergency fund
✏️
Alex’s education fund
The Challenge / Most people aspire to lead their finances with confidence—but often find financial planning and investing confusing, stressful, and intimidating.
My Role / As the product designer, I mapped discovery priorities to align user behavior to Vanguard’s investing principles through bite-sized, confidence-building user actions.
As the UX lead on a multi-disciplinary team, I helped shape our product proof-of-concept, estimated to deliver $160–426M in annual client value.
march 2024
Understanding Industry + Social Trends
Resources for self-managed portfolios range in clunky → high-risk.
Rise of social trading
Nearly half of consumers (49%) rely on finfluencers for investment advice (BrokerChooser), yet 80% of forex content on TikTok is potentially misleading—undermining long-term financial goals.
Rise of betting markets
Speculative platforms like Polymarket ($9B volume, 314K traders, The Block) are drawing attention.
For every $1 spent on betting, households invest $2 less (KelloggInsight), signaling a shift toward riskier behaviors.
Tools are evolving, but gaps remain
Only 27% of firms support multi-goal planning (Corporate Insight).
While disruptors like Monarch and Voya are gaining traction, they still lag in trust and execution.
april 2024
Establishing our Competitive Advantage
Vanguard is uniquely positioned to lead with integrated, goal-based experiences.
vanguards_guide_to_financial_wellness.pdf
52 pages
Vanguard’s guide to financial wellness:
dense + comprehensive.
Let’s make it personalized + actionable.
Vanguard was the first brokerage firm to pioneer low-cost investing and diversification to everyday Americans in 1975.
Today, in 2025, Vanguard’s methodology, expertise, and user trust are robust and rooted in investor ownership built over millions of interactions.
Everything we know about holistic personal finance is in this file, but it’s a 52-page PDF. It’s dense and comprehensive, but difficult to implement.
April–June 2024
Defining Discovery Strategy
Investment
principles
User
behavior
Participants drew their past and future savings and financial planning timelines, which revealed that financial decisions are often tied to pivotal life events.
User discovery methods
June–July 2024
Synthesizing User Insights
Users’ financial mental models largely mirror Vanguard’s philosophy, but lack clarity around key areas.
“A scenario planning tool is something that I don't really have right now—I kinda do that manually.
What if we sold our house? What would we do with the money? I haven't really seen a kind of a cascading scenario tool, and I would appreciate that.”
—Kristen, 29
Key thematic findings
August 2024
Defining our Pilot Audience: Early Accumulators
Our early pilot is best suited for early- to mid- career professionals who are new to investing and value a simple, confident way to build growth.
Early investors appreciates a minimalistic, growth-focused experience, making this segment a perfect match for an lean accelerated pilot rollout.
Initial brokerage choices often become lasting ones. Securing the confidence of early accumulators positions our product for long-term retention and advocacy.
Early investors are forming foundational financial behaviors. By guiding them now, we build towards growth together.
September 2024
Exploring features
Early feature ideation sought to close key user gaps and drive investors to a desired action.
Key features
DEcember 2024
Establishing our Product Vision
Early concept definition focuses on a full and comprehensive goal-planning and tracking experience.
“Help me understand the nitty gritty.
Tell me everything about my retirement goal.”
Personal investors
Support
1
Log off
My dashboard
Portfolio
Transact
Products & services
Resources & education
Contribute to a 529
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
All Goals
Your full goals forecast
You’re projected to have $12,500 monthly in retirement.
That’s about $1,200 more than you may need. That could mean earlier retirement or more travel.
2020
2030
2040
2050
2060
2065
2070
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
⛰️
Retirement fund half funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds ($11,300/mo)
Retirement contributions
$403,554.00
Target: $1,750,000
Funding: $1,600 monthly
✓ on track
Accounts:
Edit goal
Retirement
diversification
! off track
Less
diversified
Asset mix
! off track
Global stock exposure
✓ on track
Single-stock concentration
✓ on track
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio →
Your action plan
Set up your retirement goal
Your portfolio does not reflect your current risk profile: 90% stocks, 10% bonds.
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio analysis →
There are some optimization actions you could take.
