For as long as I can remember, I’ve been bothered by products that don’t work as they should or are needlessly complicated. As a child, I would get frustrated and lose interest. As an adult, well, it’s not much different. I enjoy a good puzzle but not when I’m trying to pay a bill or order dinner online.

For that reason, I approach my solutions with the user experience in mind, regardless of whether I’m designing a website, creating a flyer, or drafting a mass email.

Background

I am a User Experience and Visual Designer out of Northeast Ohio. I have a bachelor’s degree in visual communication design and a master’s degree in user experience design, both from Kent State University.

I had a 20+ year career at Kent State where I led teams who created digital solutions to support teaching and learning. Later in my career I crafted communications to promote and inform the university community about cyber security and other IT-related topics.

Maybe you have heard the expression, “There are three sides to every story: yours, mine, and the truth.”

Stated this simply, the expression implies that both our accounts are incorrect and that there is one true story somewhere in between. However, this is inaccurate. We merely view the situation from different perspectives. There are multiple factors to consider, which could result in multiple truths.

I apply the same philosophy to design. There is no one perfect solution, but rather the best solution considering all the factors. Consider a business goal and a customer goal. The solutions lie somewhere in between–where the two goals converge.

Additional factors (e.g., technology, time, budget, etc.) can change. And when the factors change, the “truth” (i.e., solution) may change as well.