Summary:

A multi-disciplinary, user experience specialist focused on users, customers, usability, design, communication, relationship, and business value. Combines a broad background of creative, business and real world experience to build consensus around principals such as user-centered design, quality processes and assurance, business process improvement, and professionalism in every activity.

Objective:

Seeking a full time position involving my UX sills and passions, design and development background, communication and presentation skills, and ability to:
• Manage world-class web development and design projects
• Create positive working relationships
• Mentor, train and educate
This position will provide me with opportunities for growth, continued learning, customer relations, and insight into the workings of the business I am employed by. This position will also provide me with opportunities to speak, present and teach to the rank and file as well as mentor, educate and champion User Experience personnel.

Strengths:

• Solution oriented, inventive, enthusiastic, self-starter
• Creative, with a multi-disciplined background informed by multiple technical, business and artistic pursuits
• Attention to detail with eye for standards
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Able to communicate effectively with personnel from any level and/or area of the business
• Often deemed the liaison between creative and engineering personalities
• Able to give and take direction as well as provide creative input and/or direction
• Encourage team growth, collaboration and knowledge transfer
• Experienced team lead, senior level lead, and mentor
• Accustomed to fast-paced environments and managing multiple projects with independent delivery schedules
• Experience building brand and design guidelines as well as style guides
• Deep experience in rapid screen design and prototyping informed by iterative user testing

Technical skills:

SYSTEMS:
Expert / Highly Skilled: MacOSX, MacOS, Windows2000-XP
Moderately Skilled: IIS web server environments, UNIX, Apache and LAMP environmentns
Familiar: AJAX and other Web 2.0 Frameworks

SOFTWARE (GRAPHICS/DEVELOPMENT/OFFICE):
Expert / Highly Skilled: HPQC, PhotoShop, ImageReady, Illustrator, BBEdit, MS Office/Word/Excel/PowerPoint/Visio/OneNote/SharePoint, OmniGraffle
Moderately Skilled: ASP.NET, Visual Studio, DreamWeaver, InDesign, Quark, MS Access, MIVA Merchant, PerForce, Visual SouceSafe, TeamTrack/TeamShare, Act!, FileMaker Pro, Variety of Web2.0 Social Networking sites
Familiar: QTP, HP Performance Center, Flash, ColdFusion, BroadVision, WebTrends, Oracle BI, Lombardi Teamworks

LANGUAGES:
Expert / Highly Skilled: (X)HTML, CSS, JavaScript Libraries (jQuery, Scriptaculous, etc.)
Moderately Skilled: JavaScript, DHTML, PHP, SQL-Server, MySql
Familiar: CGI, Perl, AJAX, XML, VB, RUBY, Rails

MISCELLANEOUS:
Expert / Highly Skilled: User Interface and user experience design and development, usability testing, information architecture & web content development, web template design and development, content editing, web prototyping, variety of digital paint, draw, photo manipulation, page lay-out programs, print processes, content management systems, version control software, data back-up software, OS utilities, etc.

Summary of Accomplishments:

• Established and maintain the Walmart User Experience User Group (UXUG)
• Evangelizing UX/Usability and User-Centered design paradigms through presentations, face to face meetings, relationship building, publishing articles and blogs, working directly with business and development teams
• Introduction of UX/Usability to a world's largest retailer's Information Services Division, where none existed before
• Managed Accessibility Audit & Compliance project within world's largest retail business portal site
• Designed and developed a Usability Scorecard to assist in gathering metrics around usability of existing, legacy applications and help drive higher usability standards within the organization
• Development of standards and guidelines for web design & development of a corporate retail application portal web site
• Provided (X)HTML/CSS coding, UI architecture consulting and graphics development direction to product managers, user interface team, and backend development teams at a major e-commerce "dotcom" and technical services corporation
• Rapid development of web-based, user-interface prototypes in a fast-paced, multi-project environment
• Participated in and ran user tests within a fully-implemented formal user testing facility
• Driven user testing in multiple environments and multiple levels – "in the wild" to formal
• Development and deployment of web-based store-front interfaces and CMS templates for major online design/print/buy e-commerce Application Service Provider
• Collaborated with multiple partners in development of online application UI screens and page flows
• Designed and developed architecture, content, art direction and graphics for hi-tech corporate web presences
• Designed, architected and implemented multiple web sites for non-profit agencies/foundations and small businesses—responsibilities included information architecture, art direction, graphics development, visual continuity, page layout & flow, HTML encoding and functional development, content development, and project management

Professional Experience:

December 2009-Present: Walmart Stores, Inc., Bentonville, AR - Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Bentonville, AR
Advanced QA Engineer (Sr. Programmer Analyst level) – Usability & UX Specialist/CTFL/QA Merchandising Team Lead.

