Solidarity With Black UX Professionals
We believe UX professionals play an authorial role in shaping the world we live in. The UX community does not include enough Black people. It is more important than ever to ensure their voices are heard. To show our support, UX Coffee Hours volunteers have opened up additional space on their schedules to encourage and nurture Black UX professionals. We stand as allies with the Black community. #BlackLivesMatter.For any questions, please reach out to the coordinators of this special effort, Adam Rotmil and Patricia Basuel.
Design Mentors
Adam Rotmil
Interaction Design Craft Lead, FJORD
Adam is a Craft Lead at Fjord, and teaches design at MICA. He started as an information architect in 2002. Adam has designed digital products for corporations, governments and startups. He's worked in Boston, Japan, and DC. He studied at SCAD, AIB, HGK Basel, and Harvard. Reach out to talk about: getting into UX, serving as a design lead, coaching, research, prototyping, testing, visual design, and general UX craft.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Anna Phan
UX Designer, Google
Anna’s experience over the past 10 years includes UX design, product management, and strategy. She has designed products from concept to launch in areas such as EdTech, e-Commerce, and Digital Health at early stage startups and large corporations. She strongly believes that companies can be both profit-driven and purpose-driven. She is currently a designer for Google Nest and would love to help others create their career path into UX. Ask her about job searching, portfolios, changing careers, negotiating, puns, and what it’s like to be a dog whisperer - anything goes!
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Courtney Yule
Interaction Designer, Google
Courtney has a background in designing for complex fintech applications, and is currently leading design on production software that helps manage global resource capacity to keep Google up and running. She has led complex UX projects end-to-end so can advise on design sprints & workshops, sketching & ideation, visual design, high-fidelity mockups and prototypes, design systems, UX research and stakeholder management. With experience in building UX teams she is also happy to do portfolio reviews and discuss finding new opportunities.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Jenn Lee
Product Designer, C3.ai
I'm currently a product designer focusing on AI at C3.ai. I'm specifically passionate about designing around data, rapid prototyping, and technology for enablement. As a more junior designer myself, I'm also happy to chat about transitioning from college to the industry and tips on crafting a beginner's UX portfolio!
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Marc Mueller
Lead UX Designer, Aetna
Marc is a UX designer with 7+ years of experience, including roles within agencies as well as internal product teams, spanning multiple industries such as education, insurance, finance, construction, and health services. His focus is on combining human-centeredness with processes and systems to improve experiences both for customers and internal stakeholders. Ask him about getting started in UX, working in-house or at agencies, developing or integrating into design processes, or even transitioning to different countries.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Melissa Strader
UX Manager, Google
Melissa leads a group including design, research, and UX engineering in Google Health. During her 14 years in UX, she has been both a researcher and a designer at large companies and startups. She enjoys coaching on design and product strategy, scaling & managing teams, career transitions, and building inclusive teams.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Meredith Maines
UX Designer, Blinds.com/Home Depot
Meredith is a UX designer based in Texas, currently making it easier to shop online and in-store at The Home Depot. With a background in journalism, she loves researching the why behind user behavior, then turning those insights into e-commerce improvements. She co-founded Houston's chapter of Hexagon UX, a community for womxn in user experience roles. Ask her about: transitioning into UX, conducting user research, running discovery workshops, analyzing web data, reviewing your portfolio, or practicing a mock interview.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Patricia Basuel
UX Manager, Wi-Tronix
Patricia has been designing for 15+ years and currently works in the railroad industry as a UX Manager at an IoT company. She's worked for both large (Motorola Google/Lenovo) and small companies in tech, transportation, and advertising. Her journey from graphic design to front end development to UX gives her a unique perspective in advising you on your career. Any design or tech topic is game and she’d be glad to chat about how to grow and thrive as a designer and leader.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Rıza Selçuk Saydam
Product Design Manager, Facebook
Selçuk is Product Design Manager at Facebook, working on Messenger. He is a self-taught designer, with a degree in Mathematics and Computer Science. Ask him about career advice, interviewing, portfolios, product strategy and design leadership.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Sanghee Oh
Sr. UX Designer, Microsoft
Hello! I'm Sanghee and I work on responsible AI design at Microsoft. Prior that, I spent last 7 years in design and research roles for major AR/VR hardware and software products. Find me if you are interested in career chat (transitioning into UX design or research from another field, career pathfinding) or in emerging technology (AR/VR, IoT, accessibility, AI) or just a chat. Extra point if you are a hybrid like me!