Set up automatic contributions
Set up your account to automatically make contributions and keep your goal on track.
Set up contributions →
4 more actions
Your activity
June 12, 2025
You hit a 12-month contribution streak! Nice work.
April 12, 2025
You increased your contributions by $250.
April 12, 2025
You made your first transfer.
8 more actions
Action list
Mitigate decision paralysis.
Numerical projection
Give a tangible ballpark of retirement cashflow.
Milestone projection
Make goals feel closer
and more achievable.
Contribution status
List contribution and goal details.
Activity log
Celebrate momentum.
“Help me understand the full picture. Tell me about all my goals together.”
January–April 2025
Pilot + Learning
Yes!
We saw increased confidence and clarity in decision-making, validating our hypothesis around perceived value in scenario modeling and behavioral nudges.
But, let’s make it better.
Users still struggle to commit to a goals experience if it feels too complex or time-intensive without a clear output.
↑ Simple, default inputs
Early tests validated that users appreciate and will accept defaults, but they see the experience as more personalized, and thus more valuable, if the defaults are editable within the page.
Balancing relevance and customization against cognitive load and perceived effort continues to be a focus in iterations.
Ongoing concept testing has provided directional validation of 1-page customization improving perceived value.
↗ Editable inputs
Balancing relevance and customization against cognitive load and perceived effort continues to be a focus in iterations.
Ongoing concept testing has provided directional validation of 1-page customization improving perceived value.
Goal setup
35%
✓About you
Portfolio income
Other
Projected gap
You may have $1,700/mo in retirement at age 65*
↑ Goal setup usability and concepting enhancements
Our team has ideated various ways to enhance the goal-setting experience and scenario play while creating a goal. We’ll test these concepts to help us define the elements that best improve ease, comprehension, perceived value, and action readiness.
June–July 2025
Next: Enhancements + Scale
We’ll continue to improve the user flow, scale impact, and sharpen differentiation to best align the product evolution to long-term strategic goals.
Top opportunities for experimentation
Janie Sanchez
About
Hi there, I’m Janie, a design strategist turning complexity into clarity for people, teams, and futures.
Currently designing at Vanguard to help make financial goals feel actionable.
Wondering about the red underline? Ask me about it in computer class.
reach out: hello@janiesanchez.com
Hi there, I’m Janie, a design strategist turning complexity into clarity for people, teams, and futures.
Currently designing at Vanguard to help make financial goals feel actionable.
Wondering about the red underline? Ask me about it in computer class.
reach out: hello@janiesanchez.com
01. Vanguard Goals
Empowering everyday people to reach their financial goals.
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
Your full goals forecast
1 year
5 years
10 years
Lifetime
2020
2025
2030
2035
2040
2045
2050
2055
2060
2065
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
💰
Emergency fund reached
Growing at 3.7% interest
✏️
! Off track
Alex’s education
target is off track
Align your contributions to meet this goal
⛰️
Retirement fund half-funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds at 6%
Display:
All goals
⛰️
Retirement
💰
Emergency fund
✏️
Alex’s education fund
The Challenge / Most people aspire to lead their finances with confidence—but often find financial planning and investing confusing, stressful, and intimidating.
My Role / As the product designer, I mapped discovery priorities to align user behavior to Vanguard’s investing principles through bite-sized, confidence-building user actions.
As the UX lead on a multi-disciplinary team, I helped shape our product proof-of-concept, estimated to deliver $160–426M in annual client value.
march 2024
Understanding Industry + Social Trends
Resources for self-managed portfolios range in clunky → high-risk.
Rise of social trading
Nearly half of consumers (49%) rely on finfluencers for investment advice (BrokerChooser), yet 80% of forex content on TikTok is potentially misleading—undermining long-term financial goals.
Rise of betting markets
Speculative platforms like Polymarket ($9B volume, 314K traders, The Block) are drawing attention.
For every $1 spent on betting, households invest $2 less (KelloggInsight), signaling a shift toward riskier behaviors.
Tools are evolving, but gaps remain
Only 27% of firms support multi-goal planning (Corporate Insight).
