While at Rockwell Automation as UI/UX Designer, I worked on a suite of applications aimed at simplifying the manufacturing automation selection process. It has been a very rewarding project since the problem statements tend to be complex and vary often.

My main take aways from my time as a UI/UX designer:

1) Understand the whole problem. Often we would have requirements about what our product owners and stakeholders would want to see in a feature. What we didn’t have is how does that impact our users? We would get part way through our design and end up with more questions than what we started with. This lead us back to doing more research to get those answers.

2) Test, test, and test some more. Each year Rockwell Automation host a convention call Automation Fair. This was our opportunity to show off what Rockwell had created and where we are going while also giving our partners a place to talk about their plans. For me this was my opportunity to get face to face with as many users as we could and test out our designs. Over the course of 2 days we received more feedback and insights than we could imagine. Not only did we learn about the design but we also learn about their workflows more in-depth and their hidden pain points. Once a year wasn’t enough but it’s what we had so we used it to the best of our capabilities.

I have been interested in design and building things since I was younger, from skateboard ramps to car accessories. This played a large role in determining what to get my masters in when deciding to go further into higher education. These are some projects from school and beyond.

During the summer of my final year as a graduate student, I took classes at the Advanced Design academy. This was a cohort of individuals from students to professionals looking to up their skills. This was also taught by individuals who were working as industrial designers full time and part time teaching. During this course I learned what professional industrial design work looked like and it was inspiring.

To me design is about seeing the whole picture at different levels. Much like opening up you maps app of choice and zooming out, we need to understand the problems we are solving at the 30,000 ft view but we also need to tell someone when to turn left to get where we need to go.

I am still defining who I am as an industrial designer but every day I strive to give my 100% to understanding and solving the real problem that can impact someone’s life.

I have been a gamer for as long as I can remember, starting with Mario Bros on NES. This prototype was a winter project I created when trying to find a specific gaming experience that would allow my friends and I to keep gaming as our lives got busier.

Prototype 1:
I wrote 90% of the code utilized, however, used art assets purchase on the Unity asset story. The other 10% was a course around inventory management that I modified and implemented the interfaces into my inventory UI. When considering what I wanted this game to feel like, I was learning on my experiences in gaming for the past 20+ years. I wanted a game that was quick to get into, had an in game rouge like loop, but also out of game goals to reach for.

This prototype taught me a couple of things:

1) I need to keep is small and test early. I took about 9 months to learn Unity, write the code for this prototype, and create the game object necessary. But what I didn’t take into consideration is does this feel fun. After the 9 months it still feels clunky but has a lot of system that would help this grow into a game.

2) Big scope doesn’t mean better. I spent a lot of time creating menus, inventory UI, gameplay UI, but none of that actually impacted the gameplay itself. In my next prototype. I am focused on gameplay first systems and scope second. Something can be ugly and rough around the edges but still establish the core game loop and determine the feel of the game.