Presenting & Training
With three decades in UX, a good part of that has been in front of a room: hundreds of talks and workshops, at events like SXSW, UX Lisbon, UX Scotland, Leading Design, and the Rosenfeld conferences, plus the ones I produce myself with Chicago Camps. The best part of this work has always been the moment a group lands on a shared understanding it didn't have an hour earlier.
The following are topics that I am strongly suited to present or train:
Topics
AI and Design Strategy
Where AI actually meets design practice, past the hype. I lead AI-first design teams and build the systems myself, so I can speak to what changes, what doesn't, and where the judgment still has to be human.
Getting a Team Working with AI
How a team moves from cautious or overwhelmed to genuinely productive with AI, without losing the rigor that makes the work worth shipping. Less about the tools, more about the habits and guardrails that hold up once you're producing at scale.
Design Leadership
Building and elevating design teams and the practice around them. Drawn from Liftoff!, and from a career of being brought into organizations at their inflection points to help find the way forward.
The Craft of UX
User-centered design from the fundamentals up: process, research, and the work of actually putting people at the center. The material behind A Project Guide to UX Design, taught the way I wish someone had taught it to me.
Facilitation
Designing and leading the conversations and workshops where the real decisions get made, so a group leaves aligned instead of just tired. From Designing the Conversation.
Speaking and Presenting
Helping people plan, pitch, and deliver a talk worth giving. I co-wrote Speaker Camp as a workshop for exactly this, and I still love helping someone find the thing they have to say.