Creative Director Project Manager

Varun Kollipara

Manager / Architect - User Experience Product Design Email: *****.*********@*****.*** https://www.linkedin.com/in/varunkollipara/ Phone: 845-***-**** Summary:

• With over 14 years of experience as a User Experience Strategist and Information Architect, I have developed an emphasis on Strategic Design Thinking for Mobile and Desktop Applications.

• Profound experience on leading teams of designers, researchers, copy writers and developers to create exceptional user experiences that solve complex problems.

• Deep understanding of user research methodologies, design thinking principles, and agile development processes, which allows me to deliver exceptional results on time.

• Exposure working across various domains covering both Desktop, SaaS, PaaS, IaaS and Web through e-commerce, e-Learning, Banking, Networking, Health Care, and Insurance platforms.

• My expertise lies in building user interface design and Rich Internet applications (RIA) projects for large Enterprise Product Suites, RIA's, B2B & B2C solutions.

• Passion for creating visually compelling user interfaces based on user-centered design principles, an iterative process from concept, wireframing, adding fidelity to pixel perfect comps.

• I possess the ability to understand and relate product technology, strategy, and direction with business needs. My profound experience in gathering business requirements and conducting User Research has honed my skills in qualitative and quantitative methodologies for data collection, evaluation, and reporting of usability issues to design and strategy stakeholders.

• Utilizing Heuristics Evaluation Techniques, I have successfully reevaluated and optimized several key design concepts for maximum user-centricity.

• Experience in conducting usability tests to validate design decisions and gather feedback from users.

• Throughout my career as a UX Manager/Architect, I have been actively involved in the development of information architecture, user profiling, use cases, task analysis at both strategic and tactical levels. This has allowed me to gain a deep understanding of user needs and behaviors and to develop effective design solutions that align with business objectives. Portfolio:

https://uxer.carbonmade.com

Access: usercare

Skills:

User Research: User profiles, Usability Scenarios, Personas, AB Testing, Multivariate testing, Ethnography, Contextual Enquiries, Interviews and Focus Groups. Interaction Design: Story Boarding, Paper prototypes, Wire Frames, Information Architecture, User Flows, Mockups and Prototyping.

Usability Analysis: Card Sorting, Heuristic Evaluation, Cognitive Walkthroughs, Usability Testing. Software Tools: Adobe XD, Figma, Figjam, Sketch, Balsamiq, Zeplin, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, OmniGraffle, Axure, Adobe Dream Weaver, Microsoft Visio, Keynote, Miro, Browser stack.

Browsers: Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, Opera. Education:

Masters in Computer Science, USA

Bachelors in Civil Engineering, India

Diploma in Multimedia & Graphic Design, India

Professional Associations:

BAYCHI

HCI-Hyderabad usabilitymatters.org

UIDG - User Interface Designer's Group

Professional Experience:

Employer: NantHealth – Remote April 2022 – Current Role: Manager – User Experience Product Design

• Lead and manage a team of UX,Visual Designers and Copy, providing guidance and mentorship to promote growth and development within the team.

• Work with cross-functional teams including product management, engineering, and marketing to define and prioritize UX goals and ensure they are aligned with business objectives.

• Collaborate with stakeholders to develop and execute a user-centered design process that includes user research, personas, information architecture, wireframes, prototypes, and usability testing.

• Develop and maintain design systems and guidelines to ensure consistency and efficiency in design across all products and platforms.

• Continuously analyze user feedback, data, and metrics to iterate and improve design solutions.

• Manage and prioritize UX design projects, balancing short-term deadlines with long-term strategic objectives.

• Stay up to date on industry trends, emerging technologies, and best practices in UX design and user research.

• Facilitate workshops and design sprints to encourage cross-functional collaboration and ideation.

• Advocate for the user throughout the organization, ensuring that their needs are considered and incorporated into all aspects of product development.

• Foster a culture of innovation, experimentation, and continuous learning within the UX team and across the organization.

Employer: Larsen & Toubro, Raleigh, NC May 2019 – April 2020 Role: Manager/ Architect - User Experience

• Handle and manage the User Experience team to re-write a set of legacy enterprise windows applications.

• Build and mentor design team and educate the organization about Design and Design thinking process.

• Responsible for introducing ideas, inspiring creativity, leading and motivating products and service teams.

• Lead and drive the final design recommendations, decisions and design approvals to enable execution / production phases.

• Work closely with Engineering and other cross functional teams to transform rich compelling experiences for our users.

• Proposed various visions, scenarios and concepts in order to visualize output and share across internal and external team members to gather feedback.

• Entailed everything from user research, information architecture, interaction and visual design, as well as content strategy. Skilled and partnered with all the design facets.

• Active participation in design workshops with business stake holders and users to define the requirements and understand user problems, needs and goals.

• Creating low fidelity and high-fidelity wireframes, interactive prototypes and mock-ups with Adobe XD and Balsamiq.

Client: Philadelphia Insurance, Telecommute August 2018 – May 2019 Employer: PRISM IT Consulting Services

Role: Sr. User Experience Strategist

• Led a small team for redesigning complete Philadelphia Insurance UI.

• Owned entire design process from initial ideation to assets/spec delivery.

• Spearheaded the design workshops with business stake holders and users to define the requirements.

