As a product executive at Valid, a long-standing fintech company focused on building and managing AI/ML risk decisioning solutions. She oversees all aspects of the product lifecycle, and collaborates with a team of engineers and data scientists to develop and deploy risk decisioning models at the largest financial institutions. Her innovative approach has not only reduced risks and losses but also democratized access to financial services for underserved communities. Donna’s leadership led Valid to be a finalist for the 2024 Banking Tech Awards, exemplifying how fintech can drive both profit and social impact.

In this page, I’ll walk you through the scope and different phases of product development that I am focusing on, as well as my responsibilities and my approach to solving problems in this role.

My Role:

I lead product strategy, design, development, operations, vendor management, and analytics for a Remote Patient Monitoring Consumer iOS App called Pulse.

Scope & Goal

Upon joining Heal, I performed an audit of the existing RPM app, which had very limited capabilities and a low engagement rate. My goal was to uplift the experience, introduce net new features that add value to patient’s life and drive business value and ultimately increase the engagement rate.

Business Metrics & KPIs

A good product manager needs to understand the business goal behind any new product. Upon joining Heal, I spent time understanding different business lines, the value each brings to the business, and how my product, the RPM tool, evolved and played a role in the larger ecosystem. I reviewed existing metrics to understand the baseline. A series of vision settings and ideation sessions with different stakeholders got conducted to understand the North Star metrics. After weeks of discovery, I established the key KPIs that are critical for my product:

- Attribution - Number of patients that have chosen Heal as their primary care provider over the past enrollment cycle

- Attrition - Number of patients who leave Heal as their primary care provider over the past enrollment cycle

- Engagement - Amount of time patients/users spend on the tool interacting with different modules

- Visit Completion - Number of visits completed per patient over the course of a year

After identifying the core OKRs, I measured the baseline for each of these categories and established a cadence with leadership to report on these metrics.

Discovery & Research

The existing RPM tool, known as Hub, was designed for chronic disease management. Its features were limited to vital recording using auxiliary devices communicating via Bluetooth to Heal Software housed on an Android tablet. The tablet and the pre-paired peripherals got shipped to patients.

I started by learning the existing user base and using quantitative (surveys) and qualitative studies (interviews and ethnography sessions). I learned their pain points and synthesized the insights, defined the opportunity areas, and bucketed them based on short-term goals achievable and addressable by enhancements to the existing product and longer-term goals, which requires a redesign and possible hardware and software net new builds.

We also did competitive research to learn from existing health portals and RPM tools in the market and define the value proposition and differentiating features for our product. I learned that a lot of pain points faced by our patients were hardware limitations (Mason Tablet), and we decided to switch to iOS development and partner with Apple to build a native iOS App which can be shipped on Heal-provided iPads to patients, or it can be downloaded from the app store. We decided to build with cross-platform and Android compatibility in mind.

Roadmap

After extensive research, we defined the core pillars of experience, which are as follows.

- Vital recording

- Medication Adherence

- Appointment and Visit Reminders

- Patient-facing and physician Health records and vital trends

- Payments and consent

We decided to develop an MVP that offers a basic flow for each of these core functionality and release it to the early adopter population and, based on the learnings, expand the scope and user base.

Operations

Since my role at Heal was beyond just product manager, I had to own and streamline the operational and inventory management processes. I performed an audit of all aspects of operations from procurement, pairing, packaging, shipping, and installation. Identified the bottlenecks and improved the processes to increase the delivery fulfillment time by 35% and inquiry resolution time by 20%. I conducted vendor analysis and switched to iOS tablets, with Flutter/Swift development approach to unlock better user experience for the patients.

Partnerships

When it comes to partnerships, hardware needs in the Pulse program were completely outsourced. As I mentioned earlier, our software is housed on a tablet that gets shipped to patients, and all vital recording devices are paired to the tablet and tailored to the patient’s needs and conditions. I conducted research and curated a new suite of biometric peripherals, including wearables, sleep, and activity trackers, creating a new ecosystem that doubled the number of biometrics captured by Pulse. I also switched to iPads instead of Mason tablets and partnered with Apple to secure those.

