Creative lead offering 15 years of experience that has proven to be conceptually strong, inspirational, and successful for both agencies and in-house creative teams. Versatile strategist recognized for designing and directing visual solutions for clients, across multiple mediums, using a mixture of creative skills and commercial awareness in a deadline-driven creative agency environment. Highly valued for interpreting studio vision, translating objectives into actionable plans and providing decisive leadership.

Experience

Steampunk

Design Director
McLean, VA
March 2020 – Present
www.steampunk.com

Responsible for guiding Citizen Service & Defense clients through Steampunk’s Design Intelligence^® process, incorporating human-centered design methods to solve complex challenges and leading team of UI/UX Designers, Visual Designers, Service Designers and working alongside cross-functional scrum teams in an agile environment.

Co-lead internal design and branding initiatives, including company website redesign and WordPress development; establish branding standards; design logos for company portfolios, sub-brands, practices, and marketing.

Work with program managers, practice leads and recruiting team to staff projects, review resumes and interview new candidates to fill roles within the Design & Strategy practice and Citizen Services & Defense portfolio.

Assist Business Development team by providing Design Intelligence project assets, graphic creation and defining processes as they relate to government contracts.

Guide projects through design-led discovery initiatives by conducting workshops, brainstorming, observing, identifying stakeholders, conducting user interviews and journey mapping to uncover pain points and identify opportunities.

Design solutions based on research, project requirements, information architecture and process flows by wireframing and prototyping in a collaborative approach involving clients for validation and cross-functional team members in an iterative process.

Build validation and trust by conducting usability testing and learning from how users interact with prototypes before committing to production with the goal of providing solutions that are impactful, sustainable and meet the needs of the people who use them.

Perform hybrid accessibility testing by leveraging a mix of tools including browser extensions, bookmarklets and screen readers for digital platforms.

Co-create change management deliverables with cross-function team including user manuals, training manuals, video tutorials with 508 compliant subtitles added for usability.

Six Half Dozen Design Studio

Art Director
Alexandria, VA
October 2008 – March 2020
www.sixhalfdozen.com

Consistently maintain a smooth creative process by meeting with potential clients, listening to their needs, past experience and outlining potential creative solutions, target audience, message and specs for proposed design work and assisting with time estimation for an accurate proposal of work.

Meet project deadlines, stay within the scope and company standards by effectively managing a team of designers, developers and multimedia producers, giving creative briefings, taking part in brainstorming sessions, providing feedback from clients who include corporations, public relation firms, marketing firms, associations, non-profits, small businesses, start-ups and charities.

Visual design and direction for projects based on client needs and requests. These projects include branding, collateral, infographics, publications, websites, microsites, event material, presentations and digital marketing collateral.

Oversee in-house development of custom WordPress CMS websites. Ensure websites are consistent with the client approved mock up, are built to be responsive, mobile friendly and optimized. Once launched, provide client with support and training on features such as editing, formatting pages, blogs, custom post types, content, uploading media, SEO, categories, tags, contact forms, widgets, security and plugins.

Stay on top of current design trends and continue to broaden skills, strategies and exploring new solutions through new and current mediums including video, interactive web elements, WordPress themes and plugins.

Instrumental in growing the business by researching organizations and individuals to identify new business opportunities while increasing the value of current clients and recruiting in-house creative talent.

American Society for Engineering Education

Production Coordinator
Washington, DC
February 2007 – October 2008

Held accountable for design and editorial schedules, print buying, and print process of all in-house designed materials.

Managed production of three award-winning publications, Prism, Engineering: Go For It and The Journal of Engineering Education.

Digital Press Inc.

Graphic Designer
Herndon, VA
October 2005 – February 2007

Managed incoming artwork for both in-house and outsourced printing needs while designing packaging, brand collateral, brochures, flyers and advertisements.

City Marketing Associates

Junior Designer
Herndon, VA
May 2004 – September 2004

Assisted in the conceptualizing and design of marketing materials, as well as prepared brochures and display comprehensives for client presentations.

Prime Media Productions
Intern
Smithfield, VA
May 2003 – August 2003