If you want to make the world a better place, you have to take a strategic hand
in defining what gets put into the world, not just how that thing works.~Mike Atherton
I’m a geek, an artist, an average 'Joe'sphine with a zeal for technology, design, strategy, and lean-agile product development.
I consider myself a right-brain, left-brain thinker, a big-picture visionary, strategic systems thinker, complex problem-finder, a bridge between technology and humans, and an intent-based, servant leader. I succeed when I am a creative thinker, empathic listener, simplifier of complexity, and an inquirer of constructive questions. I often find myself as a challenger of the status quo.
For me, customer satisfaction is the ultimate metric. I believe in cross-functional teams, cross-department collaboration, change management, digital and customer experience transformation to enhance organizational agility. My focus is delivering a quality user- centered experience which in turn will create a culture of continuous improvement and bring alignment between customer expectations, quality products, and successful business outcomes.
My personal passion includes building knowledge in next generation technology, architecture, engineering, behavioral economics, and design by cultivating an inquiring mind as well as continuously evolving creative-thinking, problem-solving and collaboration skills.
My work history, in executing user-centered design solutions, is within the web software industry as well as in three-dimensional user experience design within the marketing, trade show, magazine, book, and catalog publication industries.
I’m also an accomplished e-learning developer that intertwines Addie methodology and user interface design tactics to create interactive, educational, and engaging tutorials. I've also been a design instructor, mentor, and coach to younger generations of designers.
For me, user experience and user interface design is similar to an interactive novel where the reader choses the adventure which lays before them. My design goals are to guide the user through a journey that creates value and purpose to the user as well as met business needs.
I like to think of myself as strategic system thinker and complex problem-solver or should I say I find solutions to problems. I validated predictabilities & assumptions. I gather business, stakeholder, and user requirements. I research and analyze value and purpose. I visually communicate relationships between entities and their attributes. I question should we or shouldn't we. In my mind, that is what makes UX and UI Designers, Information Architects, and Business Analysis great at their jobs. The best skill of these professional fields is preventing problems before they ever happen.
UX isn’t all about empathy but it’s not all about data either. It’s about bring together, holistically, the parts that make up the whole. It’s about figuring out the right problem to solve. Asking key questions focused on the root of a problem. In other words, it’s more important to solve the right problem than to design the perfect solution.
To build a successful product, I believe in Alan Cooper’s goal-directed design process where user desirability, business viability, and engineering capability must be balanced for success to happen.
In the digital usability design solution world, there are many constraints and limitations beyond a designer’s control. These constraints discipline a designer to be solution-focused, design within platform standards, think logically about content strategy and workflow, and consider the many ways that people can interact with the product's technology. Being focused on producing a quality product; the right way, the first time, for the right consumer is where I demonstrate my own personal success stories.
My motto: keep it simple • make it useful • practice empathy • always ask why?
two side notes:
I know that there is an age old debate about Designers should design and Coders should code. As technology evolves, a designer’s tool kit of the trade evolves as well. I design in the browser to get reliable feedback from users based on facts and not assumptions, to create a collaborative team spirit with stakeholders and developers, and it keeps designing within constraints challenging.
I’m also a huge follower of Machine Learning and Deep Learning for solving challenges of today and into the future with data, analytics, and learned perception, anticipation…yeah, I’m a geek at heart.
don't overthink it and get the job done
my production skill set includes:
- User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) Design
- Information Architecture, Enterprise/Solution Architecture
- Lean UX incorporated into Agile Product Development
- UX Strategy, UX Roadmaps, CX Transformation
- Front-End Development / In-Browser Web Design
- Custom WordPress and SharePoint Site Development
- Principle-Based Visual Design
- User Interviews, Surveys, Focus Groups
- Sitemaps, Wireframes, and Rapid Prototyping
- Templates, Style Guides, and Pattern Libraries
- Personas, Journey Maps, User Stories, and Story Mapping
- WCAG2/508 Compliance Standards
- SAFe Architecture, Value Stream Mapping
- Axure, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign
- DesignOps, Iterative Design, Inclusion/Accessibility Design
- Human Factors and Cognitive Psychology
my business skill set includes:
- Participation Management
- Lean-Agile (SAFe) Work Environment
- Project Requirement Management
- Project Coordination
- Creative Direction
- Growth and Content Marketing
- Customer Experience Management
- Investment Pitches, Leadership Briefings, System Demos
- Research Analysis Insight Reports
- Production Coordination
- Content and Brand Strategy
- Workshop Facilitation and Development
- Story Writing and Content Writer
- Behavioral Economics
- Systems Thinker, Critical Thinker, Active Listener
- Mentor, Coach, Intent-Based/Servant Leader
my soft skill set includes:
- Empathy, Nurturing
- Curious, Knowledge Hungry
- Integrative Thinking, Observer
- Systematic, Organized
- Articulate, Coherent, Reader, Writer
- Seeker Of Opportunity
- Self Aware, Introspective
- Resourceful, Practical, Frugal
- Young At Heart
*Please see additional skill sets on my LinkedIn account.
design is more than just a pretty picture
Design, for me, in its most utilized form is a process, an action, a verb—a tool for solving problems and discovering new opportunities.
Design, as a discipline, starts with visual communication, how visual elements resonate with people, and how the viewer interprets and acts on what they see.
Designers should use systems thinking about the visual decisions they make and those decisions are informed by research, investigation, and fact—that’s what increases product adoption, growth, and profit.
I believe in Adolf Loos’ axiom that an architect should be able to design everything from the spoon to the city can be applied to design in general.
The principles that dictate good design—the cognitive psychology behind why people react and identify to what they see and experience—have been unchanged for a very long time. Technology changes human behavior over time but never human instincts.
to thine own self be true
My Visual Design strengths lay within the guiding principals and elements of design such as the Gestalt Principles, Pareto Principle or aka 80/20 rule in design, Rule of Thirds, the principles of C.R.A.P., eye movement patterns such are the Gutenberg Rule, the f-pattern, and the z-pattern, Dieter Rams’s 10 Principles for Good Design, and Universal Principles of Design by W. Lidwell, K. Holden, J Butler…just to name a few. I utilize these principles within my user experience + user interface designs and my fine art pieces.
on a personal note
I come from a Spanish family of builders, creators, and engineers. My grandmother was a builder of beautiful hand-sewn Northern New Mexico Santera Dolls and functional designed everyday items such as aprons, clothes-pin bags, and clothing. My uncle is a wood carver and carpenter. As a civil engineer, my father is a builder of roads and bridges. My two older brothers are engineers as well—one of computer programming and the other a mechanical engineer.
I inherited the gift of being a builder, creator, and engineer from my family genes. I’m passionate about creating objects that interact with their users. I am an artist with my hands when using pastels and watercolors. I’m a visual artist with my words when writing short stories and poems. I design cognitive solutions with my computer and both sides of my brain.
I’m a geek, an artist, an average 'Joe'sphine with a zeal for technology, design, UX strategy, and agile-lean product development.
