Design isn’t given a seat at the table, it has to be earned
I've built the leadership, culture, and standards that solve systemic issues and make design indispensable — in companies where design historically took a backseat.
Throughout my career, I’ve joined companies where design was an afterthought — where product decisions got made without a designer in the room, where research was a nice-to-have, where "just make it look good" was the brief.
And at every company, I’ve changed that.
I didn’t change that by fighting for relevance, but by proving it — directing & shipping work that changed the business’s understanding of what was possible, building teams that executives started protecting because they couldn't afford to lose them, and setting a standard of craft that raised the bar for everyone around us.
20+ Years Focusing on Design Leadership
I've built and scaled organizations across Product Design, User Research, UX Copywriting, Innovation, Marketing Design, and Motion Graphics.
For most of my career, I've focused on developing cross-disciplinary creatives — building trust, raising the bar, and helping them do the best work of their careers.
Whether building from scratch, scaling rapidly, or transforming underperforming teams, I create environments where designers are supported, challenged, and empowered.
And, as a team, we transform the role design plays in a company.
I focus on four key areas to deliver long-term business results:
Arbiters of Taste
Strategic Partnerships
User-Centered Practice
Sustainable Culture
As a thought partner it makes us stronger. As a generator it handles the mundane. We’re the judgment and arbiters of taste. I'm actively experimenting with how AI elevates research, design practice, mentoring, and leadership.
AI Thought Leadership & Experimentation
As a Team Leader:
I see it as my personal responsibility to prepare my team for a new way of working, enabled by AI.
I measure AI’s usage and effectiveness in a non-invasive way. I share news and articles with my team, and host monthly lunch n’ learns, all in the spirit of promoting curiosity, growth and learning.
By building trust across the organization, I unlock the tools my team needs to experiment, learn and be at the forefront of what it means to work with AI.
As a Subject Matter Expert:
I’m a vocal proponent of thoughtful, responsible experimentation and usage of AI.
I’m the go-to expert on AI for non-engineering teams.
I’ve led “Intro to AI for Non-Technical Teams” workshops, teaching everything from what AI is, to how to build basic workflow agents — framing every topic in easy to understand terms that are applicable and useful.
As an AI Advocate
I’m an AI Advocate at my company. I experiment, share, and measure the impacts of AI tools on workflows, quality and efficiency.
I approach it methodically, through a Design Thinking lens: Identifying a problem and opportunity, learning, iterating, developing a solution, and executing.
I evaluate new tools responsibly and push for unlocking apps and features at an Enterprise level that make AI tools useful and powerful.
Personal Project
Record Recommender
Problem:
I have a collection of over 500 vinyl records. Every morning I want to listen to a couple while I drink coffee and get ready to start my day. But when I’m tired, I find myself going for the same 10 albums over and over.
Solution:
I built record recommender as my first experimentation with AI. I started with Zapier, thinking I needed an agent. After failing to get the results I wanted (the variety, the mood-based filtering), I turned to Claude. It recommended a simple Google Apps Script automation. Claude wrote the code for me, helped me de-bug and refine.
I downloaded my Discogs library and added my personal collection to it in a Google Sheet. I used Claude to help improve genres and write a “vibe” for each day. And in the Apps Script I assigned a “vibe” or mood to each day of the week. The script matches 3 albums to each day of the week and sends them to me in an email that’s waiting for me by the time I wake up.
To this day, it’s the most useful thing I’ve built for myself using AI. The most useful things aren’t always the most complex.
Personal Project
AI Tool DB
Problem:
One of the ways I’ve taught myself about AI is by subscribing to daily newsletters. One of those is TAAFT (There’s An AI For That). TAAFT highlights a list of AI Tools every day. Some of them are useful or interesting.
Solution:
I build AI Tool DB, a very web app, in about an hour. It syncs with my AI newsletter emails, identifies the promoted AI tool sections of the newsletters, eliminates duplicates, and presents them in an easy to browse list with category filters.
Simple list of filterable AI tools
Color coded filters for ease of use
Ability to favorite AI tools
Problem:
Whenever my husband and I are about to watch a movie, he wants to know what the Rotten Tomatoes score is. Or we think of a movie we want to watch, but don’t know where to stream it.
When we search google, or IMDB, those two pieces of information are typically a few clicks away.
Solution:
I built The Usher to put the information I want, and only that information, front and center.
In case we had any other questions about the film, I added an AI-driven (Claude) chat section where The Usher, a movie expert, can answer any question we have about a film.
And for the times we’re stumped, I added The Usher to the home screen, where he can answer any question about any film (within his context window, of course, which means he doesn’t know much about very recent films, but that’s ok. It solves the nostalgic mood I’m often in).
Personal Project
Teller
Noteworthy:
First production-ready app, with account creation, subscription model (w/ Paywall gate), analytics, email marketing, etc.
Problem:
My husband and I travel a lot. And I like making photo books. But I’ve often wondered about more interesting ways to contextualize and memorialize our trips around the world.
Solution:
I built Teller as a way to contextualize our memories around a fun fictional narrative. What it turned into was a fascinating journey into how AI interprets images and text.
Teller lets you upload your image, give your “characters” names, add any additional context (like “trip to Paris for our anniversary”), and pick a genre.
To keep the quality of the stories high, I fine-tuned the prompts and added famous authors from each genre as reference.
It’s the first production-ready app I’ve launched with a full consumer feature set: free trial, account creation gate, paywall gate, subscription model, Google and Apple OAuth and Magic Link sign in (no need for passwords!).
Let's Talk
If you're looking to elevate, scale or transform your design function, I'd love to chat.
Also, if you’re navigating the early stages of your career, I’m always happy to share my experience.