Employment History

User Interface Designer - On contract to America Online

July 2004 - December 2004, February 2005 - December 2005

• Designed and specified user interfaces for AOL Community products (AOL Journals, Social Networking, Email Groups, Message Boards)
• Designed and specified user interfaces for AOL Search products (Local Search, Smartbox, Yellow Pages, Search Standardizations, and two new products)
• Created concept UIs, information architecture documents, user experience flows, interaction documents, storyboards, and presentations;identified future paths for innovation
• Drove requirements, coordinated with multiple product teams, worked with internal and external development teams, as well as partner companies

User Interface Manager, Engenia Software, Inc.

February 2000 - July 2004

• Managed, designed, and documented UI for core company software (web and pc-based project and process management applications)
• Introduced UI Design, Usability, and change management into requirements and development processes, and was an advocate for the user and usability in the company.
• Gathered, refined, and documented product requirements
• Conceptualized and designed new applications and features around core technology
• Pinch-hit for testing, analysis, marketing, product management, customer engagement, and product requirements groups, and served as a floating troubleshooter.
• Member of oversight group that successfully managed product development process in 2003 and 2004; led 3 efforts to ensure we met critical corporate goals
• Conducted usability and ethnographic studies
• Created highly successful UI specification and product requirements documentation, training material, and company collateral
• Mentored new hires, served as employee advocate, and made other significant cultural contributions
• Received Extra Mile Award, May 2004.

Senior Consultant / Senior User-Centered Designer, Ernst & Young, LLP.

September 1996 - February 2000

• Designed and implemented user interfaces for complex web-based applications, intranets, and extranets
• Managed prototype and user interface teams, as well as contractors
• Created successful and compelling prototypes that led to additional work
• Managed risk and change, including creating a change management module that was adopted by more than 20 development teams within a year.
• Led efforts to define UI Design and Development Process; modified national RUP software development processes to include a robust UI Design module.
• Served as a UI Team troubleshooter often deployed to get design efforts back on schedule, to solve tricky design issues, or to improve client relationships.
• Designed branding initiatives and campaigns, created collateral, and contributed components to cutting edge multimedia presentations, art director of video shown to all employees in the US.
• Clients included: Standard and Poor's, Whirlpool, Nationsbank, Coca-Cola, Food & Friends (pro bono).

Member*, Technical Internet Support Team, Lockheed Martin (MMTSI)

July 1995 - April 1996

• Prototyped mini-sites and document templates
• Implemented mini-sites
• Translated documents into HTML
• Quality assurance, testing, and analysis
• Created catalog of services

*"part-time" position averaged 40 hours/week, funded by the EPA contract

Research Assistant and Information Systems Consultant*, University of Virginia

June 1988 - July 1994

• Designed, renovated, created, implemented, and used information systems for scientific data
• Created informational graphics and brochures
• Built gopher-sites and websites for international and university efforts
• Managed scientific samples and documents
• Evangelized the World Wide Web
• Taught professors and graduate students to build/use the World Wide Web

* multiple part- and full-time positions, funded by multiple LTER, FEMA, & NOAA grants

Additional Employment

• While a graduate student at the University of North Carolina, I held two true part-time jobs prototyping and building websites with the Kenan-Flagler School of Business and the Center for Early Adolescence.

Education

M.S.I.S, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

June 1996

Focus: Organization and Design of Information

A.B., Smith College

June 1994

Major: Ancient Studies, Minor: History of Art

Publications

• Seven articles in A List Apart:
  • Indie Exposure, in Issue 82
  • Language: The Ultimate User Interface, in Issue 59
  • Juggling Chaos: The Gentle Art of Prototyping, in Issue 48
  • Have Laptop, Will Travel, in Issue 29
  • Testing 1-2-3, in Issue 17
  • Them Changes: Maintaining Sanity When Clients Change Spec, in Issue 9.
  • Big Team, Big Problems? Surviving Large Scale Projects, in Issue 5.
• An Overview of Scanner Technology, in Office Systems '98, with Diana George and Amy Matteson, (1998).
• The Virginia Coast Reserve: An Overview, in Virginia Explorer. Volume 10 (4), pp. 2-5, with Bruce Hayden (1994)
• Privately printed letterpress and digital art books (1992-2003)
• Editor in Chief, Smith College Sophian, Fall, 1992 - Spring, 1994. (Associate Editor, Spring, 1992; Arts Editor, Fall, 1991)

Download resume in Microsoft Word format