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Shu Jiang
UX Designer, Google
Shu is a UX Designer at Google based in the bay area. She is passionate about building products that drive business goals while empowering people. She's happy to help in these areas: portfolio review, design exercise, interviewing tips, and career development.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Sonakshi Watel
Interaction Designer, Google
Sonakshi is a UX designer on the Firebase team at Google based in New York. A software engineer turned UX designer she is passionate about making software development approachable for everyone. Ask her about internships (she was a Google UX design intern), portfolio/resume reviews, machine learning, or anything UX related.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Spencer K. Edwards
Senior Product Designer, Salesforce
Spencer's Product Designer at Salesforce based in Indianapolis, Indiana. He's seen a wide breadth of products in his career, from working in a small agency to currently working on enterprise solutions. Spencer's always wanting to see smiles, and that transfers to his passion in solving complex problems for people. Feel free to ask him anything about being a Black Designer, Enterprise Design, Product Strategy and Portfolio Reviews.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Virginia Cagney
Product Designer, Facebook
After moving from the east coast to Colorado to California, I love to discuss transition throughout your career, and making tough choices. I’ve worked at agency, startup and now a large tech company and each has been very different. Currently at Facebook I work on the Design Systems team leading Usability design by creating frameworks, tools, and patterns that can be repeated throughout the app. I love to talk about systems, frameworks, IA, and development of principles or guidelines.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Program Management
Rachel Posman
Director of UX Operations, Salesforce
Hello! I am a Design and UXOps leader with a background in Business, Design Strategy and Service Design. I love blending all of these things in my approach to UXOps. I've led Ops on UX teams at Adaptive Path, Capital One, Uber and now at Salesforce. I’m happy to chat about all things UXOps/DPM and about growing or exploring these roles. I love sharing what I've learned in my own non-traditional career journey. Let’s chat!
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Research Mentors
Asha Toulmin
Research Manager, CNN
Asha is a Research Manager at CNN. She worked at Google for several years in a variety of roles (Sales, Operations, Business Strategy) until she fell in love with UX Research. After working on a few UX Research side projects Asha went back to school for her Master's in Human Computer Interaction and has worked full time as a UXR at Google and Airbnb in addition to her current role. She is happy to chat high level career strategy, transition, fulfillment as well as give tactical feedback on resume, portfolio or interview prep.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Christina Pappas
Senior UX Researcher, AnswerLab
Christina is a Sr. UX Researcher/Team Lead at AnswerLab, a full-service user experience research agency. She also teaches Human-Centered Design and UX Strategy to adult learners through UC Berkeley Extension. Her background is in data analytics and she has an MBA – an unusual background for a UX researcher, but one that’s worked well for her! She’d be happy to talk about breaking into UX, mixed-methods approaches, agency lifestyles, and the intersection of business and human-centered design – and she’s always glad for the chance to geek out over the latest UX books, podcasts, and articles.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Craig Mackintosh
Director, UX Research & Content Design, LinkedIn
Craig currently leads the UX Research team focused on the Consumer app and website experiences at LinkedIn, as well as supporting a small but mighty team of Content Designers. Prior to that he led a UXR and CX insights team at American Express for many years, building a team of in-house practitioners as they grew the discipline. He originally started as a learning designer, before switching across roles and countries, and is happy to talk about getting started in UXR, pivoting, or the people management path.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Daphne Liang
Sr. UX Researcher, Facebook AR/VR
Daphne is a lead UX researcher for several consumer augmented reality pillars within Facebook AR Products. Prior to Facebook, she received her Master’s in Human Computer Interaction from University of Washington where she also spent her time working with NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory on improving uplink efficiency for the upcoming Europa Clipper mission. Her interest in technical domains stems from starting her research career in developer tooling software and eventually leading to consulting with early stage tech startups. She’s happy to chat about landing your first or next job, ramping up career progression, navigating small to large organizations, research methodologies, and general experience sharing.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Jane Davis
Head of UX Research & Content Design, Zapier
Jane is the Head of UX Research and Content Design for Zapier, having previously led research teams at Dropbox and BitTorrent. She accidentally became a researcher while attempting to become a librarian. She can advise on effective interviewing, transitioning from IC to management, team leadership, creating business impact with research, scaling research impact, and researching in growth organizations.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Jess Nichols
User Research Lead, Dovetail