Building a team of engineers, QA, and Designers

Since we were expanding the product and tech team at Heal and we were developing a couple of major in-house tools (including a state of art EHR system). I had to hire and build a team of engineers, QA, and design to support the Pulse process. In late 2021 and early 2022, hiring engineers in-house was a major challenge, and I had to augment with a mix of outsourced engineers. I worked with a series of agencies that help recruit and hire talent domestically and internationally and finally onboarded engineers based in Brazil and hired a designer in-house to support the work.

Prototyping, Usability Testing & Development

In order to make sure our design is meeting the needs of our users, we developed clickable prototypes to test with our existing patients and potential adopters to improve and enhance the flows and UX based on the Input and learnings. We repeated this process to make sure that our final designs are refined and provided the optimal experience for our patients before starting development.

Collaborators & Partners

Paul Lafata, Curtis Freeman, Anthony Parsad

I joined JP Morgan Chase Corporate Investment Bank at a critical juncture as the technology team was planning to build a central application for internal bankers to service corporate clients with account management and digital payments. I had to create a roadmap to migrate the core functionality portfolio managers need to serve their clients into a new modernized application. Employees often had to swivel chair to disparate systems to complete these tasks.

I had to Oversee the end-to-end product development life cycle from ideation through planning, execution, and launch. I had 4 product managers and 5 scrum teams to achieve this goal. I worked directly with a team of internal designers. I had two lines of business as my stakeholders contributing to the budget.

I had to create annual roadmaps, timelines, schedules, cost control, risk mitigation, requirements gathering, development sprints, and post-release feedback loops. Communicate effectively with project stakeholders and guide cross-functional global teams to work collaboratively to deliver innovative solutions.

Migration Plan

Service Portal developed in mid 90s was a tool that originally designed to be a central place for all client portfolio managers to access client accounts, entity structures, digital payments and transactions. I was tasked to lead a team to migrate these core functionality over to the new tool (Navigator). I started by prioritizing the features and flows using two criteria - identified isolated flows that users can leverage to complete client requests without any interdependency on the flows that are not migrated yet. Another factor was the frequency of usage and having my team focus on building the flows that are heavily utilized today.

Roadmap Plan

We had a total of 3 year to build a central application for the portfolio management team - 2 years to migrate and modernize the core functionality and another year to introduce net new features. Based on the prioritization criteria guided by core KPIs (defined by stakeholders and user groups) we created annual roadmaps to achieve this goal. We had a rough horizon one (3 years) plan and each year we created detailed roadmaps by chunking the roadmap items into smaller rocks and pebbles.

Budget Proposals

Each fiscal year, I had to estimate the number of engineering teams (based on historical velocity) that are required to build the items on my roadmap and request budget to secure these teams.

Build a team

A big part of my role at JPMC was team development. I had to recruit, interview and hire top notch product management talent. Upon building a team of 5 product mangers I had to lead and coach these product managers while overseeing a diverse $8M portfolio of products and roadmaps that I was building with the help of my team. I crafted hiring and performance plans to attract and retain 11 product owners from top tech and fintech companies to our team and established career growth paths and plans for the team. People management is the most rewarding aspect of my role and I give the outmost importance to advocate for my direct reports and mentor junior talents in matrix settings.

Analytics and Voice of Customer

Since Navigator was a B2B tool and primary had internal users, my North Star metric was to increase capacity and employee productivity. The number one metric that I was measuring and marching towards was to reduce the end-to-end inquiry resolution time.

Improved the user satisfaction rate by 40% by building an intuitive, comprehensive desktop servicing tool

Metrics and KPIs

Recovered 10% of daily productivity with automation tools, including a robust elastic search engine that analyzed 50 sources in under 6 seconds and an e-mail automation tool that converted client inquiries into fulfilled cases

Improved the accuracy and compliance rate by 27% through an AI tool for transactional inquiries using SOPs

Reduced resolution times by 30% and saved $20M annually after building a client-centric inquiry resolution tool.

Partnered with executive leaders and cross-product teams to set the vision for the product and influenced key stakeholders to align resources and prioritization

As a product manager on the Apple Card project, I'm excited to reflect on our journey since the groundbreaking launch in August 2019. Collaborating with Apple and Goldman Sachs, we aimed to create a credit card that would truly enhance consumers' financial health.

