About
My career has focused on up-leveling the craft of designers and the quality of user experiences. I thrive on cross-functional teams in strategic, player-coach roles.
Contact
Speaking
Design systems are drivers of cultural change disguised as a component library—getting your org to commit to this change often requires influencing across all levels from designers to VPs. In doing so, you’ll rely on skills like communication and relationship building, in order to expand your system of allies. In this talk, I’ll share mistakes and lessons learned along the way and offer ideas to help you navigate the challenges of design systems buy-in and advocacy.
Building design systems is a thankless job. It feels like some days the quality of the product's UI is weighing on your shoulders and others like you're being critiqued for stifling the design team's creativity. When you build an internal product for your peers, critical feedback becomes personal and can demotivate or derail your team. It can feel like sprints and quarters are spent reacting to the needs of others, and your roadmap is commanded by the teams you support. Acting in a support role means you're responsible for defining your team's motivation, milestones, success... and how your work impacts the business overall.
Writing this talk began as a way to cope with burnout after 4 years of working on design systems. Intended as a cathartic moment of self-reflection, this talk will pull from personal experiences [in hope of] providing practical strategies that break the cycles of fatigue, stress, and overwhelm; empowering design systems leaders to define their focus and what really matters.
design systems have changed the way we design and build applications. They have evolved into quintessential guides for teams and organizations and have become increasingly popular with companies such as AirBnb, Microsoft, and Salesforce even selling their own design system for other businesses to use.
Work Experience
Leading the team responsible for a cross-platform, design system, which supports all dropbox products on web, native app, and desktop. Focused on evangelizing adoption, migration, and community contribution models. Our system supports tokens, components, patterns, navigation, and IA principles. Leading work in close collaboration with the Brand team.
Building out the first cross-platform, cross-brand design system for Expedia. Focused on evangelizing and onboarding teams, contributing to the library, and driving speed, coherence, and quality across iOS, Android, and progressive web apps.
Previously, lead UX for the global navigation, native app home screen and web storefront products. Focused on building personalized experiences based on user feedback and traveler needs. Collaborating with Product and Engineering leadership to drive strategy for mobile app engagement metrics. Mentors five designers.
Education
Projects
Transformed a fragmented suite of products and platforms into a cohesive experience through evangelizing our design system, Dropbox Interface Guidelines.
Defined and developed the creation of Expedia’s Unified Design System, a cross-platform, multi-product system encompassing UI kit, Training, and Migration support.
Side Projects
This template makes it easy for remote teams to generate ideas, vote, and prioritize. All within Figma! Recommended for roadmap planning or cross-functional team ideation exercises. Where did this come from? In a virtual-first environment, our cross-functional team is spread out over many cities and time zones.
When it came to team planning, we wanted a collaborative way to generate ideas, categorize and vote. We also wanted a visual tool to help us weigh impact over effort, ensuring that our team was prioritizing the right set of ideas.
Two years ago, I joined a team tasked with building a design system for Expedia from the ground up. Our main goal has been to deliver a cohesive experience to our users across touch points while working with an established brand that has equity; in particular the colors and logo…