Karl Schultz Email & Phone Number

San Francisco, California, Us

Provided deep knowledge with user research about a diverse range of customers and users, helping product managers, designers, developers, and stakeholders deliver successful product launches at a startup provider of comprehensive insurance products and proactive cybersecurity tools, assisting organizations to manage and mitigate risk

San Francisco, California, Us

Created clean product designs to simplify complex user experiences for a diverse range of customers and users for product design and development at a startup provider of comprehensive insurance products and proactive cybersecurity tools, helping organizations manage and mitigate riskApplied design thinking framework to empathize and understand users, define their problems, ideate on creative solutions, and prototype realistic representations for user feedback

Sydney, Nsw, Au

Provided all aspects of product design to craft clean user experiences, user interfaces, and visual designs, with customer research, ideation with storyboarding, prototyping, conceptual modeling, and testing to improve the purchase experience for (SaaS) products for software developers and product managers (B2B)Drove user-centered design process to solve complex customer problemsCollaborated cross-functionally with multiple stakeholders to solicit and synthesize feedback for alignment on product developmentIterated design ideas, sketches, storyboards, concept models, and prototypesFacilitated design discussions to improve design solutionsApplied design systems for continuity in user experienceConducted customer research and applied findingsGathered customer feedback to validate ideas and improve design solutions

New York, Ny, Us

Discover insights to identify, understand, and advocate for the customers (intend to “buy”) and users (intend to “use”) of a product/service. Identify new opportunities and plan capabilities that address the needs of both the customer and business. Draft hypotheses and validate assumptions to mitigate risk. Collaborate with the User Research team to plan studies (write screener/protocol, schedule, compensation, etc.). Conduct user research, synthesize, and report findings. Administer attitudinal research (moderate on-site/remote interviews, participatory design, rapid user feedback, etc.) and manage behavioral research (moderated/unmoderated usability studies, and clickstream, A|B testing analysis).Serve as an effective communicator, advocate for the customer, advise business stakeholders, and socialize new opportunities. Promote the UX discipline, share capabilities, and represent the department to the organization.Facilitate partnerships to enable product development for optimal user experiences. Align stakeholders to the vision, mission statement, and goals (defined with a definition of success). Outline long- and short-term product strategies. Define requirements, implement the product plan, connect resources/prioritize tasks. Synchronize multiple initiatives with a holistic view point, to improve the user experience across multiple touch points.Provide leadership for the UX team. Introduce and apply new practices (design thinking/strategy, customer development, service design, intent planning, lean startup, innovation accounting, listening labs, user centered design, journey mapping, and object oriented UX). Onboard new UX team members. Train, inspire, and motivate the team. Mentor UX designers: provide advice, share resources, lead collaboration exercises, and develop tools to support best practices. Review details of interface/interaction designs (flow diagrams, information architecture, wireframes, prototypes, and visual design/animations).

New York, Ny, Us

Conceptualized and designed multi-channel customer experiences for Macys.com and Bloomingdales.com using Lean UX techniques.Identified and represented the customer for the business. Learned about the customers, and advocated for their point of view to stakeholders throughout the discovery process.Supported cross-functional teamwork and communication. Facilitated discussions of the user experience to expose key questions and requirements, and identify opportunities.Partnered with product managers and stakeholders to define projects that best meet user needs, business goals, and technical capabilities.Collaborated and brainstormed to improve the customers’ experience, both holistically and at specific touch points.Advanced UX best practices, including Lean UX. Validated customer-centered hypotheses with Lean UX, and reviewed user behavior from Coremetrics analytics to inform data driven design decisions.Served as user experience subject matter expert and promoted Lean and other UX best practices, while mentoring other team members.Identified customer experience strategy goals. Synthesized user research with core capabilities to develop a strategic customer experience vision. Created personas, customer journey maps, and user scenarios as User-centered design tools.

