What's my design process?

I believe talking to users and truly understanding their problems trumps any visual flare I can possibly create.

I think designing products really tests one's context switching ability: Jumping from writing the problem down to a core set of needs, to iterating layouts in Sketch, to illustrating icons for the UI, to throwing together a front-end prototype - it can get exhausting fairly quickly.

Sometimes I find that using design tools (Sketch, XD, Figma, Photoshop, etc.) for UI tends to be more work than I’d like, especially when working through preliminary ideas solo. When I feel like I have a really clear set of expectations, I'll jump into a simple sketckbook-like code editor, such as CodePen and start working through ideas for layouts, components, UI workflows, etc. In my experience, having front-end code to handoff to developers also helps reduce friction between the approved design and the shipped product.

Here are some ideas I've been working on: