Design Portfolio
My portfolio includes visuals from real projects, from ideation to delivery. Before transitioning into UX and Product Design, I built a strong background in the arts. After studying fine and studio arts, I owned a calligraphy, illustration, and graphic design business focused on weddings and events. It prepared me to adopt Figma and foundational UX design principles quickly. However, improving my speed and applying that knowledge took determination and humility. I continue to sharpen my skills every day.
My favorite exercise for aligning cross-functional teams around problem definitions is to lead a collaborative session. The session starts with a fun illustration of the "Yes and..." improv principle. We use these sessions to ensure everyone's knowledge is shared, assumptions are highlighted, early ideas are noted, and technical debt is discussed. Then, I synthesize the critical takeaways into formal documentation.
When tackling a hairy problem, I often lead a prioritization exercise with my product manager and lead engineer. The exercise can take many forms, but the primary goal is to highlight any concerns or dependencies and advocate for the user's needs. This typically happens after user interviews.
After completing user interviews, I create user personas, journey maps, and user stories. I often incorporate a Jobs to be Done framework. This helps the greater product team gain insight into our users and gives leadership an early glimpse at the factors informing our ideation.
Sometimes, UX problems require a foundational solution. I identified that our taxonomy contributed to user confusion and usability issues in our marketplace. Account Managers had been adding categories as needed, resulting in categories that overlapped and were inconsistent. I led several card-sorting exercises with internal and external users to test some conflicting assumptions we'd grappled with.
Not only do I start projects by reviewing user session recordings and heat maps from legacy features, but I also find them helpful in improving the usability of my designs. In this example, unmoderated first-click tests gave us confidence that our users could find the advanced setting for adding columns used less frequently.
Sometimes, product teams can be desensitized to confusing user flows. In this case, legacy fields had become obsolete for all but a few long-time users. Our KPI was to increase the percentage of new users who made it through our onboarding process and made their first sale. In addition to redesigning some parts of the flow, I found some pain points causing abandonment. I created a facsimile of our product and ran unmoderated A/B tests to help illustrate how confusing our existing flow was for potential new users.
Visuals are helpful when educating teams on concepts in a world full of people who learn differently. This is one example of how I clarify complex concepts in my documentation.
I drive my teams to prioritize accessibility for all people. From text color to one-handed keyboard navigation and supporting screen readers, adhering to WCAG standards is essential. We'd identified that some of our Design System component states were difficult to distinguish from each other. I audited the components for color contrast, utilized vision impairment simulators, and proposed changes.
After scribbling ideas, I sometimes sketch out tidier versions to help my team understand my top solutions. Here is one example where I illustrated how we might offer our users a "quick glance" at their customer flows to reduce the need to open the entire chart.
As I advance in my career, I've come to value wireframes more. With tools like Figma's auto layout and components, it can seem easier to drag in high-fidelity components to illustrate a potential flow. Not only do wireframes help stakeholders understand that a concept is not yet finalized, but they also help cross-functional teams iterate without feeling as constrained.
Unbiased user interviewing and usability testing are some of my strengths. Putting users at ease with giving raw feedback allows me to peel back the surface answers, get to the root of their needs, and pinpoint friction.
Unbiased user interviewing and usability testing are just a couple of my strengths. Putting users at ease with giving raw feedback allows me to peel back the surface answers, get to the root of their needs, and pinpoint friction.
Legacy Design
New Design
Our goals were to decrease the effort required to vet and assign the best available field service provider and increase positive outcomes on work orders. This before-and-after illustrates why user confidence increased immediately, as both front- and back-end improvements worked to meet our KPIs. My case study provides more information about this project.
Legacy Design
New Design
Gaining buy-in to redesign this page was surprisingly challenging. Everyone recognized the need, but no one wanted to touch it. Our team embraced the work of not only bringing it into the current decade but also ensuring that we were highlighting the right information for our users.
Legacy Design
New Design
This modal appeared after users submitted their products and sales pages for review. Users needed to take a follow-up action for their product sales page to be approved. This modal explained that they needed to add the paylink to their call-to-action. However, users were skipping this critical step, leading to approval delays and increasing ClickBank's labor costs. The existing illustration added personality, and the text was thorough. However, I hypothesized that they were distracting from the task at hand. This quick iteration solved the problem.
Legacy Design
New Design
Unlike other projects I've undertaken, the ClickBank Marketplace was already functioning correctly. Nothing significant was broken; the UI was simply clunky to navigate. Company-specific icons lacked context. The home page lacked easy navigation to offer lists pre-filtered or sorted by known user priorities. It was written in outdated code. We shipped the new home page, improving the design and usability as we welcomed a broader user base.
Legacy Design
New Design
The marketplace listing page, a companion to the home page redesign, received its own refresh. We added important analytics, clarified icons by adding labels, and introduced a way to highlight new features. Due to legacy limitations, product images could be introduced later. We shipped this quickly to adhere to agile, iterative development principles. The design would continue to morph as we received feedback.