Innovation strategist and experience designer with more than twenty years helping organizations turn emerging technology into things people actually love.
Based in Santa Monica. Available for consulting engagements, workshops, and speaking.
Let's Talk →Background
As a graduate student at UCLA, I studied how filmmakers use their medium to create specific, intentional emotional experiences. Hitchcock didn't frame a shot just because it looked cool. He framed it because he knew exactly how he wanted you to feel, and he could do it using the tools of his craft. But was the shot composition what you were thinking about during that shower scene? I'm betting no.
Technology works the same way. When it's doing its job, nobody's thinking about it at all.
From interactive narrative games at Phillips Media to connected toys and AI-enabled products at Mattel, I've spent most of my career applying that principle to play. I start with the feeling first. How do I want people to feel when they use the product, play the game, or engage with the toy? If I know that, then it's about finding the technology that can deliver that feeling without stealing the spotlight.
Download Résumé ↓Case Studies
Work With Me
I work with teams across industries -- consumer products, entertainment, technology, retail, and beyond -- that are trying to bring something genuinely new into the world.
Most innovation processes are ego-protection systems. Teams fall in love with their idea and spend months looking for evidence they were right. By the time they discover they were wrong, the money is gone and the window has closed.
I do it the other way around, and my three-part framework is built around a somewhat surprising mindset: Humility. I spend a few weeks at the front end actively hunting for where the idea is wrong -- because that's where the real signal lives. And I do this with your team, not for them, so the insights belong to everyone and the momentum stays inside your organization.
The goal isn't to confirm your idea. It's to get it in front of real humans as fast as possible through lo-fi prototypes so you can find out where you're wrong. Don't just listen to what people say, watch what they do. More often than not, behavior reveals more insight than words.
The how isn't just about what technology you need to deliver the experience. It's also about anticipating the hurdles. Are your stakeholders aligned? Is the project properly financed? Do you have the right people with the right skills on the team?
A lot of teams get tripped up on this part. They believe in the idea so completely, they convince themselves everything will fall into place. Taking the time to identify what might not come together early enough in the process allows you to mitigate the problem or, if necessary, make a hard pivot.
Launching isn't the goal. Sustaining is. How many people (other than you) will actually spend money on this? How does the business model hold up as your audience expands? What are the hidden costs you haven't considered?
The truth is some ideas are worth proving as experiments. But others need to become real businesses. You need to know which one you're building before you build it.
Interested in working together?
Contact Me →
