Michael Van Der Gaag Email & Phone Number

Rochester, Ny, Us

Rochester, Ny

Specializing in Usability, User Experience and Customer/Product Discovery, I take a collaborative approach to help product and software development teams achieve success. I Guide them through the entire development life cycle helping them select and apply the right method to validate and test their products from concept and prototype through final design.Focus:> User eXperience (UX) Strategy, > Customer & product discovery> Conducting , one-on-one and remote Usability research and testing> Analyze and render the Information Architecture, > Conduct Process Improvement studies, As a Certified Agile Scrum Master, I have a passion for Sprint "0".

Rochester, Ny

Rochester, Ny

RPCN is an all-volunteer, non-profit organization that promotes professionalism, ethics and excellence in consulting. As Program Chair, I engage presenters who can help our members be better at what they do, gain insight into their business, better understand their clients needs. I seek to create opportunities and programs to help the members discover methods to achieve success.I invite business and community leaders to help us understand the economic opportunities of the region; sales and marketing strategists to help us better position our companies to attract more clients and close more deals. It is the executive coaches, visionaries and creatives, who help us gain the most unique insight to uncover our authentic selves. The following are topical areas of interest that I have been targeting > Business-of-Business> Marketing & Sales> Economic Opportunity> Consulting Fundamentals> Computer Skills & Software tools Even as program chair, I continue to stimulate the organization to be open to a diverse membership, sponsor programs that explore not just the methodology of consulting, but the attitude and a more authentic, holistic and engaging style.

Directing NSF Funded Research using the SIPPA Health: Self Health Management App. to answer the question: "What it takes to motivate people to manage their own health." The research resulted in a follow-on Phase 2 grant.

Bayside, (Queens) Ny 11361

Conducting NSF funded Research that included mentoring the project team through product and customer discovery, usability and user experience interviewing techniques.The focus of the company is health management .Purpose of the NSF-funded research: 1) Discover what motivates people to manage their own health and 2) develop a representative content model that adapts the Information Motivation Behavior Theory to the stimulate user engagement in Self-Health Management. 3) In parallel, we used the study to examine the usability and user acceptance of the SIPPA Health smart-phone app as an instrument for delivering the messages and collecting the users' responses to motivational questions.While my title was Principal Investigator, my responsibilities were focused on the user side of the equation. Working with the CUNY Professor & owner of the company, I was responsible for designing the process for conducting a hybrid customer/product discovery and usability research. I also developed the questions and a survey instrument for presenting the script and collecting and analyzing participant responses. In addition, I guided a team of student researchers through the process of interviewing and conducting interactive research with prospective users/customers in the down-state. I conducted the study sessions myself with upstate area participants.

Rochester, Ny

Role: As president:- Helped RPCN apply a strategy to become a world-class organization of professional consultants that enables its members to develop premier consulting businesses that deliver customer-centered solutions that are better, smarter and more innovative.- Moved the organization to become more media savvy, enabling members to access program from anywhere over the web.- Stimulated the organization to be more open to a diverse membership, sponsor programs that explore not just the methodology of consulting, but the attitude and a more authentic, holistic and engaging style.

Rochester, New York Area

Participate in an exchange of strategies and ideas to help others make their careers more productive, rewarding.

New Providence, Nj 07974

Manage and consult on all aspects of Usability research and evaluation for LexisNexis and Martindale Hubbel web-based products and services. Propose, plan, facilitate, moderate and analyze results from usability testing, user research, focus groups and market research. Communicate research findings to product teams and recommend design and functionality improvements. Identify, prioritize, and propose resolutions to usability issues throughout the product life-cycle. Manage user research participant recruiting and/or be the point of contact with outside recruiting and research facility/laboratory firms. Guide strategic user experience initiatives that promote a user-centered design approach.

Recruited companies to participate in the areas largest career fair. Manned the registration desk. Greeted and supported participants as they arrived and set-up.

Usa & Canada

Provided guidance to clients for the definition and development of IT solutions, and in integrating UX in Agile Methodology.Analyzing stakeholder needs the user interaction requirements and design. Conducted stakeholder workshops and contextual studies to identify application functional and usability requirements, devising concept models, UI design specifications and usability guidelines.Conducted usability testing and Usable Access evaluations of solutions designed for people with disabilities ("accessibility"). Created and applied methods for engaging the target communities in a process for analyzing information architecture, defining taxonomy, identifying requirements and process for role-based information profiling.

Following a user centered disciplined approach, conducted user research for the definition, design and development of client server and web-based applications, information systems and portals. Derived, documented and maintained: usability requirements, feature descriptions, use cases, user stories, and wire-frames. Supported teams in defining the project, identified usability tasks, planned sprints and phases, defined work processes and deliverables.Conducted usability assessments and usability testing at critical points design, development, implementation and post delivery. Guiding teams throughout the definition, design implementation process. Helped clients improve ROI, while enhancing user performance, acceptance and satisfaction.

Rochester, New York Area

Provided guidance and contributed to the fundraising and communication regarding the services of this independent worthwhile agency.The Center for Youth is the best organization for young people seeking to deal with, explore, or understand issues of importance to them - from their perspective, and on their terms. Started by kids, for kids, all Center services - from counseling, to shelter, to education, to referrals - are rooted in, and delivered with the knowledge that youth want to, and can, take responsibility for their life choices.

Rochester, New York Area

As Principal Consultant: developed proposals, managed projects and teams, guided clients through User Centered Design( UCD) and Usability Engineering (UE) methodologies,applied UCD/UE techniques to simplifying user interaction with complex hardware and information rich systems. Defined user control dialogues and anthropometric specifications for office copiers, printers, document management systems, and medical devices like blood analyzers, PCR (DNA) analyzers and medical imaging systems.Performed task analysis, assessments of product/system control interactivity and status messaging. Planned, conducted and analyzed results of both formative and summative Usability Testing. The work focused on interactive products, management information systems and IT solution concept development.Planned and conducted Ethnographic Research; analyzing characterizing product usage in natural worker settings.Experienced with Instructional Design methodology, managing the development of training solutions in information systems and organizational improvement. Clients included: Xerox, Kodak, Child Welfare Institute, Harris Communications, NCR, D/XImaging

In contract to Xerox corporation: supported the development of office reproduction and document management systems.Conducted research on adapting controls and displays technology to office products and systems.Identified innovative improvements to user-system control and hands-on interaction.For the Americanization of OEM products: conducted one-on-one lab and field based Usability Testing.

Graduate Studies In Industrial Organizational Psych; Concentrate Human Factors

Activities and Societies: Planned, designed and conducted a user evaluation of an ergonomic cooking stove.Graduate studies in Industrial.

Ba/Bs, Psychology

Activities and Societies: Honors Research in Psychology: Belief and AttentionSpecialty: Learning Motivation and Behavior