I am Paul Parson and in my roles I have helped take an idea from good to great. I've covered the creative spectrum from copywriter to art director, front-end developer to product manager, intrapreneur to creative director. I love bringing together the possibilities of beautiful design and elegant code to create one amazing product!
For 13 years I have been working as a digital designer. Most recently, I am a senior visual designer and design lead at IBM Watson and I do professional branding and UX contract work, as well. Originally from San Diego, I called the Rocky Mountains home for over 12 years after graduating from University of California, San Diego with a Bachelor of Arts, Visual Arts/Media.
In 2016, I moved the family to Austin, Texas to work on IBM Watson Conversation and the future of cognitive applications and conversational UI. Design is a passion for me. I love making beautiful, usable things. I love the importance of asking "why" before starting a project. And I love leading customers through the process of identifying the most crucial aspects of their business through workshops or other design exercises. By reframing needs as design questions we can find the most important challenges to solve first!
I translate requests for deliverables into business problems and needs first. Oftentimes, those business needs do in fact have deliverables, but oftentimes they are not what was originally requested. ;)
The importance of asking the question "why?" upfront is so that our solutions have a solid foundation in a business problem. Once a business problem has been identified and a client's customers have been identified, crafting solutions becomes that much easier. This is how I make your users want to be your customers.
I practice design thinking in all of the areas below:
Asking questions of your project stakeholders like this will challenge them to begin to think more like a designer. This is powerful for us as designers, because now we have advocates in the business beginning to think through solutions with a customer-centric filter. We can now truly address customer needs and deliver great products that make them more successful!
