Multiple Files per Process

All Processes Are Not The Same

Compliance teams were having to haphazardly combine documentation or find workarounds for simply having separate documentation for a single process. We wanted to provide the flexibility for our users to work the way they do.

This is one of the first major projects I took on after joining the company, so there was a lot to learn about in the world of accounting compliance. So this project helped me get up to speed a bit.

Definitions

  • a sequence of steps an organization follows to record, classify, summarize, and report its financial transactions in a manner that follows applicable laws, regulations, and accounting standards.

  • any policy, procedure, or mechanism that an organization puts in place to make sure the integrity, accuracy, and reliability of its financial reporting, while adhering to laws and regulations.

Problem

Currently, FloQast processes could only account for a single file/document to be used to provide a narrative for a given process.

However, customers often use multiple documents to provide complete coverage of that process.

In addition, each document is parsed to extract appropriately tagged controls and their corresponding descriptions. This can results in conflicts with descriptions and require correction.

Original Process Page

High-Level Goals

The scope of this project was to:

  • Upload multiple files per process

  • Description conflict resolution

  • Versioning per process/document

Kickoff

I typically like to work with my team on creating a PRD in a structured form that helps provide context and goals as laid out above. This way they can be broken down to tasks that are required to accomplish those goals within our platform within a goal-oriented feature matrix.

View Notion PRD

First Iterations

We move onto tackling our high-level goals in a first iteration.

Displaying Multiple Documents

The take was to give as much context as we could within the process details page. It seemed obvious to list documents within a narratives section to be able to add additional documents to.

Users would also be able to view the tagged controls associated with that document by expanding the row.

Description Conflict Resolution

When multiple documents are parsed, the same control can appear with different descriptions across documents. The initial iteration surfaced these conflicts in a drawer, presenting each description side by side so compliance managers could make a deliberate, informed choice on which description should be adopted and update the other documents accordingly.

View Version History per Document

Audit trails are non-negotiable in compliance workflows. The first iteration introduced a per-document history panel logging each upload with a snapshot of that documents file, assignees, and linked controls — giving teams the confidence to trace any changes when necessary.

Feedback

I presented the current designs to our design panel, which is a critique sessions with our entire design team where they provided some feedback to move forward with.

Dropdown Overload

We began to realize that the number of actions that a user should be able to take on a given document began to become overwhelming for a dropdown including the idea of having duplicative actions for a narrative document vs the file itself.

Version History Visualization

It was stated during a design critique that it may be beneficial to be able to visualize the version histories similar to viewing version histories in Figma.

These two points ultimately lead to the final designs that introduce a new document details page.

Final Designs

Processes Details Page

Conflict Resolution

Document Details Page

What Worked Well

Triad Kickoff Established Trust Early

Introducing a structured PRD framework from day one helped align the team around shared goals and gave me immediate visibility into how engineering and product operate and vice versa. This helped set the tone for ongoing work.

Crash Course on Accounting Compliance

Partnering closely with my PM to get up to speed on accounting compliance gave me the foundation needed to make informed design decisions. Understanding the nuance between processes and controls was essential to designing conflict resolution flows that actually reflected how users think about their work.

What I’d Do Differently

Advocate for Design Decisions More Strongly

Early in my time on the team, I deferred to feedback I didn't fully agree with out of a desire to build trust. I've since learned that thoughtful pushback (grounded in rationale) is itself a trust-builder. I would have defended my design direction more confidently while remaining open to iteration.

Next Opportunities

Dashboard Enhancements

With multiple files now tied to a process, there's an opportunity to surface richer status and coverage signals at the dashboard level. This could give compliance teams a clearer at-a-glance view of which processes are complete without errors versus those still needing attention.

Outcome

Feature Adoption

Within the first quarter of release, a majority of active enterprise customers had uploaded multiple files to at least one process, validating the assumption that single-file support was a meaningful limitation.