I'm a self-taught design leader who came up tinkering on the web in the '90s. For 20+ years I've worked on government services people rely on at important moments: health care, benefits, retirement, funding. I like taking complex, policy-heavy, legacy systems and making them clear and accessible.
I'm currently a Principal Product Designer at Skylight, working on product design, strategy, modernization, and accessibility for the Administration for Children and Families. Before that I led design at Ad Hoc (VA, CMS), was an Innovation Specialist at 18F, and spent ten years as Creative Director at NIC Inc. building Kentucky's state websites.
My style is low-ego and direct. I share work early, make decisions visible, and try to leave teams with practices that keep working after I've moved on.
Manager of Design · 2023 - 2025
Modernized the primary healthcare system for over 9 Million Veterans. Replaced a non-linear 1990s legacy system with guided registration workflows, automated external data checks to prevent duplicate records, and established reusable design patterns.
Design System Lead · 2019 - 2023
Scaled the core system powering Healthcare.gov, Medicare.gov, and CMS.gov. Expanded the team from 1 to 8 cross-functional members, consolidated 14+ fragmented resources into a single source of truth (design.cms.gov), and built a multi-brand token system for component scaling.
Innovation Specialist & Front-End/UX Lead · 2018 - 2019
Modernized the public-facing digital experience for federal retirement savings. Implemented USWDS standards, coached agency staff to establish an in-house user feedback loop, and enabled long-term agency ownership over iterative site enhancements.
Product designer · 2017
Rebranded the NSF Small Business Innovation Research program as "America's Seed Fund". Redesigned the public experience (seedfund.nsf.gov) to demystify federal funding, boost applicant awareness, and diversify the startup founder pool beyond traditional research institutions.
Simpler, smarter, and more human-centered government technology.
Helped start and grow the static-site theme.
Co-managed a restructure of the methods guide and its front end.
Led redesigns and re-architecture as Creative Director.
Streamlined account creation with the experience team.
Simplified a long, complex security clearance form into a guided experience built on USWDS.
Built app UI in React and clarified the public site's value proposition.
Organizations and agencies I've worked with across federal, state, and local government.