My Resume
Professional Summary
I am a user experience practitioner and manager who:
Thrives on creating software applications and web sites in challenging environments
Asks the right questions in a way that keeps people open to new ideas, uncovers valuable information, and actively engages team members and participants
Creatively applies methods and tools that are most appropriate to a given situation
Advocates for end-users and gathers quality feedback
Translates requirements into solid recommendations and polished designs that work for users, yet are feasible given the technical and business constraints of a project
Is skilled at influencing stakeholders at all levels of the organization
Develops staff by providing the resources, knowledge, and experiential learning opportunities they need to be successful in their projects and their career
Designs, documents, and implements effective yet lightweight processes as part of self-driven, continuous improvement efforts
Specialties
User profiles / personas, use case development, task analysis / workflows, requirements gathering, information architecture, interaction design, wireframing / mockups, appropriate-fidelity prototyping, usability testing, style guides, Visio, Photoshop, Dreamweaver, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Balsamiq, Java
Industry Experience
Manager, Business Applications and Infrastructure, Architecture & Tools Usability Teams, MathWorks, Inc.
October 2006 - Present
My team’s focus is on improving the user experience of internal business and development applications/tools, including our corporate Intranet, various custom-built Java applications, and procured software packages. As an individual contributor I leverage the full range of user-centered design methods and tools – I may be interviewing users one day, and creating mockups or facilitating usability tests the next. As a manager, I regularly communicate with others to make sure I’m staffing the right projects and honing our methods to identify the high impact usability improvements. I also coach my staff to produce useful deliverables and to take on new responsibilities based on business needs and their professional development goals.
Key projects:
Conducting user and industry research to help IT and Development organizations to develop a strategy for enabling internal applications on mobile devices (smart phones and tablets).
Developed processes and tools to help the organization migrate Intranet content from various systems to Microsoft SharePoint, with a focus on improving collaboration, findability, and site maintenance. Worked with the Human Resources department to consolidate 14 country-specific versions of their web site into one audience targeted design in SharePoint.
Designed a framework for evaluating the usability of commercial off-the-shelf software applications prior to purchase, and helped redefine my team's involvement during the implementation phase.
Conducted a large scale study with users in 20 departments and 4 countries to discover pains around the existing Intranet search implementation and plan for phased improvement projects.
Coach staff as they work collaboratively with development managers to improve our processes for responding to usability issues during the development lifecycle, and to grow an internal style guide focused on timely design questions and community contributions.
User Interface Design Manager, Avaya, Inc.
April 2006 - October 2006
Established a user-centered design methodology and interaction / visual design team within the Enterprise Communications Applications Division, which provided support to multiple, geographically distributed product development teams.
Usability Specialist, StreamBase Systems, Inc.
April 2004 - April 2006
Worked with Product Management, Engineering, QE, and Documentation to manage the schedule for incorporating new features and addressing bugs and enhancements in releases of StreamBase Studio, which happened about every four months. Also designed, developed, and rolled out a user-centered design process that included cross-functional participatory design sessions, design specification templates, implementation reviews, bug/enhancement prioritization and tracking, etc.
Key projects:
StreamBase was initially a command-line based stream processing engine; my first project involved translating this into an Eclipse-based GUI (called StreamBase Studio) that could be more widely used by application developers.
Another one of my early projects involved gathering information from the limited number of folks within the organization who had spoken with customers, extracting themes based on these interviews, and creating initial drafts of personas that we refined with new data over time. These personas were actively used in participatory design meetings to resolve challenging prioritization questions and effectively replaced the generic phrase "the user".
The second phase of the StreamBase Studio project involved translating the command-line Feed Simulator (a test and debugging tool) into a UI that fit with the application-building interaction model we built in phase one.
When StreamBase Systems was looking to refine their web presence, I worked with Marketing to conduct a usability test of the new Web Site that was under development.
Senior Technical Writer/Interaction Designer, BEA Systems, Inc.
June 2000 - April 2004
Wrote online documentation for WebLogic Portal and WebLogic Server. While working toward my Master's degree in Human Factors in Information Design at Bentley University, also took on several projects that eventually transitioned me into the Usability / Interaction Design field.
Key projects:
Facilitated cross-functional, participatory design sessions for WebLogic Server 9.0 Administration Console features, including security configurations (users, groups, roles, realms).
Led a geographically distributed project to re-architect the WebLogic Server documentation web site to better meet the information needs of system administrators.
Collaborated with engineering and usability to design and document WebLogic Portal features such as the WebFlow and Pipeline Editor and the e-Business Control Center.
Helped the corporate Ease of Use Center design and administer questionnaires, and provided assistance with usability tests.
Produced online documentation and Javadoc for four releases of WebLogic Portal and three releases of WebLogic Server.
Prior Experience
Technical Writer, DirectAdvice.com, Inc., September 1999 - June 2000
Technical Writer (Consultant), Pfizer Central Research, Groton CT, February 1999 - September 1999
Technical Writer, Manager of Web Development, Lead Interactive Developer, The Allied Group, Inc. (now Strategic Technologies), February 1997 - February 1999
Education
Bachelor of Science, Professional & Technical Writing and Computer Science; University of Hartford, West Hartford, CT; May, 1997.
Master of Science, Human Factors in Information Design; Bentley University, Waltham, MA; February, 2004, Magna Cum Laude.
Affiliations
ACM’s Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction (SIGCHI)
Beta Gamma Sigma Honor Society (Bentley University)
UPA Boston Chapter; Secretary (2006), Vice President (2007-2008)
Presentations & Publications
Enabling IT Applications on Mobile Devices, UX Magazine; October 10, 2011: Article 742.
User-Centered Design in Procured Software Implementations, Journal of Usability Studies; February 2011: Volume 6, Issue 2.
User-centered Procurement: Evaluating the Usability of Commercial-Off-The-Shelf Software, Beyond Assumptions: Usability and Educational Technology - a Northeast Regional Computing (NERCOMP) Event; September 2010.
Migrating a Corporate Intranet to SharePoint: A Case Study, UX Matters August 2010 Issue.
Migrating a Corporate Intranet to Microsoft SharePoint, UPA Boston Monthly Meeting hosted by MathWorks; April 2010.
User-Centered Procurement -- Evaluating the Usability of Off-the-Shelf Software, UX Magazine, Vol. 9, Issue 1, 1st Quarter 2010.
Evaluating the Usability of Commercial-Off-The-Shelf Software, UPA International Conference: Bringing Usability to Life; June 2009.
Migrating a Corporate Intranet to SharePoint, UPA Voice, December 2009.