Hi! 👋 I’m Nicole.
I'm a seasoned end-to-end UX/product designer focused on getting to the root of complex problems and straightening them out in delightful, intuitive, user-centered ways.
About
⤷ Seen here: A UX designer that clearly needs more monitors.
Designing for emergent technology requires imaginative thinking & is full of rewarding challenges. Solving complex problems for our users takes persistence in the face of sometimes convoluted and contradictory requirements - including questioning our assumptions of the baseline requirements themselves (and coming up with clever ways to address them). Creating something people never realized could be made - and hearing them say they don’t know how they ever lived without it - never fails to inspire me to keep pushing the envelope.
I do whatever it takes to continuously improve our users’ lives and get stakeholders on board. I run brainstorming sessions, facilitate workshops to help teams plan and measure for success, create design guidelines, imagine the practical and impractical, visiontype & strategize for the future, evangelize design-thinking, interview and observe our users, set up good foundations, push for analytics that matter, and always collaborate & listen.
I’m a ❤️💛💙/ 💚 according to Discovery Insights. If you’re curious about what that means, you can read more here. Want even more personality info? Here’re my CloverLeaf Insights.
email nguernsey.ux@gmail.com
text 219.916.0678
Experience
2020 - now
Product Design Manager, Project & Design Ops Lead @ Streem
2016 - 2020
Senior User Experience Designer @ Blackbaud
Design focused
• Create artifacts, visiontype, and create design strategy as needed to learn about our users and problem space, communicate findings and designs, and test assumptions and solutions for multiple projects and personas. Collaborate on pilot and market test for designs.
• Facilitate cross-functional learning workshops, brainstormings, critiques, and collaborative sessions with our design team and other roles.
• Contribute to Sky UX design system by facilitating pattern needs sessions, creating proposals and documentation, and testing patterns.
• Mentor junior designers and researchers, giving feedback, advice, and reflection, contributing to their career growth and design practice.
• Interview and evaluate candidates to grow our UX team.
Research focused
• Lead cross-functional team to rollout and educate teams on new release- testing measurement standards company-wide. Create resources to support this teaching effort.
• Partner with product stakeholders to create, deploy, and interpret feature and product-wide CSAT surveys.
2015-2016
User Experience Designer @ MCD Partners
• Synthesized research into data visualizations for pitch, resulting in new work acquisition.
• Designed and built award-winning wireframes, flows, user journey maps, and surveys to communicate research findings and design strategy for multiple projects.
• Worked closely with colleagues and clients to create deliverables to address client needs and set up maintenance strategy after hand-off.
• Facilitated design thinking, ideation, and feedback sessions with design team, clients, and stakeholders.
• Conducted usability studies using video conferencing tools, resulting in multiple critical and non-critical issues found and remedied.
2012-2014
User Experience Designer @ Onyx Electronics
• Organized and facilitated user interviews, contextual inquiries, and usability testing.
• Met with clients weekly to present and discuss research and prototypes.
• Visiontyped strategic designs and presented to stakeholders, resulting in two funded projects.
Side projects
Building a desktop calendar
Create an always-on screen desktop calendar that looks like part of the background. Updates live from multiple sources.
VR UX Consult
Test usability of games in build phases and early release, including button interactions and menus for multiple durations of play. Offer insights and redesigns as needed.
Facilitate brainstorming sessions on plotlines, level and character design, and sound design to aid in game creation.
Create design and research strategy plans and set project timelines to help game developers manage their work and set release and quality goals.
Raspberry Pi Fiddling
Various projects I’ve done using Raspberry Pi.
Education
2014 - 2016
Human-Computer Interaction Design MS @ Indiana University Bloomington
Classes
• Prototyping, Rapid Design for Slow Change, Design and Research Methods, Interaction Design Practice, Design Theory, Visual Meaning and Form
UX Designer for Promoting Inclusivity in Technology
• Collaborated on creation of digital training for 100+ associate instructors to promote inclusivity within Informatics and Computer Science.
• Facilitated inclusivity workshops for associate instructors to help them champion inclusion inside and outside their classrooms.
Assistant Instructor, Undergraduate Capstone
• Gave project feedback and advice to undergraduates throughout the year.
• Taught undergraduates about agile software development process and design and coding of iOS applications.
Graduate Mentor for Interaction Design Practice
• Gave project feedback and advice to first year graduate students throughout the semester.
2008 - 2012
Psychology & Brain Sciences BA @ Indiana University Bloomington
Minors
• Anthropology
• Fine Art
Student Mentor in Informatics
• Teach, advise, grade, and mentor informatics students for multiple classes.
Summer Event Coordinator, Ashton Residence Center
• Collaborated to create brand and marketing strategy for freshman events.
• Designed logos, pamphlets, banners, and other materials for Ashton Residence Center.
Environmental Sustainability Board Member, Ashton Residence Center
• Researched and proposed long-term sustainability strategy to larger board of stakeholders to reduce university’s carbon footprint.
• Lead effort to end styrofoam usage in dormitories and university cafeterias, resulting in 75% less styrofoam use.
Tools
