"Fall in love with the problem and don't fall in love with the solution itself" -Utkarsh Seth
I am a user experience researcher who is excited by equity-focused design and design set for the next billion users. I drive successful and delightful products that are usable, equitable, enjoyable, and useful.
Passions
Creating products that solve real world problems.
Mixed methods UX research that drives wonderful insights. Once we know the problem well, the solution will follow. Qualitative and quantitative research that give a full picture of the user and data to back it up.
Guiding young UX researchers towards growth and excellence through mentorship and collaboration.
Gaining alignment with stakeholders, business, and dev teams through storytelling via workshops, journeys, insights, and driving empathy across the company.
UX curiosities and areas of passion include ethical use of AI, accessibility, knowledge management, socialization methods.
Outside of the professional realm: gardening, yoga, running, backyard chickens, painting, reading, calculus, language learning, and real analysis.
Seeking
A collaborative work space that seeks to creatively and efficiently develop equitable solutions to real world problems through user focused products. A flexible work space with plenty of opportunities for ownership, growth, and mentorship.
Experience
First Command Financial Services
September 2023-PresentSenior User Experience Researcher and Designer
Workshop Facilitator: planned logistics, activities, pre-research, execution, and follow up of workshop across multiple users and business partners. Have become a go-to of workshop expertise to my team .
Project Lead: creating strategy, roadmap, and following through with execution for various projects- Client Reassignment, Client Insights Panel, Strategy for Journey Democratization
User Experience Researcher and Designer
User Focused: jumped in feet first to understand company's complex multi-user symptom and began creating strategy to democratize this knowledge via personas, journeys, process maps, and internal videos.
Stakeholder Alignment: presenting findings in a clear and concise manner to stakeholders and business owners via meetings, workshops, and videos
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April 2022-October 2022UX Researcher Freelance
Client Focused: using mixed methods to provide actionable insights to increase engagement and usability of products and site.
Communication: presenting findings in a clear and concise manner to stakeholders and business owners
November 2019-October 2022
Classroom Teacher Geometry, Pre-Algebra, Intervention, Spanish. GT/ESL/Newcomer
Problem oriented: drove the successful transition to digital and hybrid learning during pandemic by quickly adapting to new technology and iterating quickly as issues arose
Data driven: utilize best practice of data analysis to find pain points of conceptual or technological issues for students
Collaboration: team, cross-team, and across districts to increase efficacy, extrapolate and extend patterns in order to ensure rigor of curriculum
Verbal skills: Presenter for Advance Academics Teacher Institute: Mental Health and GT Learners
Summer 2014
Published Children's Story The Empty Pitcher
January-April 2010
International Volunteer nutrition, childcare, medical volunteer in Entebbe, Uganda. Learned basic Luganda and worked with Ugandan clinicians and nurses.
Education, Workshops, and Certifications
Forrester Seven Stages of Journey Management- August 2024: course on methods and democratization of journeys across the enterprise
SAFe Agile: PM/PO Certificate- April 2024: deepening and formalizing proficiency in Agile environment for streamlining production
Strategyzer methodologies- Book work with applications then being an embedded researcher on a cross-department team in our company's inaugural PI led by Strategyzer
Google UX Design Certificate- December 2021-March 2022: 7 part course teaching the design process: empathize, define, ideate, design, test
Math 7-12 Teaching Certificate-2019, add-on certificates GT (Gifted and Talented) and ESL (English Second Language)
University of Texas at San Antonio summa cum laude BS Mathematics- May 2009. Under graduate thesis: Fibonacci Numbers in Arts, Math, and Popular Culture
Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science at the University of North Texas- May 2007. Early college admittance program for driven high school students. Allowing students to begin college after their sophomore year of high school.