Jess is a research leader, design sprint expert & experience strategist. She has worked at companies such as Twitter, Uber and Deloitte Digital, and previously was a business analyst & UX designer before transitioning to user research. She currently leads user research at the cloud-based user research platform Dovetail. Jess can advice on topics like becoming and being a user researcher, resume reviews & interviewing and collaborating & getting buy-in with stakeholders; as well as sharing her experiences throughout her career.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time here.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Kassie Chaney
Director of UX Research, Linkedin
Kassie leads research on hiring, jobseeking and learning products. With a background in psychology and sociology, Kassie took a meandering path to UX. She previously worked in education policy analysis and market research. She's worked across consumer and enterprise research businesses and is passionate about how to scale in-house corporate research. Kassie would love to talk about: getting started or pivoting into UXR, people management path, and interview prep or LinkedIn profile review.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Krisha Maclang
Senior UX Researcher, Realtor.com
Krisha's path to UX research was not a straight-forward one. With a career spanning 3 countries, she transitioned to UX research from advertising/marketing/communications after graduating from her Master's program in Digital Media. She is a mixed-methods UX researcher who has conducted research for finance, video games, augmented reality, virtual reality, and real estate. You can talk to Krisha about transitioning to UXR from a different field, being a lone researcher, establishing UX research at a company, everyday life as a UXR, and general advice about UX research.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Krystle Young
Senior UX Researcher, Tubi
Krystle is a Senior UX researcher in SF and has led designs for ridesharing apps and streaming TV and movies with Uber, Disney, and Tubi TV. She started out her career with a master's in HCID and bachelor's in Psychology and Social Behavior. She has experience working on e-commerce, healthcare, and internal tools. She geeks out hardcore on all things design and pop culture related and does UX design and writing for funsies in her spare time (which always seems to be in short supply!). She would love to chat about pro tips for planning and executing research, UX strategy, evangelizing UXR values and impact, ethics in tech, cross cultural learnings, career growth, and scaling up teams across organizations big and small.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Laith Ulaby
Director of User Research, Udemy
Laith has an academic background in Ethnography and has been working in applied settings for ten years at a range of different organizations. He loves talking about Human Centered Design, Inclusive Design, career building, and thinking about how to mix and combine data. He currently leads the UX Research and Market Research team at Udemy and teaches at UC Berkeley.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Patti Carlson
Director of Research & Insights, Dropbox
Patti Carlson has over 15 years of experience in the UX field. With a background in Psychology, she has experienced being a UX Research team of 1, a leader of a a 20-person UX Research team, and everything in between. Patti will enthusiastically dig into topics like breaking into the field, data storytelling, how to maximize your impact and effectiveness as a Researcher, transitioning to leadership roles, ResearchOps, and scaling and democratizing research.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Tejas Peesapati
UX Research Lead, Google
Tejas focuses on Economic
Opportunity within Next Billion Users org at Google where he studies what it means to get people out of poverty and what role
can technology play in it. He is passionate about research in developing economies and building sustainable
products that enhance lives of underserved populations around the world.
He advises on getting started with UX Research career, finding first
job, interviewing and career growth/planning.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Writing/Content Strategy Mentors
Betsy Mikel
Sr. UX Content Strategist, Mozilla
Betsy came to UX content strategy from a background in journalism, copywriting, and a severe allergy to poorly written error messages. She currently works on the small-yet-mighty content team at Firefox, where she embeds with product teams to solve content problems for web and mobile. Betsy can answer questions about transitioning to the field, building your collaboration skills, and working more effectively with designers.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Janel Torkington
Content Strategist, Facebook
I'm a content strategist at Facebook in London. I specialize in ads, high-level user flows, and creative strategy. I'm just now getting into mobile (both Android + iOS). Error messages are my favorite. Super into helping you use effective communication to get buy-in for your million dollar idea. Earnest, effusive, and an unabashed Ottolenghi fangirl.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.
Melissa Sepe-Johnston
UX Writer, Google
Melissa is a UX writer for Google Maps in NYC. Before joining Google in 2018, she spent nearly a decade as a UX generalist, content strategist, and design lead for various agencies and software companies. She’s a nerd for information architecture, content-first design, and workshop facilitation. Chat with her about any of those topics, as well as UX career paths, interviewing, growing your design skills as a writer, and advocating for content in your organization.
If you are a Black UX professional, schedule time through Google Calendar.
Not a UX professional that identifies as Black? You can schedule a session here.