We focused on integrating features that set Apple Card apart: no fees, daily cash back, and seamless connectivity with Apple’s mobile devices. Our goal was to elevate privacy, security, and transparency, enabling users to effortlessly analyze their spending and optimize interest savings by managing their balances more effectively.

Goldman Sachs played a crucial role as the card issuer, handling underwriting, customer service, the underlying platform, and regulatory compliance through Goldman Sachs Bank USA.

Simplicity, transparency, and privacy were the pillars of our consumer product development philosophy. It was a privilege to work on a project that redefined the credit card experience and contributed to healthier financial lives for our users.

My professional work at KPMG XDE is confidential by nature.

We help organization across a wide range of industries to redesign their user experiences and develop new products.

The projects that I have worked on have included the following industries: Financial services, Healthcare and life sciences, Energy, Oil & gas, Telecommunication, Pharmaceutical, and Public sector.

Accomplishments in this role

-Lead teams of clients, product managers, designers, and business analysts through qualitative and quantitative research, synthesis of insights, and ideation of new solutions

-Design ethnographic research plans, execute and formulate actionable insights to guide service and product development

-Manage and maintain client relationships through project approach design and business development pursuits

-Manage resourcing, project timelines and budgets across multiple locations on 8- to 12-week engagements

-Designed a new service venture to disrupt the hospice sector driving value by connecting patients, caregivers, and providers; increased patient compliance by 40%, resulted in reduced readmission costs

-Redesigned a learning and development platform for KPMG member firms to adopt microlearning and just-in-time training

-Redesigned the end-to-end service journey for home security products at a major telecommunication company

-Envisioned the future of customer-centric supply chain for a consumer goods and pharmaceutical company

-Designed a central platform for collaboration and data sharing for oil & gas services in the shipping sector

-Gathered product requirements for a retail banking product at a major investment bank. Managed a product squad (team) through product development life cycles using agile methodologies, scrums, and JIRA

-Guided a utility company through redesigning their customer experience by adopting AI and advanced data analytics tools

Client: NinthWave

Scope: Product management, product design, aggregated financial data, behavioral economics

Challenge & Goal:

Create a platform that enables financial advisors and their clients to understand and share their spending, budgeting and investment habits.

Approach:

We used a series of qualitative and quantitative market research studies to understand user needs and market demands. The primary challenge was for the financial advisors was lack of transparency and visibility to learn about their clients' idiosyncrasies and tailor their recommendation to their unique needs and behavioral patterns.

Solution:

One stop platform with multiple user access points that provides personal financial management functionalities to the retail banking user, and offers limited (based on user preferences) access to client’s financial behavioral patterns and details.

Collaborators:

NinthWave which is a financial data startup firm based in NYC hired me as a design strategist to conduct user research and strategy studies, and help them design user interfaces.

Subject Matter Expert:

Susan Certoma

I teach a course focused on”service design” which brings a multidisciplinary team of professionals and students together to learn about design principles that can be applied to the service industry to create meaningful experiences grounded in system thinking. This class has a three-tiered structure. In each session, students learn about an industry and the major shifts that are happening in that sector. This class introduces key themes that can be applied to service design initiatives to nudge the designer to create value by designing socially responsible and sustainable services. Most importantly students learn about design thinking methodologies, service blueprinting, empathy mapping, etc. All these methods can be utilized while designing end-to-end services. This class is part collaboration, part lectures, and discussions, and part workshopping. There are two class projects; one is focused on problem-solving and students pick a problem that is facing the economy or sector of their interest and using the class material around service design methodology, they analyze the existing problem and ways to solve the issue or prevent it. The final project is an individual project that encourages the students to design an innovative solution and service to add value in the area and industry of their interest.
 

Selected Student projects:

Clare Elliott | Designed a business model for crowdsourcing app that navigates the visitors to the local attractions of a new city.

Don Lail | "Games as service" _ designed a strategic plan to provide early access to early adopters in the video game market and capture their feedback.

Erica Lester | Designed a service that minimizes the material waste in food delivery systems like, Blue Apron by incorporating games and crafts in the packaging.

Layla MacRory | Re-designed the DMV ticketing experience and incorporated different services like gaming and coffee shops into the DMV experience.

Molly Reddy | Designed an app for the disconnected youth to connect them to and prepare them for their next job.