Alexandria, Virginia, Us

Trained product and engineering teams how Lean UX method can be used to mitigate risk and gain maximum learning from minimal effort.Administered rapid prototyping for mobile-first tests providing a framework to prioritize and focus workflow for limited resources and simplify product design. Reviewed customer service data, user comments, and weblogs for additional user insight. Built rapid prototypes with Proto.io, InVision, and POP app.Created personas, customer journey maps, and user scenarios for User-centered design tools to help investigate, ideate, prototype, evaluate, and produce improved user experiences.Complied qualitative user research to understand the fundamentals of user behavior. Recruited candidates for feedback, conducted customer interviews (using Listening Lab technique), and collected ad hoc feedback with potential customers from prototypes for quick validation. Wrote ads, composed interview scripts, and maintained a database of candidates for user interviews.Analyzed quantitative user research from Google Analytics to identify opportunities from web traffic data. Managed remote online user testing including multi-variate FiveSecondTest (Usability Hub), UserTesting.com, and A|B version tests. Administered all aspects of user surveys (using Wufoo) including writing, formatting, posting, tracking, and analyzing for customer insight.Researched competitive audits for product development, including corporate giving, petitions, and social activism domains. Ran a fundraiser campaign as a case study to empathize with fundraisers, donors, and volunteers.Advised and supported startup executive team to inform product design strategy and development. Consulted nonprofit and social media business partners to learn about best practices and new opportunities. Worked closely with the startup marketing team to align product design with branding and advertising goals.

Designed successful user experiencesDesigned and implemented a new user interface (results listing with map view page) that improved engagement and increased domestic hotel booking profits (conversion margin per quoter) for an online travel agent—now launched globally.Applied Lean UX to enterprise productWorked directly with lead Product Manager and lead Engineer to provide Lean UX requirements for the hotel product Agile team while coaching other Agile teams for success.Conducted user testing and Listening Labs in San Francisco and London to identify new business opportunities (new cohorts)—including writing candidate screeners and interview scripts, moderating interviews, compiling analysis, and writing reports of findings with UX recommendations. Oversaw remote usability testing techniques, including Usertesting.com, and FiveSecondTest (Usability Hub).Created UX designs to solve new hypothesis, iterated new ideas quickly with prototypes and live app for A|B test data, measured and assessed results, then guided the team to build only upon features with proven value.UX strategy proposalsAuthored user experience strategy plans with recommendations from customer research, stakeholder collaboration, and business plan analysis.

San Francisco, Ca, Us

Managed UX projects and resourcesDesigned and developed user experiences for web apps, client-side apps, and mobile platforms. Created style guides and pattern libraries. Developed and refined wireframes for large-scale consumer electronics content website redesign. Designed navigation structures, and supporting interaction designs for broadcast media website.Multi-tasked and met deadlines in a fast-paced environment. Organized, prioritized, and estimated individual task durations. Developed and tracked project plans. Enabled iterative UX design process to define and support product development.Managed a team of UX designers in concept development, design ideation, and collateral delivery. Coordinated work with subcontractors and vendors. Mentored design intern.

San Francisco, Ca, Us

Designed successful user experiencesAdvocated for user empathy by describing the intended user experience with User-centered design tools, including personas, storyboards, and workflows. Discovered new cohorts of users with unmet needs. Drafted concepts to address unmet user needs for new business opportunities. Constructed mock-ups using rapid prototyping methods (such as paper prototyping, low-fidelity clickable mock-ups, etc.) to demonstrate new concepts. Validated proof of concept with usability testing using low-fidelity prototypes.Created a product finder with in-line buying advice for consumer electronics shoppers. The new product feature added new user visits, more page views, and additional advertising leads per day to the bottom line. This feature was then extended to other product segments and continues to be used on the web site.

Contributed interactive designs at design agencyApplied knowledge of user interaction design best practices, and negotiated design development with an understanding of both capabilities and limitations of existing web technologies.Developed concepts, sketches, storyboards, wireframes, and user scenarios to help define interactive goals and extended client branding. Tested interactive designs by building clickable prototypes. Built final interactive projects with Dreamweaver and Flash.Prepared sketches and storyboards for motion graphic sequences. Produced motion graphics and animation effects.Created style guidelines design specifications for programmers, including screen layouts, user interface elements, color palettes, typography specs, and icons. Managed subcontracting of programmers for web applications.Contributed branding designs at design agencyDesigned identity systems and packaging designs (from concept to mechanical) using Adobe Illustrator, PhotoShop, InDesign, and QuarkXPress. Researched and developed product naming for branding (for example, Entwine). Illustrated artwork for print.Moderated client meetings with strong presentation skills. Successfully communicated conceptual ideas and design rationale by visual, oral, and written means.

Art direction and graphic design for direct marketing.

Created concepts and developed designs to final mechanical art for direct marketing campaigns. Reviewed market research for product positioning. Supervised artists and vendors, ensuring costs were within budgets. Organized image resource library and archiving system.

Managed all aspects of department that produced artwork for direct marketing campaigns. Projected costs for budgets and hired/evaluated staff and vendors. Organized and managed an artwork production quality control system. Upgraded art production from mechanical to digital. Created file formats that reduced pre-press film costs. Developed department invoicing system. Proofed pre-press color and press-checked for web and offset litho, including 4-color.