While disruptors like Monarch and Voya are gaining traction, they still lag in trust and execution.
april 2024
Establishing our Competitive Advantage
Vanguard is uniquely positioned to lead with integrated, goal-based experiences.
vanguards_guide_to_financial_wellness.pdf
52 pages
Vanguard’s guide to financial wellness:
dense + comprehensive.
Let’s make it personalized + actionable.
Vanguard was the first brokerage firm to pioneer low-cost investing and diversification to everyday Americans in 1975.
Today, in 2025, Vanguard’s methodology, expertise, and user trust are robust and rooted in investor ownership built over millions of interactions.
Everything we know about holistic personal finance is in this file, but it’s a 52-page PDF. It’s dense and comprehensive, but difficult to implement.
April–June 2024
Defining Discovery Strategy
Methodology
investment principles
User
behavior
Participants drew their past and future savings and financial planning timelines, which revealed that financial decisions are often tied to pivotal life events.
User discovery methods
June–July 2024
Synthesizing User Insights
Users’ financial mental models largely mirror Vanguard’s philosophy, but lack clarity around key areas.
“A scenario planning tool is something that I don't really have right now—I kinda do that manually.
What if we sold our house? What would we do with the money? I haven't really seen a kind of a cascading scenario tool, and I would appreciate that.”
—Kristen, 29
Key thematic findings
August 2024
Defining our Pilot Audience: Early Accumulators
Our early pilot is best suited for early- to mid- career professionals who are new to investing and value a simple, confident way to build growth.
Early investors appreciates a minimalistic, growth-focused experience, making this segment a perfect match for an lean accelerated pilot rollout.
Initial brokerage choices often become lasting ones. Securing the confidence of early accumulators positions our product for long-term retention and advocacy.
Early investors are forming foundational financial behaviors. By guiding them now, we build towards growth together.
September 2024
Exploring features
Early feature ideation sought to close key user gaps and drive investors to a desired action.
Key features
DEcember 2024
Establishing our Product Vision
Early concept definition focuses on a full and comprehensive goal-planning and tracking experience.
“Help me understand the nitty gritty.
Tell me everything about my retirement goal.”
Personal investors
Support
1
Log off
My dashboard
Portfolio
Transact
Products & services
Resources & education
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
All Goals
Your full goals forecast
You’re projected to have $12,500 monthly in retirement.
That’s about $1,200 more than you may need. That could mean earlier retirement or more travel.
2020
2030
2040
2050
2060
2065
2070
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
⛰️
Retirement fund half funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds ($11,300/mo)
Retirement contributions
$403,554.00
Target: $1,750,000
Funding: $1,600 monthly
✓ on track
Accounts:
Edit goal
Retirement
diversification
! off track
Less
diversified
Asset mix
! off track
Global stock exposure
✓ on track
Single-stock concentration
✓ on track
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio ->
Your action plan
Set up your retirement goal
Your portfolio does not reflect your current risk profile: 90% stocks, 10% bonds.
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio analysis →
There are some optimization actions you could take.
Set up automatic contributions
Set up your account to automatically make contributions and keep your goal on track.
Set up contributions →
4 more actions
Your activity
June 12, 2025
You hit a 12-month contribution streak! Nice work.
April 12, 2025
You increased your contributions by $250.
April 12, 2025
You made your first transfer.
8 more actions
Action list
Mitigate decision paralysis.
Diversification status
Signals the need to rebalance portfolio.
Numerical projection
Give a tangible ballpark of retirement cashflow and milestone timeline.
Contribution status
List contribution and goal details.
Activity log
Celebrate momentum.
“Help me understand the full picture.
Tell me about all my goals together.”
January–April 2025
Pilot + Learning
Yes!
We saw increased confidence and clarity in decision-making, validating our hypothesis around perceived value in scenario modeling and behavioral nudges.
But, let’s make it better.
Users still struggle to commit to a goals experience if it feels too complex or time-intensive without a clear output.
↑ Simple, default inputs
Early tests validated that users appreciate and will accept defaults, but they see the experience as more personalized, and thus more valuable, if the defaults are editable within the page.
↗ Editable inputs
Balancing relevance and customization against cognitive load and perceived effort continues to be a focus in iterations.