Client: Marriott International

Scope: pricing strategy, design research, innovation road mapping, user research, business model, product launch.

Challenge & Goal:

Marriott international approached a group of my fellow design leaders at MICA and Carey business school to design a pricing strategy to launch a new WIFI model for their events and conferences.

Approach:

We dug into the overall process that an event planner goes through during preparations for a meeting or conference_From researching all the different possible locations to their interactions with the sales teams and transfer of the information from Sales to Operations and AV/ET teams. We analyzed the follow up interactions that take place Post-Event. We delved into the different pain points discussed by both planners and Event Technology personnel.

Solution:

We identified the gaps of internet & technical knowledge between different sales teams as well as the difficulty in finding information on why pricing is the way it is and what each property has at its disposal with regards to Event Technology. Perhaps the most revealing quote was “planners often don’t know what they need until they are told what they can’t have.”

We decided to simplify the process for the event planner by developing an Event Planner web application that integrates the capabilities of a web search database with the ease and accessibility of Marriott’s meeting services app.

This application has features like Real time data-Web search database_ carefully sequenced flow of questions to guide planners in their decision-making process.

We aimed to create a more seamless experience for event planners where they can utilize Marriott’s custom all-in-one web application to pick the perfect location.Where they can also draw upon the technical expertise that is now networked across properties utilization of this application both externally and internally (in conjunction with a revamped CRM program) will allow for streamlined transfers of information & update between all parties.It also enables Marriott to store useful information that can be easily referenced for future engagements

Collaborators: Filda Mwenje, Kristin Holifield, Chris Schilder

Subject Matter Expert: Jennifer Mclennan

Scope:

Data analytics, predictive modeling, housing market and pricing strategies

Challenge & Goal:

The goal of the project was to extract publicly available housing data; assess price history and range against different variables like location, heating unit, number of bedrooms, and number of bathrooms; and find a correlation between the variables that predicts housing prices in urban areas.

The real estate and construction industry is not historically associated with data crunching and analysis. However, data analytics can play a significant role in profit-making in this industry. With help of data analytics, developers and real estate investors can predict the best areas and markets to invest and build their next developments. Research and consulting arms at real estate companies perform market intelligence and conduct a review of the past year’s housing data and trends as well as data-driven insight for potential real estate investing. Real estate companies can change their business models to adapt to a more revenue-generating format, and they offer wide variety of services to homebuyers and realtors. These services are not solely on the support side; they also include tools and insights for mitigating and transfering risk associated with large investments on properties. One of the biggest challenges for a real estate developer is to predict whether a housing development is worth investing in, due to the risk that the final price of the houses or the entire development might not be what the developer expected.

Approach:

Our approach in developing the predictive model included a four-step process:

•       The first step was initial research to identify which variables were significant for consideration as dependent variables. This step also involved identification of Variable type, namely Discrete and Continuous.  

•       The second step was to analyze the Discrete Variables and consolidate them into groups to reduce complexity of the model and at the same time retain the valuable information. This analysis also further reduced the number of variables.

•       The third step was to analyze the Continuous Variables and eliminate any Continuous Variable if found insignificant.

•       The fourth and final step was to insert the derived data obtained in the second step (now the new dependent variable). We eliminate all columns or fields that were no longer significant and used the reduced data set to create the predictive model.

Available Data

We were given two data sets, Training and Test. The Training data set was to be used for creating the Predictive Model and the Test Data set for application of the Predictive Model. The following table shows the details of the data available to us.

The target variable is ‘IsBadBuy’ which assumes a value of ‘0’ or ‘1’, to indicate whether it is a Bad Buy or not (1 for Bad Buy and 0 for Not a Bad Buy). Not all data is available for every data point, i.e. there are NULL values for some data points. Table 1 in Appendix shows the definition of each attribute of the available data and data issues if any. At this point we do not make any decisions about whether or not we use all the available variables for our predictive model. This happens in the subsequent steps.

Initial Data Analysis

We analyzed all attributes/fields available and made use of some research to eliminate some of the dependent variables as candidates for our predictive model. Care was exercised not to eliminate any variable based only on intuition. In this step, we also identified variables that took discrete values, otherwise called Discrete Variables and Continuous Variables. These two variables were treated differently for Predictive Model analysis as seen in the subsequent sections.  

