👋 I’m a senior digital product designer specializing in visualizing information, service design, and contributing to design systems.

My approach centers on crafting meaningful, ethical, and inclusive experiences that prioritize people and leverage data effectively. By integrating user needs with intelligent design, I create solutions that are both efficient and intuitive, ensuring accessibility and impact across diverse audiences.

Product Design

Custom Dashboards for People Analytics

On a custom dashboard, you could link Business Intelligence data with Workday data and build dashboards that would be useful for different business functions, like People Analytics.

Defining Personas

From the start of this project, I worked directly with a Business Analyst and defined the users of the product. Together, we defined the actions each user would take and how they would interact with each other when using the People Analytics platform.

Product Definition

I developed personas and refined the core functionality to prioritize features and functionality that would ensure our design met the user needs.

Artifacts to Build Alignment

As a result of our newly acquired company, Stories.bi, one of the main challenges was our highly distributed team around the world. I created artifacts that helped us all agree on the same meanings, allowing us to uncover different viewpoints earlier in the process.

Framework Selection

We needed to build upon one of the multiple internal frameworks available within Workday. I evaluated them by building a proof of concept and working with the development teams. We needed to find a flexible framework that could be rearranged by end-users.

Turn a Data Tool Into a Web Based Platform

The Discovery Boards framework had the fewest functional gaps and would support the look and feel that we desired.

Feature Addition to the Design System

The workday pattern library had drag handles, but they did not provide the bi-directional functionality that we required. I iterated on new variants of the drag handles to create a new component and interactions to support the application.

Design Systems

Chart Feature for Accessibility

In 2018, Workday began to replace its D3-based charting library with one made for larger data sets. The Workday Design System team updated the design system to include fill patterns for better accessibility across the platform.

Bespoke Existing Fill Patterns

At the project's start, I studied fill patterns in our D3 visualizations and found they didn't align with the design system and were unclear at small scales.

Elements to Examine Density

I adopted a clean slate approach to design the fill patterns. I began by selecting basic elements to examine the density in space. As I explored options from less dense to denser patterns, the foreground and background unveiled new shapes to work with. For instance, crossed lines formed diamonds in the negative space.

Search for the Correct Density

The chart system needed to support a wide variety of chart sizes. The biggest challenge involved finding fill patterns that suited small spaces. I collaborated closely with the developer, iterating through multiple prototypes to select patterns that fit well in those confined areas.

Working with Color

Once I selected patterns, I began to incorporate colors from the design system at Workday.

Modes of Color Selection

Defining the logic for how to use the solid colors in the fill pattern mode was the next step in determining the appropriate level of legibility. How could we determine the right level of fidelity in our patterns?

Referencing Legibility Standards

I worked with the developer to create a tool that evaluates the contrast levels between charting colors and the fill patterns to calculate a score based on legibility standards. It used color interpolation methods for blending between the two values. I used this tool to generate a set of high contrast color and fill pattern pairs.

Testing Values of Interpolation

After several iterations, I selected a version of the interpolated color for each fill pattern. We shipped this first version with limited internal testing, primarily based on the internal team's feedback. I normally would want to test the selection with users and with different screens, but we were working under intense time constraints and shipped my recommendations for the first release.

Well Received and Incorporated

The project was well-received by users and the color and fill patterns improved accessibility across the platform.

Information Visualization

Visualizing Data for Investment Research

The Global Investment Research division of Goldman Sachs wanted to add interactivity to its research reports in the fall of 2019. Previously, they had focused on printed reports that would serve clients across the firm.

SVG for Custom Design Solutions

Due to the sensitive nature of the data within reports, I found Scalable Vector Graphics as a custom solution to design and develop interactive graphics. This would assist with visually explaining our investment analysts’ concepts for Goldman Sachs clients.

Evergreen Content Creation

In addition to creating individual exhibits, I worked with the Core UX team to standardize icons and create evergreen content that would support future exhibits and add consistency among our production.

Service Design

Service Design to Find Business Opportunities

Analysis of the Current Map

To better understand the Campaign process, I asked the Marketing team numerous detailed questions and compiled their responses. With this information, I created a new map to structure and visualize the answers clearly.

Categories Become a Legend for a New Map

Categorized the existing map's data to reveal key patterns and relationships, then used this to create a clearer, more organized map with improved hierarchy and visualization for better usability.

Themes Based on Opportunites found

Testimonials

“I really appreciate Kiera’s heads-down desire to do things properly and her process oriented approach to design. She’s extremely proactive, thoughtful, collaborative, and open to learning new things.”

— A. Gitlin, JPMC Design Lead for Chase Travel

“It has been a pleasure working closely with Kiera! She’s incredibly kind, curious, and thoughtful. She took time to understand how we work and dove deep into learning about the Apiture design system. She made a meaningful impact on the Dev Portal team—both by offering smart design solutions and by thoughtfully evaluating how well our design system could support their needs. She brought great insight, positivity, and collaboration to our design team, and we’re all grateful to have spent time working with her.”

— J. Richardson, Design System Lead at Apiture

“Kiera was enthusiastic, intelligent, and a great creative partner on Workday dashboard layouts. We had productive whiteboard sessions and found innovative solutions together. I wish her all the success in her future endeavors.”

— A. Krishnaram, Director of Product Management, Oracle Analytics & AI Platform | Data apps & products

“Kiera is a great design partner. She created a framework to help us map the merchant’s journey to identify pain points, gaps, and opportunities. We used the journey to facilitate conversations with our product partners to help connect to the merchant experience.”

— S. Colwell, JPMC Content Designer

“As a developer, I enjoy working with her for the good communication, get-done attitude, and excellent work!”

— X. Chen, Software Engineer at Meta/Oculus

“She’s ambitious, eager to learn, and a great person to work with!”

— R. Suleski, Technology (UI) at iCapital

“Kiera is a talented designer and was a pleasure to work with. She not only created innovative data visualizations (including SVGs) for the data-science literate, but also helped to foster a more data-centric culture among junior analysts who were just getting started with coding.”

— M. Hinds, Power Quant / Fundamental Analyst

Download Resume

Digital Product Designer

Product Design

Design Systems

Information Visualization

Service Design

Testimonials