Ongoing concept testing has provided directional validation of 1-page customization improving perceived value.
Goal setup
35%
✓About you
Portfolio income
Other
Projected gap
You may have $1,700/mo in retirement at age 65*
↑ Goal setup usability enhancements
Our team has ideated various ways to enhance the goal-setting experience and scenario play while creating a goal. We’ll test these concepts to help us define the elements that best improve ease, comprehension, perceived value, and action readiness.
June–July 2025
Next: Enhancements + Scale
We’ll continue to improve the user flow, scale impact, and sharpen differentiation to best align the product evolution to long-term strategic goals.
Opportunities for experimentation
Janie Sanchez
About
Hi there, I’m Janie, a design strategist turning complexity into clarity for people, teams, and futures.
Currently designing at Vanguard to help make financial goals feel actionable.
Wondering about the red underline? Ask me about it in computer class.
reach out: hello@janiesanchez.com
Hi there, I’m Janie, a design strategist turning complexity into clarity for people, teams, and futures.
Currently designing at Vanguard to help make financial goals feel actionable.
Wondering about the red underline? Ask me about it in computer class.
reach out: hello@janiesanchez.com
01. Vanguard Goals
Empowering everyday people to reach their financial goals.
Personal investors
Support
1
Log off
My dashboard
Portfolio
Transact
Products & services
Resources & education
Contribute to a 529
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
Your full goals forecast
1 year
5 years
10 years
Lifetime
2020
2025
2030
2035
2040
2045
2050
2055
2060
2065
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
💰
Emergency fund reached
Growing at 3.7% interest
✏️
! Off track
Alex’s education
target is off track
Align your contributions to meet this goal
⛰️
Retirement fund half-funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds at 6%
Display:
All goals
⛰️
Retirement
💰
Emergency fund
✏️
Alex’s education fund
🏡
Mortgage payoff
The Challenge / Most people aspire to lead their finances with confidence—but often find financial planning and investing confusing, stressful, and intimidating.
My Role / As the product designer, I mapped discovery priorities to align user behavior to Vanguard’s investing principles through bite-sized, confidence-building user actions.
As the UX lead on a multi-disciplinary team, I helped shape our product proof-of-concept, estimated to deliver $160–426M in annual client value.
march 2024
Understanding Industry + Social Trends
Resources for self-managed portfolios range in clunky → high-risk.
Rise of social trading
Nearly half of consumers (49%) rely on finfluencers for investment advice (BrokerChooser), yet 80% of forex content on TikTok is potentially misleading—undermining long-term financial goals.
Rise of betting markets
Speculative platforms like Polymarket ($9B volume, 314K traders, The Block) are drawing attention.
For every $1 spent on betting, households invest $2 less (KelloggInsight), signaling a shift toward riskier behaviors.
Tools are evolving, but gaps remain
Only 27% of firms support multi-goal planning (Corporate Insight).
While disruptors like Monarch and Voya are gaining traction, they still lag in trust and execution.
april 2024
Establishing our Competitive Advantage
Vanguard is uniquely positioned to lead with integrated, goal-based experiences.
vanguards_guide_to_financial_wellness.pdf
52 pages
Vanguard’s guide to financial wellness:
dense + comprehensive.
Let’s make it personalized + actionable.
Vanguard was the first brokerage firm to pioneer low-cost investing and diversification to everyday Americans in 1975.
Today, in 2025, Vanguard’s methodology, expertise, and user trust are robust and rooted in investor ownership built over millions of interactions.
Everything we know about holistic personal finance is in this file, but it’s a 52-page PDF. It’s dense and comprehensive, but difficult to implement.
April–June 2024
Defining Discovery Strategy
Methodology
investment principles
User
behavior
Participants drew their past and future savings and financial planning timelines, which revealed that financial decisions are often tied to pivotal life events.
User discovery methods
June–July 2024
Synthesizing User Insights
Users’ financial mental models largely mirror Vanguard’s philosophy, but lack clarity around key areas.
“A scenario planning tool is something that I don't really have right now—I kinda do that manually.
