Consulting Projects

The Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) sought to establish an online presence to build awareness, gather collections, and connect with the public before the museum’s physical space was constructed on the National Mall in Washington, DC.

The resulting website featured an innovative Memory Book—an interactive platform where visitors could upload family histories, memoirs, photos, and audio recordings. These contributions were displayed in a “web” of interconnected stories, creating a shared tapestry of African American heritage and experiences.

• • Digital Experience Design: Designed a platform that prioritized user engagement and storytelling to showcase personal and cultural histories.
  • Technology: Built on Ruby on Rails, the site offered a seamless and interactive user experience, fostering community contributions and preserving them for future generations.
  • Collaboration: Worked directly with Smithsonian Institution personnel, including Lonnie Bunch, the Founding Director of NMAAHC, to ensure alignment with the museum’s vision and goals.

IBM partnered with Google in Mountain View to address some of the company’s most challenging user experience issues with their internal engineering web applications.

For Google’s Corporate Engineering initiatives, I oversaw a $30M multi-year contract and budget aimed at enhancing Google’s internal engineering applications. Google enlisted IBM to leverage our expertise in user research and design to optimize these applications for improved efficiency and user satisfaction.

As Program Manager, Team Manager, and Client Liaison, I played a critical role in coordinating cross-functional teams, managing client relationships, and ensuring the successful delivery of solutions that met Google’s objectives.

While at IBM, I contributed to business development initiatives by collaborating with Watson technologists and a visual designer to craft a compelling customer experience story for a US motorcycle manufacturer. The project centered on depicting a day-in-the-life path-to-purchase journey for two distinct personas, highlighting both technological enablers and the human side of the sales and customer relationship cycle.

• • Strategic Narrative Development: Created a detailed, persona-driven story that aligned technology with customer needs and business objectives.
  • Creative Director: Strategized and contributed to the design of a 48” x 72” mural using Adobe InDesign to illustrate the customer journey and enable impactful discussions with the client.
  • Internal Alignment: Utilized the mural to socialize technologies across teams, fostering collaboration and clarity.

The work was recognized in Forrester’s “A Picture’s Worth 1,000 CX Strategy Slides: The Right Way to Illustrate Your Customer Experience Vision to Achieve Clarity and Buy-in,” as an exemplary model for customer experience strategy.

For IBM’s presence at NAIAS 2017, we delivered a multifaceted experience designed to bridge the gap between physical and digital interactions. Our team developed an interactive booth experience, organized panel discussions and presentations, and created marketing materials and social strategies to amplify engagement and messaging.

The Ultimate Road Trip:
To showcase the transformative potential of IBM’s cognitive mobility solutions, we designed an interactive experience titled The Ultimate Road Trip. This concept followed a group of friends driving the Mississippi Blues Highway in a partially autonomous vehicle, demonstrating how cognitive mobility enhances their journey, from personalized recommendations to real-time navigation assistance.

• • Interactive Technology: Integrated Leap Motion to enable users to control the experience through gestures, providing an immersive and engaging demonstration of IBM’s capabilities.
  • Storytelling & Engagement: Crafted a narrative-driven approach that highlighted the human benefits of cognitive mobility, resonating with both industry professionals and the general public.
  • Event Management: Ensured seamless coordination of all booth activities, panel discussions, and supporting materials, aligning the physical booth experience with IBM’s digital vision.