Product Designer Currently working in XR | XS | XD | IxD

📧 k@rezacdennis.com

Profile

Research-obsessed product designer with background in rhetoric, interactive digital media, argumentation & advocacy, and instructional design. Energized by planning and executing projects that aim to understand ordinary questions with extraordinary depth and that disrupt traditional thinking.

Career Journey

Design Process

Professional Experience (2010-Present)

UX Strategist at Useagility*

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• embedded on retainer to evangelize UX to the product team of a quickly modernizing premium finance firm.
• managing UX research and strategy projects for the Business Intelligence team of a Class 1 Freight Railroad.
• supporting project-based clients like Higher Ed and global-impact non-profits.

Contract UX Researcher

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• hourly contract for various > 100- hour learning-validation, customer, and product research projects for launch and growth phase companies + ideas.
• studying the UX of mentoring for entrepreneurs and implementing an alt LMS system for a nationally renowned hip hop educator.

I established my product design practice as an outgrowth of pedagogically forward-thinking rhetoric and digital media teaching at a traditional liberal arts college between 2010-2019.

Rhetoric Professor

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• taught over 100 sections of interdisciplinary communication courses on topics from rhetoric to UX research.
• worked with innovative students conducting research using lean methods, HCD design-thinking, service blueprinting, and guerrilla UX research.
• won national debate championships, mentored incredible students, and advocated for student centered decision-making at every turn.

Graphic Design

• maintained graphic design clients that included the player development office of three NFL teams, two NFL-associated 501c3 organizations, a Grammy award winning Jazz artist, and packaged goods brands.

Degrees

**B.A. in Economics** from the College of Liberal Arts at Southern Illinois University

M.A. in Communication from College of Mass Communication at Texas Tech University

Certificates

Certified UX Designer at CareerFoundry + Voice Interface Design Certificate

Certified Design Sprint Facilitator from AJ&Smart

Platform Cooperative Design at The New School