International Motors

Sep 2024 - Present

UX CAPABILITY LEAD, DESIGN SYSTEM PRODUCT OWNER

I sit in Design Ops, under the mission of maturing and scaling International Motors' software design capability. We work across our three main divisions: Software (UX), in-vehicle experience (HMI), and Marketing Communications. We do the following to pursue our mission:

• Reduce design cost leveraging each others strengths, merging redundant efforts, the design system and standards.

• Increase design speed via design system componentization, design element distribution, and collaborating.

• Increase design quality by ceding to each others’ specialties, so we do what works, based on evidence, over preference or position.

My focus is the design system.
Our team works with product teams across the enterprise, Traton and VW brands.

Design Ops also works to elevate the expectations for designers, as defined by experts, celebrate and connect designers across the enterprise, clarify roles and operational models and align efforst required for design to fulfill its function. We work in spite of silos as much as though we were one formal department.

I founded design ops, the design system and established the design ops alliance at International Motors. Design ops is a formal department. The Design ops alliance is a group of the highest ranking design experts in the company who collaborate to elevate design and the design practice across the enterprise. If the company had a centralized design department, the design ops alliance members would all be be it. Since we’re not, we work through influence and collaboration with zero funding to achieve design excellence, reduce reduntant work and accelerate the maturation of design across the company.

I enjoy nurturing, supporting and connecting designers. A keystone practice I established is the weekly (completely voluntary) design forum currently named “UX Roundtable.” It is well attended and lively. It’s member-defined weekly agenda keeps it what I’ve heard are some designers’ favorite weekly meeting.

NAVISTAR INC.

Feb 2018 - Sep 2024

Product Designer, UX LEAD, Navistar Digital Experience

My work at Navistar centers around delivering digital products that shift commercial truck and bus fleets toward digital vehicle management. I work to pave the way to fleet automation through digital experiences for emerging technologies like remote maintenance and repair management, remote vehicle settings and software updates, remote EV and diesel vehicle oversight, digital fleet cost optimization, and autonomous vehicle integration. I see trucks and buses as IoT devices, In my mind, that makes the experiences I contribute to components building towards a broader, more integrated fleet OS: “The Internet of Trucks.”

• Lead Navistar Digital’s UX team: managing designers, design system work, and clients.

• UX Product Design Lead: International 360 fleet service request and repair management app.

• Facilitate requirements workshops with business, product owner, requirements and dev.

• Reshape high-level digital product strategy with user research facts over assumptions.

• Advocate for and implement practices to move Navistar digital up the UX maturity ladder.

• Coordinate and align efforts between PM, BA, QA, UX, Dev and Product Owners.

• Evangelize UX as a team-wide practice beyond UX specialists.

• Develop other designers to broaden skills, stand for design, negotiate requirements.

Navistar Inc.

May 2017 - Jan 2018

UX Consultant Product Design

• UX Lead: OnCommand® Link iOT Over-the-air engine calibration mobile and web apps.

• Define and maintain Navistar's cross-product digital design system.

• Consult/Contribute toward establishing Navistar's UX practice.

• Work on native app and web SaaS products relating to:

  • Engine calibration updates

  • Telematic Fleet Management

  • Vehicle health and diagnostic trouble codes (DTC's)

  • Electronic driver logs (EDL)

  • Digital vehicle inspection reports (DVIR)

• UX research & analysis, human-centered design facilitation and graphic facilitation.

Hyatt Hotels

Sep. 2014 - Oct. 2016

Visual Designer, User Experience

• Visual Design Lead for Hyatt’s first in-house iOS and Android App.

• The app recently went on to win J.D. Power’s first Best Travel App Overall award.

• Established Hyatt’s first UX design system (standards, specs, assets, templates) for apps.
  That system became the default point of reference for Product, UX, BA and Dev teams.

• Designed Hyatt.com's responsive header, footer and navigation.

• Designed & CSS Prototyped templates for Hyatt Ziva, Zilara and Centric property sites.

• Proposed and Designed Hyatt’s favicon and evangelized digital native visual branding

PREVIOUS

Art of Science

Interactive Graphic Designer
Aug. 2001 - Sep. 2001

EMERY GROUP

Art Director/Graphic Designer
Nov. 2001 - Sep. 2002

DEEPOUTDOORS

Creative Director
Sep. 2002 - Apr. 2003

COLOR GRAPHICS

Graphic Designer/Pre-press
Oct. 2003 - Nov 2004

Education

Fort Hays State University

1995 - 2000

Bachelor of Fine Arts: Graphic Design

• Trained under Chaiwat Thumsujarit.

• Interned at Leo Burnett junior year (1998).

• Won 1998 Fort Hays State University Encore Poster Design Competition.

• Interned on Hyundai account at Bates USA west sophomore year (1996).

• Won bid to design Hyundai retail collateral while interning at Bates Advertising.

• Scored 99th percentile CLEP scores in Spanish language.

UI

Design System Arch. & Leadership
Visual Design
Graphic Design
Style Libraries
Specification Libraries
Layouts
Typography
Iconography
Color

UX

User & UX Research
Scenarios & Stories
Information Architecture
Wireframes
Prototypes
Interaction Design
Graphic Facilitation

Front End Dev

HTML
CSS
PHP

Tools

Figma
Zeplin
Photoshop
Illustrator
JIRA, ADO (Azure Dev Ops)
Email ESP's

Standards / Methodologies

Google Material Design
Apple HI Guidelines
Mobile First Responsive
UI in an Agile Environment
Lean, MVP, Iterative Design

Languages

English 99th percentile vocabulary
Spanish 99th percentile fluency

Corporate Design

Identity
Branding