My process can be tailored to fit any scope, budget, or timeline.

Empathize

My education in clinical, research, and consumer psychology, allows me to deeply empathize with customers, and shape winning product strategies.

Design

Whether it's an enterprise workflow application, or a transactional eCommerce site, my design philosophy is simple.  The final product must be intuitive, effective, and enjoyable. 
 

TEST & Refine

I have experience with a wide variety of prototyping tools, and usability testing methodologies.  In-person or remote, moderated and unmoderated, I believe in testing concepts early and iterating quickly.

Empathize

Interviews and Field Studies

I started my career as a clinical psychologist.  My education and training in how to listen to people and understand their needs (spoken and unspoken) has served me well as a user experience specialist.  I have been practicing and teaching others how to gather actionable insights from interviews for over 20 years.   Whether it's a focus group or one-on-one, remote or in-person, I know what to ask and how to listen. 

Mental Models, Personas, AND Process Flows

Documenting the insights gained from interviews, and helping the entire product team empathize with customers (users AND buyers) is the most important part of the discovery process.  I will tailor and present a variety of easy-to-digest deliverables, for stakeholders at any level.

Design

Concept Models and Storyboards

Once insights from the discovery phase are distilled, and the product vision begins to crystalize, I like to communicate key system-level concepts and interactions using one-page graphic illustrations.  These artifacts help keep the product team grounded in the big picture of the user's journey and goals, while we're working through the individual steps in the detailed design.

Wire Frames And Spec DOCS 

I will present as much (or as little) detail as individual development and QA teams need in wire frame and specification docs.  Each year, it seems teams rely less and less on these lengthy docs, and more on living, breathing prototypes.  I can deliver either (or both).

Rapid Prototyping

I am proficient with several rapid prototyping tools (my current preferred combination is Sketch and Invision).  If your organization requires something different, chances are I'm familiar with it and can produce high or low fidelity prototypes with it.

Test & Refine

Usability Testing

I started my UX career at Usability Sciences Corporation; one of the leading usability testing firms in the world.  Since then, I've planned and conducted hundreds of usability studies for digital and physical products in virtually every industry.

Heuristic & Competitive AnalyseS 

I'm a stickler for details and adherence to best practices.  I use a comprehensive index of desktop, mobile, and web heuristics to evaluate digital or physical products.

Surveys

I've been building and administering surveys and self-report evaluations for more than 16 years.  I've amassed an index of more than 300 items that can be used to measure anything from basic usability and learnability, to persuasive power and emotional impact.

Site Analytics

Sometimes you can piece together exactly why users are behaving in an unexpected way by looking at patterns in the user interaction data. I'm a huge advocate for the use of platforms like Tealeaf for detailed analysis of customer interactions, but even basic google analytics data can be useful.