What if we sold our house? What would we do with the money? I haven't really seen a kind of a cascading scenario tool, and I would appreciate that.”
—Kristen, 29
Key thematic findings
August 2024
Defining our Pilot Audience: Early Accumulators
Our early pilot is best suited for early- to mid- career professionals who are new to investing and value a simple, confident way to build growth.
Early investors appreciates a minimalistic, growth-focused experience, making this segment a perfect match for an lean accelerated pilot rollout.
Initial brokerage choices often become lasting ones. Securing the confidence of early accumulators positions our product for long-term retention and advocacy.
Early investors are forming foundational financial behaviors. By guiding them now, we build towards growth together.
September 2024
Exploring features
Early feature ideation sought to close key user gaps and drive investors to a desired action.
Key features
DEcember 2024
Establishing our Product Vision
Early concept definition focuses on a full and comprehensive goal-planning and tracking experience.
“Help me understand the nitty gritty.
Tell me everything about my retirement goal.”
Personal investors
Support
1
Log off
My dashboard
Portfolio
Transact
Products & services
Resources & education
Contribute to a 529
Welcome back, Julia
$78,403.00
Value as of:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Last login:
June 30, 2025, 11:40 a.m., Eastern time
Dashboard
Balances
Holdings
Activity
Performance
Goals
Portfolio watch
All Goals
Your full goals forecast
You’re projected to have $12,500 monthly in retirement.
That’s about $1,200 more than you may need. That could mean earlier retirement or more travel.
2020
2030
2040
2050
2060
2065
2070
2M
1.75M
1.25M
1M
600k
300k
0k
⛰️
Retirement fund half funded
Compound interest projected building up
⛰️
Retirement fund in use
Starting to withdraw funds ($11,300/mo)
Retirement contributions
$403,554.00
Target: $1,750,000
Funding: $1,600 monthly
✓ on track
Accounts:
Edit goal
Retirement
diversification
! off track
Less
diversified
Asset mix
! off track
Global stock exposure
✓ on track
Single-stock concentration
✓ on track
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio →
Your action plan
Set up your retirement goal
Your portfolio does not reflect your current risk profile: 90% stocks, 10% bonds.
Review your mix of investments
Based on your targets, your investment allocation could be more optimized.
Review portfolio analysis →
There are some optimization actions you could take.
Set up automatic contributions
Set up your account to automatically make contributions and keep your goal on track.
Set up contributions →
4 more actions
Your activity
June 12, 2025
You hit a 12-month contribution streak! Nice work.
April 12, 2025
You increased your contributions by $250.
April 12, 2025
You made your first transfer.
8 more actions
Action list
Mitigate decision paralysis.
Diversification status
Signals the need to rebalance portfolio.
Numerical projection
Give a tangible ballpark of retirement cashflow
Milestone projection
Make goals feel closer
and more achievable.
Contribution status
List contribution and goal details.
Activity log
Celebrate momentum.
“Help me understand the full picture.
Tell me about all my goals together.”
January–April 2025
Pilot + Learning
Yes!
We saw increased confidence and clarity in decision-making, validating our hypothesis around perceived value in scenario modeling and behavioral nudges.
But, let’s make it better.
Users still struggle to commit to a goals experience if it feels too complex or time-intensive without a clear output.
↑ Simple, default inputs
Early tests validated that users appreciate and will accept defaults, but they see the experience as more personalized, and thus more valuable, if the defaults are editable within the page.
↗ Editable inputs
Balancing relevance and customization against cognitive load and perceived effort continues to be a focus in iterations.
Ongoing concept testing has provided directional validation of 1-page customization improving perceived value.
Goal setup
35%
✓About you
Portfolio income
Other
Projected gap
You may have $1,700/mo in retirement at age 65*
↑ Goal setup usability and concepting enhancements
Our team has ideated various ways to enhance the goal-setting experience and scenario play while creating a goal. We’ll test these concepts to help us define the elements that best improve ease, comprehension, perceived value, and action readiness.
June–July 2025
Next: Enhancements + Scale
We’ll continue to improve the user flow, scale impact, and sharpen differentiation to best align the product evolution to long-term strategic goals.
Opportunities for experimentation