• Creating low fidelity and high-fidelity wireframes, interactive prototypes and mock-ups with Illustrator, Photoshop and Balsamiq.

• Maintained excellent rapport with partners, executives and other key members of the project.

• Worked simultaneously on multiple tasks while dealing with changing priorities, always maintained a strong sense of accountability and ability to meet the deadlines.

• Working closely with UI developers to build the best interactive applications.

• Testing the HTML on all browsers and devices and identify bugs and niggles as well as experience issues and share with QA team.

Client: CVS Health, Greensboro, NC October 2016 – August 2018 Employer: PRISM IT Consulting Services

Role: Sr. User Experience Designer

• Advocating for the value and importance of User Experience throughout the project cycle, hold explicit representation for customer/user perspectives in business and technology decision making.

• Collaborating with cross functional teams to gather detailed business UI requirements and feature stories.

• Working closely with UI frontend developers to ensure the best intuitive applications are built.

• Ensuring intended designs and user experience are maintained throughout by collaborating with various functions.

• Participation in user research efforts to define a user driven experience.

• Supporting UAT in identifying and resolving issues to make sure expected functionality is developed and as well as to ensure UI consistency.

• Participated in various scrum ceremonies like sprint planning, grooming, retrospectives and stand ups.

Employer: Cisco Systems Inc, San Jose, CA Mar 2015 – Oct 2016 Role: Software Engineer – User Experience

• Utilized platforms such as Mozart, Cloud virtualization, Elastic Service Controller and Cisco Cloud services to deliver successful projects.

• Conducted Heuristic evaluations to identify design improvements for existing legacy applications.

• Created process flow charts, low and high-fidelity wireframes, interactive prototypes, and mockups, along with design specifications and a UI toolkit to aid developers in implementing user-centered designs.

• Optimized Human-Computer Interactions by minimizing dialogue and reducing ambiguity in project screens.

• Enhanced the visual appeal and communication of web applications by incorporating graphics and visual elements.

• Acquired domain expertise in User and Asset Management for IaaS and SaaS environments, including compute, network, and storage.

• Expertise in virtualization, hyper visors, operating systems, and test automation tools.

• Experience in QA, API testing, and service level testing (e.g., REST, XML). Client: Cisco Systems, San Jose, CA November 2013 - March 2015 Employer: AITA Consulting Services

Role: User Experience Designer

• Collaborated with cross functional teams to understand business goals, objectives and site functionality, and assisted in defining product requirements to ensure a user centered design philosophy.

• Created visually appealing graphics, icons, UI components, and other assets for the whole application, while designing overall task flow and site maps

• Developed UI specifications and style guides to ensure consistency and adherence to brand standards.

• Managed overall usability engineering efforts, logged usability issues, and tracked usability metrics to improve the user experience.

• Utilized Axure to develop prototypes, wireframes, and mockups prior to implementation, ensuring that all functional and brand requirements were met.

• Ensured that interface designs were usable, accessible, and followed company design standards.

• Designed interactions and workflow diagrams to effectively communicate design concepts and ideas to stakeholders during the design process. Client: BOA, Williams Sonoma June 2012 - October 2013 Employer: Progress Solutions Inc.

Role: UX Designer

• Created process flow charts, low fidelity wireframes, high fidelity wireframes, mock-ups, design specifications to aid developers.

• Interviewed end users, stakeholders and development teams to determine project needs.

• Worked closely with different business units & users to discuss and generate new functionality.

• Determined when a usability evaluation was needed: led planning, preparation, and follow up, so that each design iteration was evaluated effectively and at the correct time.

• Research and track advancements in mobile application design patterns.

• Delivered interface design for native mobile apps for both iOS and android, including mobile wire framing, creation of user flows and prototypes.

• Designed HTML prototypes and UI deliverables, navigation flows, storyboards, interaction models, user task flows, and screen designs.

• Worked closely with product management teams to strategize design solutions. Collected use cases and requirements from various stakeholders.

• Was instrumental in the development of Hi---fidelity prototypes using Adobe Photoshop.

• Involved in strategic planning, marketing and cross-cultural integration.

• Designed the GUI of enterprise application & implemented changes to specification for developers and programmers.

• Functional Requirement Documents (FRD’s) for Development teams Employer: Growwell Fincon Services August 2006 – August 2010 Role: UX Consultant

• Responsible for creating logos, flash presentations, illustrations, graphics and dealing with the structure and layout of images and text in a pleasing format for web and Print.

• Responsible for branding the top adoption related web sites with associated logos, collateral, trade show displays, print ads, packaging designs, and promotional pieces.

• Accountable for achieving statistically successful and competitive web advertising campaigns. Selected Accomplishments.

• Present final layouts to creative director and project manager for approval.

• Managed product demos and presentations from concept and design to implementation

• Ensure that projects conformed to design and schedule requirements.

• Create mock-ups of creative material.

• Confer with creative, art, copywriting and production department heads to discuss client requirements and present concepts to coordinate creative activities.

• Craft a range of ads and collateral using appropriate typography, images and page layout.

• Presenting final layouts to creative director and project manager for approval.

• Ensure that projects conformed to design and schedule requirements.

• Worked with a smart team, which gave me exposure to print, web & interactive media.

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