• Advanced QA Engineer (Sr. Programmer Analyst level) – Usability & UX Specialist/CTFL/QA Merchandising Team Lead
• Evangelist for Usability/UX Design principles throughout Walmart ISD
• Developed Usability Scorecard for Walmart ISD and Walmart Retail Link development teams
• Requirements gathering, test case development, test lab development
• UI testing / web application software testing lead
• Developer of best practices and guidelines in regard to UI design, UX standards, QA testing
• Consultant to development teams for UI design, iterative user testing, best practices in UX Designs
• Presentations to Division on UX/Usability best practices
• Developed workshops to train associates in prototyping processes and requirements gathering
• Stakeholder and contributor to development of division-wide standards for web application development/design and accessibility
• Instrumental in negotiating improved relationship between dotcom and ISD divisions design and UX teams
• Evangelist for Usability/UX Design principles throughout Walmart ISD
• Developed Usability Scorecard for Walmart ISD and Walmart Retail Link development teams
• Requirements gathering, test case development, test lab development
• UI testing / web application software testing lead
• Developer of best practices and guidelines in regard to UI design, UX standards, QA testing
• Consultant to development teams for UI design, iterative user testing, best practices in UX Designs
• Presentations to Division on UX/Usability best practices
• Developed workshops to train associates in prototyping processes and requirements gathering
• Stakeholder and contributor to development of division-wide standards for web application development/design and accessibility
• Instrumental in negotiating improved relationship between dotcom and ISD divisions design and UX teams

January 2007-December 2009: Walmart Stores, Inc., Bentonville, AR - Programmer Analyst - UX Evangelist/UX Engineer/UX Governance/Web Developer/QA Merchandising Team Lead

• Developed standards and guidelines for UX governance to be adhered to by development teams
• Developed style guides and standards around web screens UI elements
• Consulting/advising application teams on UX guidelines and UI layouts
• Art director and UX expert for major redesign of premium retail application portal web site (Retail Link)
• Prototyping UI screens, internal web sites, internal/external web applications
• HTML/CSS/JavaScript page-flows for web application deployment
• Requirements gathering, test case development, test lab development
• UI testing / web application software testing lead

June, 2006-December, 2006: VeriSign.com, Mountain View, CA
UI Designer/Web Developer working for internal Usability Group at VeriSign, building online interfaces and prototypes for existing and new products.

• Web product & page design
  • HTML/CSS/JavaScript development for page-flow mock-ups and product prototypes for web deployment
  • Requirements gathering
  • UI testing

April, 2004-June, 2006: Cafepress.com, San Leandro, CA
Sr. UI Designer/Web Developer/Team Lead for an "on demand" print services and e-commerce site hosting company providing web-based commerce applications to creative individuals and groups for entrepreneurial deployment of designs printed on a host of products.

• Client service design and interface designer/developer

• Product & web graphic design specialist & Team Lead

• Develop, train and manage team of Web designers/developers, insuring consistent client services development and quality assurance

• Develop on line documentation/training service manuals for design and client services personnel

• Design and development of templates for e-commerce storefronts deployed via memeber administration pages

1998-Present: Seidel & Associates (S&A), Palo Alto, CA
Sr. UI Designer/Web Developer/Project Manager for a boutique web design and development company providing professional services to small businesses, tech corporations, and nonprofit groups.

• Freelance Web design and development

• Client development & CRM

• Develop and manage team of associate Web developers for client projects

• Provide full-service graphic, web and architectural design capabilities to clients needing professional web branding, site maintenance, application design and online messaging

May 2000-April 2001: Charitableway, San Carlos, CA
Sr. UI Developer for a company providing online donation systems to corporate employee giving programs for clients such as Sabre, Hewllet-Packard and Sun,

• UI Team Lead and Sr. Developer providing leadership to User Interface Design Team, developing HTML and usability standards for major e-commerce ASP

• Developed, implemented and conducted usability testing

• Rapid development of HTML site and product prototypes for client projects

• Creative resource for web graphics, overall site design and print collateral

• Development of HTML and page layout standards & templates

• Liaison between engineering group and visual design team; HTML solution provider to engineering team

September 1999-May 2000: Aquent Partners, Sunnyvale, CA
Creative Services & Web Consultant

• Graphic design, HTML and JavaScript development for Charitableway including responsibilities for user interface design, graphics development, web-based application design, marketing demo design and HTML consulting to backend engineering design group

• See May 2000-April 2001 above

August 1996-1999: PROVISTA Software Intl, Fremont, CA
WebMaster & Consultant (June 1998-August 1999) for a software consulting firm specializing in porting legacy data & business application systems from mainframe environments to desktop and web-based environments for clients such as Pacific Bell (SBC), Clorox, California Lottery, CalPoly University, IBM, Infravio, Integrete, City of Fremont, CA and more

• Responsible for content, design, development and maintenance of corporate web site

• Consultant, working with PROVISTA clients on web related projects and issues

Director of Sales (August 1996-January 1999) for a software consulting firm specializing in porting legacy data & business application systems from mainframe environments to desktop and web-based environments for clients such as Pacific Bell (SBC), Clorox, California Lottery, CalPoly University, IBM, Infravio, Integretel, City of Fremont, CA and more

• Responsible for outside sales to new clients for multi-million dollar software development/consulting firm

• Designed and created necessary collateral, promotional and sales materials

• Created and maintained client/contact database

• Organized, wrote and submitted Project Proposals (RFP Submittals)

• First salesperson to perform at and above sales goals in company history (1997)

• Successfully migrated manufacturing/retail skills to high-tech industry gaining experience in business software, mainframe, networking, client-server and middleware technologies

Previous to 1996:

• Business owner, corporate partner, executive

• Creative designer, artist, consultant

References:

• Upon request

Affiliations:

Professional Organizations

• Usability Professionals' Association

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