JenStrickland.design listening for the right “it”
before we build it right

welcome

Design signifies intent. What are your intentions?

Technical Note: This responsive portfolio is hand-coded and designed by myself, respects your choice of color mode, and has perfect accessibility and sustainability scores.

I believe in “delivery as diplomacy” — listening and observing first, making sure our deliverables directly reflect what agency partners tell us so they know they’ve been heard. Respecting the real-world constraints government staff face every day has been key to earning deep institutional trust. In fact, one of my Maryland Department of Human Services partners recently shared that my “ability to bridge QC’s concepts for a system redesign to improve the SNAP payment error rate into reality is entirely unprecedented.”

Accomplishments

  • Award-Winning Rapid Response: Co-led the end-to-end UX design and rapid prototyping for the VA’s digital COVID-19 screening tool across web and mobile platforms; enabling millions of Veterans, caregivers, and staff to safely access healthcare facilities under emergency timelines and contributing to the initiative earning the VHA National HeRO Award and the Service to the Citizen Award.
  • Increased mobile visitors by 75% for the Fidelity.com Accounts & Trade experience via a responsive redesign. My CSS-based solution unblocked the data-dense Positions grid allowing the project to ship on schedule.
  • “Responsified” Motovy.com resulting in a $500,000/day increase in mobile revenue per arrival for a normally $1 million/day site.
  • Spearheaded a culture change to “Accessibility & Mobile First” for the VA.gov modernization.
  • Initiated, researched, and built a mobile device testing suite to support responsive web design testing.
  • Created a “Lunch & Learn” series inviting coworkers to present passion projects before their peers over a catered lunch.
  • Over 25 years of experience in design, research, and front-end web development.
  • Public speaker on tech subjects, regular volunteer/mentor in the community, exhibiting artist, and performing independent musician.
My focus is on the 4 C’s:
Collaboration, Communication, Creativity, Compromise (negotiation)

Process

Process is a fluid thing, dependent upon the people involved, resources available, and goals. Generally, my process will leverage these four stages:

  1. Understand: research, gather information, research, audit, research, clarify, research ツ
  2. Plan: strategize, coordinate, collaborate, ideate, schedule, review
  3. Design: ideation, collaboration, sketch, craft, prototype, test, problem-solve
  4. Iterate: validate, obtain feedback, tweak, pivot, improve, document

Read about my process at Fidelity.

“‘Exceptionally strategic’ is the phrase I would use to describe Jen. She has an incredible ability to walk into a room and immediately bring empathy and compassion to the forefront of any challenge we were tackling. Her ability to balance strategy, empathy, and attention to detail made her an invaluable part of the team.”