Where I am now

Hopefully, in the woods, roaming around, having philosophical and existential conversations with myself about AI on mobile. Or probably just conversations with myself in general.. 👀

Here's The Deal

I love design. I breathe it. In fact, I wanna build new perspectives on it. Things can be good, but things can always be better – easier and more intelligent (see what I did there? AI-speak”). I’ve learned to love building design strategies as much as the processes, partnerships, and teams over the past 18+ years. Part of my purpose is to make lives easier, and have some fun while I do it! This isn’t just for customers, clients, and partners, but for my team.

AND SO I GREW

My mind was blown when a team I worked with surprised me by submitting my custom work for design awards in 2015 and I actually won. It’s never something I thought about doing for myself or thought I was capable of achieving, but happened. People always mentioned how they loved my work more than I did, and impostor syndrome was always very real. After I won two best-in-class award, I started pushing myself even further. If I was capable of achieving something like this, what else could I do? More importantly, what else could I learn, and who could I impact as well as bring along in the journey? Since then, I’ve invested myself in learning the art of managing up, across, and down while continuously building tactical strength into my gaps, and uplifting those I work with through growth and thought leadership.

MINDSET SHIFT

In 2019 I attended Adobe Max. This was a conference that was always on my bucket list. The amount of information to build myself up, as well as others, was more than I could have dreamt of. I took what I learned back to my team at Capital One and went to work on ideation of how to strengthen not just our team, but the top-of-house creative network. “Bridge builder” is what our Commercial head of design called me. I wanted to build our connection and synchronicity in what we designed, how we designed it, and how it embodied the brand vision for the company. The team was excited and involved, and we began collaborating more and more. There is one thing that excites me more than design, and that’s driving design cultures forward.

INTROSPECTIVE

Since I also have a small history in teaching curriculum in schools, I wanted to help others whether it was in designing products or building the culture of the teams I worked with. How could I help? The past few years I spent a lot of time mentoring other designers while unsure of my own voice at those times. The more time I spent with people I worked with, the more I recognized my own previous struggles in them. I took time to build out a curriculum to mentor other designers in not only tactical skills, but in finding their own individual voice as a designer, their own style, and a steady practice in applying the best of themselves to their product work. Not to forget myself, I decided to take on my own mentors and business coaches. Holy crap it worked. The designers who were once shy in communicating with teams around their thought processes were now leading sessions and bringing out strengths in others on their product teams.

TYPICAL MENTIONS

Have I worked with business stakeholders and product owners? Of course. I also had drinks with them to learn about the people I worked with in a less formal scenario. Over 15+ years of designing, I have worked in creative realm from freelance for agencies, to systems design thinking for enterprise companies like Capital One, Google, TiVo Inc, and so many more.

HERE WE ARE

Today, I’m in a place where I’m able to be a business strategy consultant for C-suite management, a liason and partner to Middle to upper management, as well as a coaching partner to interns to principal levels to be promoted and achieve their next-level definition of “best self”. I take pride in this. Because I’ve learned, I can do and teach.

SCHEDULE A SYNC

I don’t just sign up to help, and I wouldn’t want that for you either. Let’s take 30 minutes to talk about your vision and core needs to establish if we have an opportunity to work together as a best fit. If it seems you may need something else I’m happy to help you establish a strategy to find what it is that will empower you to be at your best!