During my search for the right in-house Product Team to join, I decided to help this agency build out a Product Experience function to facilitate their evolution beyond brand and marketing. Creating a new function within a company is a complex challenge that started with an evaluation process. I'm now in the stage of blazing a path toward growth and success that includes internal education, repurposing and realigning current resources, setting up processes and structure to work differently, adjusting the target for new client opportunities, external repositioning with existing clients, and creating a strong overall go-to-market strategy. I spend my days working closely with top executives to ensure my efforts continue to align with the overall company direction. Since joining VSA I've had the pleasure of working with great clients such as Cole Haan, IBM, CME Group, and Consumer Reports.

Joining within a year of a public offering meant a lot of change management as the company continued to flex and scale in response to the ever-evolving landscape of such a transitionary stage. Among the changes, I cleaned up our design processes to improve the team's health and prepare them for growth personally and overall as a functional discipline. I lead the overhaul of our product lifecycle in partnership with product and engineering leaders. Other notable contributions: → I kicked off the creation of a design system that is built to be framework/product agnostic and creates an opportunity for global brand/experience consistency across a large suite of products. I assembled a team, developed processes, defined the guiding principles, created roadmaps, and lead on-going planning, tracking, reporting, and management. The first design system to be fully implemented within the company and with rapidly growing adoption across multiple products. → I resurrected a defunct research practice by launching a usability study program with early and impactful results. The program provided data that helped the product team build better internal comms channels improving the quality of feedback & insights. Users showed a measurable increase in satisfaction with our products. → Given the company's rapid growth through the acquisition of many other companies it was important to create a centralized way for connecting the design thinkers across many products and functions. I created an organic space for sharing an inclusive range of topics. → I developed an audit program to ensure we're aware of our compliance. I also created a tracking method to better understand the impacts of our accessibility health on our users and the business. Tactically I also wove accessibility into the core capabilities of our design system. Lastly, as an Accessibility Advisor for our DEIBA board, I continue creating a broader understanding of the importance of quality accessibility practices.

This company dissolved during the COVID-19 pandemic. When I joined them amidst the pandemic it was a pivotal time for the team as it was necessary to integrate multiple teams into one—which I did successfully. From there my focus shifted to creating a strong foundation that would sustain as we scaled and help propel our scaling in what we knew would be a rapid growth period post-pandemic. I focused on our structures and processes by leading the team through several initiatives:→ revising our design system from an out-of-the-box solution to a custom/scalable solution that included a centralized documentation site→ shifting our toolset to focus on Figma with onboarding for product, engineering & marketing→ setting a vision and defining the guiding principles that impact the way team members make decisions and align to the greater product/company values→ defining and educating the teams about the discovery process in partnership with our product and engineering team leaders→ re-calibrating the team structure to create better balance and growth for a multi-disciplinary team→ defining new roles such as research, UX writing, and design technologist→ creating a whole new career framework specific to the design team→ establishing new design culture processes that included expos, deep-dives, team lunches, etcIn addition to leading the product design team, I was responsible for the brand and marketing team. The focus of this team was also to prepare for post-pandemic recovery which included a rebrand and full redesign for two of the three owned web properties. In addition to the ongoing campaign support through multiple channels, the team also focused on redesigning the recruiting sections of the primary website.

I oversaw wonderful and creative problem-solving design minds focused on all guest-facing digital experiences. We covered the entirety of content on aslaskaair.com, our award-winning loyalty program, multiple systems and app for the lounge experience, the One World alliance integration, a robust design system, and the full account experience.

While deciding on the next permanent role in my career I was approached by a colleague to help with their rapidly growing Acer account. I focused on elevating their evergreen social & paid media efforts as well as bringing product launches and campaign extensions to life with creative social activations.

From leading the creative team, scoping projects, and writing copy to building PowerPoint decks, presenting to clients, and staying connected to the development team, my goal was always to ensure our designs could actually be built and hit the mark of the business goals and user needs. The reality is I answered a lot of emails, gave a lot of presentations, and reviewed a lot of designs. Working with designers, developers, project managers, account reps, clients, vendors, and other executive team members… I oversaw and ensured quality/timely execution of digital products such as websites, web apps, and marketing/social campaigns.

I focused on two major projects during my time at this tech giant. The first was a complete redesign of news.microsoft.com which helped usher in a more modern approach to sharing editorial content that provided flexibility and discoverability for a very wide range of content maintenance scheduling. The second was a digital messaging ecosystem to raise awareness for one of Microsoft’s Rio2016 Olympic initiatives at microsoft.com/rio2016 that included everything from a first-ever fully accessible digital comic to a personalized avatar generator and a digital out-of-home advertising campaign for Times Square and LA Live. With both of these projects, I lead the design process from complex UX challenges to in-studio audio recording efforts, I oversaw the other design team members, worked with outside vendors and various tech partners, presented to stakeholders, and even pushed lots of pixels.

I championed and strengthened the relationship between technology and marketing to ensure proper brand alignment with new brand guidelines that were being developed during a large website overhaul. As the Design Lead for a soup-to-nuts e-commerce site redesign (including search, select, buy, and fulfill) I also keenly identified opportunities for our product to step out as an industry leader and navigated the creation of new UI/UX patterns that did not exist in the world of digital design.

My client list included Target, Nintendo/Wii, XBox, Home Depot, Microsoft, and T-Mobile. I worked with large and small teams where my focus was interactive art direction and visual design. In all projects, I constantly brought a UX sensibility and perspective to the approach. My largest contribution was leading 10 designers as an off-site team at T-Mobile focused on overhauling many of their consumer-facing digital products from e-commerce to their activation app.

This agency specializes in strategic partnerships and campaign design. Their campaigns connect Corporate Foundations, Artists/Celebrities, and Non-Profits to maximize awareness and social good. I provided creative guidance and design for the brand as well as projects that ranged from building marketing/advertising campaigns to creating extensive high-profile reports for the C-suite of Fortune 500 companies. Most of the work was under strict NDAs.

I helped launch the very first Global Citizen Festival in NYCs Central Park. I provided creative direction, app design (UX/UI), branding and campaign design, as well as marketing/content strategy. I helped bring together some of the greatest musical artists of the time with some of the biggest brands of the time to celebrate the power and potential of humanity to solve some of our most important global challenges.

I composed RFP responses that ranged in size from 10-160 pages and were mostly targeted at winning bids in the $100k to $900M range. I also conceptualized and designed materials such as signage, brochures, and public relation articles.

I developed targeted marketing and advertising campaigns for specific groups and various products. I conceptualized, designed, and implemented programs and related material ranging from signage, brochures, and public relation articles to comprehensive campaign collateral in order to reach targeted audiences and grow market share.

I helped develop the brand identity and implement that across the business, from the printed business suite and advertising to printed collateral and bid packages. I creatively composed presentation materials for prospective clients with the intention of gaining a professional working relationship based on superior customer service and a superb product.