How the work runs
The part most projects skip comes first.
- 01Measure first. The hypothesis, the number that would change our minds, then the instrument.
- 02Design from the evidence. Personas from factor analysis, journeys from interviews, concepts as testable hypotheses.
- 03Build it, or build alongside. Front-end in your toolchain, and the spec I'd want to build myself.
- 04Leave the system. The repository, the protocol, the design system, the training. Your team runs it after I'm gone.
- 05Put a clock on it. Every rule expires on a schedule unless it earns its place again.
The two arrows that touch people are crossings, so they come with consent, a meter, and a way to say no.
Work · 2008 to now
Key outcomes.
8 of 8top-task completion, up from fewer than 1 in 3Love With Food account redesign · 2016 · unmoderated study, coded
4,300+GitHub stars, 2,600+ live sites a decade onsmoothState.js · 2014 · verified via API and BuiltWith, 2026
−26%design spend, capacity doubledInovalon · 2018 · founded the Design CoE
48→72%expert agreement, with a NO-GO on the recordSonder · 2020 to now · 13 fidelity cycles
17 of 17
2024 – now
Colorado Digital Service
State payroll modernization and sign-in for myColorado; assumption mapping credited in the State's case study.
2025 – now
GameLab
48 pre-registered experiments, 34 falsifications, tournament evaluation, citations enforced in CI.
2020 – now
Sonder
LLM-assisted synthesis benchmarked against expert coding; 48% → 72% agreement over 13 fidelity cycles.
2023 – 2024
Tenasol
Brand identity, product UI, investor decks, and website for an AI text-analytics startup ahead of its raise.
2022 – 2023
Opportunity@Work
Community-centered engagement and action research, as Senior Manager of Design Research.
2021 – 2022
Turo, via Huge
A 400-participant monadic ad test and ten listening sessions; a repeatable campaign-evaluation method.
2021
Autodesk, via Tomorrow Partners
Coded interviews, storyboards, and stage diagrams for a ten-stage generative-design workflow.
2020 – 2022
Whistle Labs
Research through redesign; the flight-risk-owner loyalty segment reshaped the homepage and the campaign.
2020
FAIR UXR
A free eight-lesson course on FAIR research repositories, launched on Instagram.
2019 – 2020
Arrow Electronics, via ClientSolv
39 interviews, 1,600+ observations, 50+ insights, eight profitability levers in 90 days.
2017 – 2019
Inovalon / Avalere Health
Founded the Design Center of Excellence; $687k vendor contract replaced, spend −26%, capacity ×2.
2017
City of Philadelphia
19+ interviews and an intercept survey on the open-data portal, ending in a press conference.
2016
CID Entertainment
A 90-day market-entry strategy and Curadora, an MVP that converted prospects to paying customers.
2014 – 2016
Love With Food
Responsive redesign with a 60% sign-up lift by A/B test; account top-task completion from under 30% to 8 of 8.
2014
smoothState.js
Open-source page transitions; 4,300+ stars and 2,600+ live sites a decade on.
2011 – 2014
WebLinc Commerce
Lead front-end for Free People, BHLDN, Terrain and others; design-system program, i18n playbook, onboarding.
2008
Efencea
A PvP tower-defense game on BYOND, co-created at 16; first playable in eight days, still live.
On the record
“We trusted him to interview our customers on our behalf to get a true unbiased voice-of-the-customer.”
“The quality of work was extremely high, especially given the short timeline.”
“A transformative force multiplier.”
“Easily one of the most brilliant product designers I've worked with.”
“…his dedication to growing the skills and careers of the developers he led.”
“I'd hire him in a second, and you should strongly consider doing the same.”
Next step
Write to me.
Tell me a little about the problem. We'll work out the next step, whether that's a screen, a panel slot, or a scoping call.
mail@miguel.design →