About Ellie Poczik (pō´ zik)
Design Philosophy
I believe great design is both aesthetically pleasing and fulfills a need. An experience designer’s role is to discern what the user’s need is through empathy, observation, and research and then collaborate with a team to implement an interface that solves the problem in an innovative, straightforward, and beautiful way.
User Experience Origin Story
Eleven years as a buyer in the automotive industry taught me an important truth: there is a desperate need for UX design and research in enterprise software. At each company I worked for, I devoted most of my time learning shortcuts for esoteric programs and organizing training sessions to share best practices with coworkers.
After years of struggling with workarounds for bad design, I discovered that there is a whole career field devoted to the creation of user friendly, intuitive user experiences (see work experience).
Oh, yeah. During those years I also learned diplomacy, communication, negotiation, and project management skills.
Skills
Cross Functional Team Management
Discovery and Design Session Facilitation
Certified Agile Product Owner
User Experience Strategy
Usability Testing
Journey Mapping
Persona & Scenario Creation & Utilization
Wireframing
Clickable Prototype Creation
Interviewing
Workflow Modelling
Conversational German
Work Experience
Education
University of Michigan
School of Information
Master of Science in Information
Human Computer Interaction
University of Notre Dame
Bachelor of Arts
Psychology, German
Hobbies and Interests
Avid Boxer
Fiber Artist
Wine Enthusiast
Art Lover
My Animals
