Jane Darkes

Key Responsibilities:

Strategy & Discovery: Lead discovery work understanding user needs, organisational goals and service gaps. Plan and deliver research programmes following GDS standards where relevant. Translate findings into actionable recommendations and prioritised roadmaps.

Service Design & Process Improvement: Facilitate workshops mapping current and future state journeys, co-designing new services and defining operating models. Deliver service blueprints, process maps and journey maps that align teams.

Product Development & Prototyping: Define and shape MVPs and digital tools with developers and designers. Lead design sprints, rapid prototyping and user testing to shape digital services, internal platforms and customer-facing tools.

Agile Delivery & Team Enablement: Embed Agile ways of working across client teams. Write user stories and epics, support backlog management and contribute to sprint ceremonies. Help teams adopt iterative development and user-centred delivery.

Client Leadership & Engagement: Build trusted relationships with senior stakeholders as strategic advisor and hands-on partner. Present insights and decisions clearly to technical and non-technical audiences. Help clients make confident, informed decisions in fast-moving environments.

Sector Expertise: Deliver work across regulated sectors including banking, pensions and health, plus complex environments like cloud migration, student finance and digital marketing. Experience spans enterprise-level organisations and early-stage innovation projects.

Skills: Service Design, User Research, Business Analysis, Agile Delivery, Product Management, Digital Strategy, Workshop Facilitation, Stakeholder Engagement, Journey Mapping, Discovery & Alpha Standards (GDS), Prompt Engineering

As a Trustee at Citadel Youth Centre in Leith, I provide strategic guidance and governance to support the delivery of vital services for young people and families in the local community. My role involves contributing to board discussions on organisational priorities, funding, safeguarding, and long-term planning, ensuring the charity remains accountable and impactful.

I bring my experience in service design, digital strategy and stakeholder engagement to help the organisation adapt and grow sustainably, with a focus on inclusive access and long-term resilience.

Journey Developer – International Payments (NatWest)

Led discovery work on international payment journeys, mapping multi-channel ‘as is’ processes to identify pain points and opportunities. Developed ‘to be’ journeys and service blueprints to support improvements in customer experience, operational efficiency and compliance.

Worked across cross-functional teams including franchise, technology, Risk, Finance, and Consumer Duty to align around a long-term vision for fees, pricing and regulation. Supported the ISO 20022 change programme, contributing to the design of a new charging engine.

Collaborated with senior stakeholders across domains to shape future-state journeys and pricing strategies that meet regulatory requirements and deliver value to customers.