Meet “Teddy”

Project: Teddy – An AI Assistant for Smarter Credit Card Onboarding

Role: Lead Product and UI Designer | Team of 5

Focus Areas: User-centered design, design thinking facilitation, AI integration, narrative storytelling, onboarding UX, and deep cross-functional collaboration

The Challenge

At TD, many digital experiences are traditionally bank-focused, prioritizing internal structures over user needs. I led a cross-functional team to reimagine the credit card shopping and onboarding experience across TD.com and the mobile app.

Through a Design Thinking workshop I facilitated, we identified core pain points in the current journey:

  • High abandonment during credit card applications

  • Lack of personalized support or confidence when choosing a product

  • Confusing product comparisons, especially for younger or first-time applicants

  • No in-the-moment help when customers ran into errors or friction

The Solution: Teddy, an AI-Powered Digital Assistant

We created Teddy, an intelligent support agent designed to meet customers where they are — proactively stepping in at key moments to offer:

  • Real-time, context-aware support (e.g. form help, eligibility explanations)

  • Tailored product recommendations based on user preferences

  • Financial literacy tips, particularly for Gen Z and first-time cardholders

  • Conversational UI modeled on helpful, empathetic tone to build trust

We pitched Teddy using research-backed, persona-based storytelling centered on a mother and her 18-year-old son, showing how the same tool could flex to support users at very different life stages.

Some screens I designed to stretch the current boundaries of our mobile app UI, drawing on design research from td.com on how users want to compare products on desktop and mobile.

My Role & Contributions

  • Led the Design Thinking workshop to define the opportunity space and align on user-first goals

  • Worked cross-functionally across web and mobile teams, including TD.com (shopping), mobile app (marketing/product), and application/onboarding

  • Co-created narrative to illustrate concepts to influence executive leadership

  • Collaborated with content design, accessibility, and engaged research to ensure Teddy’s voice is inclusive, empathetic, and trustworthy

  • Designed with the intent to expand the existing design system, while pushing new patterns for AI and conversational flows

A new feature I proposed: the ability to fund your account in increments, which is different than how TD allows customers to fund Secure Credit Card accounts today. I drew inspiration from other financial institutions like Affirm and Chase’s “pay-over-time” credit card feature.

Cross-Team Impact

This project became a model for cross-platform collaboration, with teams across:

  • TD.com (the “shopping” experience)

  • Mobile app (marketing offers and product comparison)

  • Application/onboarding

  • Engineering and product

Together, we aligned on a shared vision for how AI could enhance customer confidence and reduce friction, regardless of platform.

The design team uses FigJam to collaborate on designs and presentations as well as run Design Thinking workshops and collect feedback from stakeholders.

Outcomes

  • Leadership buy-in secured for 2026 roadmap for user testing and technical scoping

  • Teddy is now influencing other initiatives tied to AI-driven banking assistance

  • Sparked new interest in building personalized, user-centered journeys grounded in real human needs instead of bank structures

Below: Other screens I designed within the Teddy flow. I established the UI elements for the team, based on some similar work that was done by our Canadian counterparts and bringing to life the TD marketing campaign elements in the digital space.

Below: Our current state mobile app. As part of this project, were asked to think “bold” and “modern” so the UI images above stretch our visual style without going too off-grid from our core brand style and elements. Simple changes to typography, color and rounded edges have helped elevate the look and feel.