Adam Armstead

Manager of TakeLessons' Design Team (two direct reports and one indirect report) which supports all of the companies internal and external products. Directly responsible for conducting the company's user research and interaction design activities

Notable Achievements:

Conducted all user research and interaction design while guiding visual design for the company's largest product launch in history
This launch included:
• Fully reimagined & responsive teacher accounts
• Fully redesigned public website and information architecture to support services in verticals besides music
• Our first iOS app: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/takelessons/id697958533?mt=8

Designed and prototyped the interaction for the mobile-optimized takelessons.com, utilizing a novel recommendation flow that improved lead conversion from baseline by 400%

Updated the design of student accounts using a mobile-first approach to make them fully responsive across different screen sizes

Implemented Lean and Agile design processes for quick feedback across multiple rapid iterations

Managed user experience work on multiple projects for many different platforms: Web applications, iPad applications, embedded instrument software and desktop software

Conducted field research with target users and used results to guide design of the user experience of MiSeq, Illumina’s most important instrument launch of 2011

Lead interface design and usability validation for the MyGenome iPad app

Laid the user research and interaction design groundwork for NextSeq and BaseSpace OnSite which I had been working on for nearly a year before I left the company.

Conducted usability evaluations of different solutions for an internal quality management system which strongly influenced the decision of which solution to license

Forged relationships with designers throughout the company through formation of an Illumina User Experience Group for greater coordination and continued learning

References:
http://illumina.com/systems/nextseq-sequencer.ilmn
http://www.illumina.com/software/basespace/basespace-onsite.ilmn

Managed user experience work on multiple mobile phone programs, which included coordination with Product Marketing, Software Development and Program Management and liaising with wireless carriers.

Conducted a variety of user research including surveys, heuristic evaluations, and formal usability tests which were used to influence feature sets and design of multiple mobile phone programs

Served as the UX representative on a concepting team to define the experiences we would support in 2012

Served as the Ergonomics expert on the user experience team providing expert review of the industrial design concepts and all hardware builds which enabled early correction of issues and resulted in a significant reduction of costly rework

Improved and documented processes for coordinating with internal groups, external software developers, and wireless carriers.

Managed user experience work on the Self-service Postal Kiosk program, which includes delegating and overseeing tasks for Human Factors Engineers, Graphic Designers, and Industrial Designers.

Created the user interface, functional specifications, and a fully-fuctional prototype in response to an RFP from La Poste. These efforts contributed to Pitney Bowes being awarded a multi-million-dollar contract to deploy postal kiosks in French post offices.

Designed the user interface and created functional specifications for a pilot deployment of kiosks with Canada Post

Coordinated, conducted, and analyzed usability testing of the Pitney Bowes intranet and made suggestions which would significantly reduce the number of steps required to complete tasks and increase worker productivity.

Gathered requirements for new products by conducting customer site visits and engaging stakeholders

Coordinated daily with business groups such Marketing, Line of Business and Software Engineering