Currently working as a Designer in the Product Design Team. We create designs for our company-wide core products. Much of my work involves ideation and explorations into new product features. This requires me to build interactive prototypes that can be user-tested. We then iterate on the design via user and stakeholder feedback and see how we can pull successful concepts into our core products.

The Innovation Lab was an in-house corporate incubator program. My projects varied greatly in scope from quick-turnaround MVP prototypes to long-term project initiatives. These projects often went outside of traditional news related apps. As part of our annual Innovation Challenge, I often worked with teams of reporters from around the country to visualize and prototype their product or app ideas.

I worked as a designer in Gannett’s centralized Local Digital Solutions Network. In this position I often created designs, story layouts, or assisted in product feature designs for our local newsrooms throughout the company.

As a team member in a small digital development team, I rapidly created interactive story-telling presentations on the web and native apps. This involved working closely with reporters and editors in the newsroom to plan, mock, build, and launch investigative stories and special seasonal features. This also included designing and publishing monthly tablet special editions for Rochester Magazine.

A majority of the work was conducted through Department of Defense and Department of Energy government contracts via the SBIR (Small Business Innovation Reasearch) program. Through these contracts, I provided assistance to high-tech small businesses on the design of their capabilities brochures and trade show displays. This required me to work collaboratively with clients, market researchers, and government personnel. Other responsibilities included designing and managing email campaigns, regular maintenance of Dawnbreaker and client websites, and providing assistance to the print design team when needed.

I designed both print and web collateral for various clients. My main responsibility was to assist in creating new identities and materials for clients while working closely with the art department and account executives.