The Impact of AI on Foreign Exchange Traders at Work
Exploring how AI can enhance the workflow and decision-making of foreign exchange traders by combining financial expertise with user-centered design insights.
I served as a UX Researcher, responsible for deciding on the research approach and methods to first understand the life of a foreign exchange trader. I was also in charge of recruiting foreign exchange traders, conducting usability testing, and creating participant interview scripts for my team to follow.
Skills gained from this sponsored project: Moderating & Note-taking / Usability Testing / Persona / Journey Map
Problem Context
Foreign exchange traders work in high-pressure environments where they rely on a combination of technical analysis, intuition, and real-time data to make decisions. However, the overwhelming amount of data and the challenge of navigating multiple platforms often hinder decision-making efficiency.
Through the collaboration between Bentley’s Human Factors in Information Design Program and the Trading Room, our team aims to understand the foreign exchange trader's user experience, focusing on their workflow and exploring how AI can improves their routines.
Research Questions
To better understand key pain points and opportunities for improvement in foreign exchange trader workflow and decision-making
Our research questions aim to uncover the key activities, challenges, and emotional experiences traders encounter in their work and how they utilize technology and data to support their decision-making.
Expected Business Impact
This project begins the HFID program's collaboration with the Bentley Trading Room to:
Align the trading room's user experience with real-world foreign exchange practices
Recommends improvements to the Bentley Trading Room's user experience based on foreign exchange traders' work routines
Strengthen the HFID program’s partnership with the Bentley Trading Room to create a realistic, immersive trading environment for students
Process
Our Approach
Qualitative Research Method: 1:1 interview
I chose this method because it allows our group to gather in depth insights by asking them questions to explore trader's decision making process. A one-one interview also allow us to ask follow up questions to deppended understanding the varied experiences of traders and clarify their responses.
To understand how we could improve foreign exchange traders workflow and what technology could help with their decision making process, we find experienced foreign exchange traders. Our methodology involves gathering insights through interviews to explore the following key points in our test plan:
Foreign exchange traders experiences, workflows, and tools in their day-to-day activities
Understanding the daily activities of foreign exchange traders will help us better understand the difficulties they encounter, the resources they use, and how they communicate with different data sources. Through improved tools and simplified procedures, we will be able to pinpoint inefficiencies, ascertain how technology influences their decision-making process, and identify areas for improvement.
Foreign exchange traders’ technology, data usage, and views on AI tools in decision-making
By researching the technology and data traders use, how they interact with systems, and the value they place on data, we can identify the most trusted tools, the types of data used in decision-making, and whether the technology supports their needs.Understanding their view on AI is important for us to determine how open foreign traders are towards trusting AI insights and any concerns they have about AI tools
Usability Testing
Participant Screening
Both types of foreign exchange traders are important to explore, as individual traders use their own capital while institutional traders rely on firm capital. Their day-to-day work varies due to differences in work environments, resources, and access to data and technology. This approach helped us understand how AI technology could better integrate into their decision-making processes or support their daily work, offering valuable insights for students in the Bentley Trading Room who may wish to pursue one type of trading over the other.
Recruitment process
UserTesting
We chose this platform is because we can easily screen out specific number of foreign exchange traders with 3+ years of experience, ensuring they have varied expertise across different markets and open to share their job and responsibilities.
Alumni Network
Jay, founding director of the Bentley Hughey Center for Financial Services/Trading Room introduced us to Lucy Slowe, a Bentley alumna who interned at Bentley's Trading Room. Lucy is currently working as an institutional foreign exchange trader at State Street Bank, bringing invaluable real-world experience to the project.
Research Methods Question
Coming from a design background, I don't have a deep understanding of what is specifically a foreign exchange trader, I did some of my own research through watching videos of what is a foreign exchange trader.
Goal: To prepared for the user interview I had prepared a interview script for my group with questions to understand foreign exchange traders, how the two types of traders difference in workflow, resource, background, decision-making, and the use of AI, and just to understand how it would help them in decision-making process. Some questions I sought to answer were:
Why do I need to ask these type of questions?
After observing these experiences and learning more about foreign exchange traders, it was time to get to work on consolidating our data and providing helpful recommendations for improvement to the the forex traders.
From Table to Key Insights
After hearing each insight gathered on each of our participant. We then identified common themes and extracted insights for both institutional and individual traders.
Institutional Foreign Exchange Traders
1. Heavy Reliance on Real-Time Data & News for Trading Decisions
2. Risk Management and Trading Strategies Are Central to Daily Operations
3. Emotion and Psychological Pressure in Trading
4. Integration of AI and Automation in Trading Operations
Individual Foreign Exchange Traders
1. Balancing Trading with Personal Life or Full-Time Jobs is a Key Challenge
2. Challenges with Information Latency and Market Timing
3. Emotional Control and Discipline are Key Challenges
4. Integration of AI and Automation in Trading Operations
Recommendations and Next Steps
Balancing Efficiency and Skepticism in AI
AI and automation are being used to improve trading efficiency, most of the effort is put into improving data analysis and speeding up trade execution
But for now, institutional foreign exchange traders view AI with a degree of skepticism about reliability, prefer "human in the loop" due to the sensitivity of trading decisions
Interview Trading Room Managers and Students
Interview students to understand how the current curriculum aligns with industry practice
Explore opportunities to better prepare students for real-world challenges by aligning the curriculum with the evolving needs of the trading industry, especially in terms of AI integration and decision-making
Explore other finance positions
Conduct additional research on various finance positions to uncover further opportunities for aligning education with industry expectations and addressing the broader impact of AI and automation across different sectors
Reflection
What I learned
Throughout this project, I have dedicated significant effort and gained valuable insights, notably by taking a role as a UX Researcher. I monitored 3 user testings and creating the user interview script.
Combining observational research and interviews: Combining interviews with observations helped us better understand how traders how make quick decisions, especially when it's hard to explain things verbally.
Screener specificity: I found in our first round of recruitment that it was much easier to recruit individual traders than institutional. As a result, I told the team we should run a second round of research with more specific screener questions.