Discrete Variables

From our Initial Data Analysis, we identified and marked all significant dependent variables as Discrete Variables and Continuous Variables. In this step, we further analyzed the Discrete Variables. As mentioned earlier, Discrete Variables are those variables that assume discrete values only, for example vehicle color, which assumes values like Silver, Red, White, etc. The objective of this step was to identify whether all the discrete variables that deemed significant in our initial analysis were truly significant or not. Once we found that a particular variable was significant, we then attempted to consolidate/group the discrete values. The value chosen to determine whether we could group discrete values together was Bad/Total Ratio. For example, if we were to find that all cars of colors Red, Blue and Green have Bad/Total Ratio within a 2% difference, we could group them together and create a new derived variable with name ‘Red or Blue or Green’. This consolidation helped reduce noise and simplify the model while retaining all information.
 

Discrete Variable Analysis and Consolidation

We further analyzed and consolidated the Discrete/Binary variables identified in the previous section. The first order of business was to check whether the variable had any significance at all, and if so, we could group the discrete values to reduce complexity while at the same time retaining all information. The detailed results of this analysis can be found in Discrete Variables section of Appendix. The following table shows the final result of this analysis. As the table makes clear, some of the variables that were considered significant or unresolved (TBD) were eliminated and the discrete values were grouped together.

Note: The consolidation of discrete variables into groups is based on the available data. If more data becomes available, this process should be repeated again as it may result in new groups or expansion of existing groups.

Continuous Variables

Unlike Discrete Variables, Continuous Variables assume continuous values, for example Vehicle Odometer. Also unlike Discrete Variables, it is not possible to group Continuous Variables. To determine whether or not a continuous variable is significant, we used box plots. In essence, we separated the data into two sets, one each for 0 and 1, that the target variable ‘IsBadBuy’ assumed, and observed how each box plot for these two sets appeared when each Continuous Variable was considered.

Collaborators: Vamsi Bhagavathula, Candice Richardson

Service Design_Digital Marketplace

Scope: service design,marketing strategy, design research, innovation road mapping, user research, business model, social enterprise, value proposition design.

This project is focused to design a new service model for connecting Persian artisans in textile and rug industry to western consumers.

Mentor: Mira Azarm

Scope:

Service innovation, value proposition, public sector service design

Challenge & Goal: 

The United States Postal Service is a costly entity for the government that has been losing billions of dollars annually for the past several years. Lack of innovation in service delivery is the main contributor to this ill-performing history. The goal of the design project was to evaluate the challenges and needs of USPS customers and introduce new services and product initiatives to remedy the issue and project steady growth.

Approach:

We started by making frequent trips to local post offices in the Washington, DC and Baltimore metropolitan areas and observing customers as they interacted with post office services and personnel. We interviewed customers to capture their insight and feedback for the future of the USPS. We asked about their wish list items for the post office, such as which other services their post office could offer to them.

Based on the user research studies, we learned that there are three main user groups that are concerned about innovation and disruption at the post office. The first group consists of small business owners who utilize post office services for conducting business online and remotely. The second group is young, tech-savvy professionals who rely heavily on online shopping and delivery due to a busy urban lifestyle.

Solution:

Through careful study of each user group and discovery of their unique needs, we introduced a mix of product and service solutions that could simplify or improve their lives: 

Design – Create a communal atmosphere to encourage users to spend more time at the post office. Introduce functionalities such as Wi-Fi and comfortable seating, so that customers can prepare for their postal needs on site. Introduce local and geography-specific themes for different cities to create a sense of belonging.

Same Day Delivery – Partner with local grocery stores and other small businesses such as dry cleaners to deliver products and goods to customers. USPS has abundant infrastructure and resources for reliable and efficient delivery that can be used to generate income by partnering with other businesses.

Mobile Application – Introduce a mobile application with which residents can review their non-confidential mail in scanned digital format before it arrives at their door. Allow users the option to receive only their confidential mail and decline to receive junk mail and other unnecessary paper mail. The USPS is currently entirely paper-dependent, which creates tons of paper waste annually. This solution can reduce paper waste as well as delivery volume and cost.

Collaborators: Brandon Ball, Amal Hmayed, Kaitlin Jentzen, Susan Juvet, Dewayne Whitefield 

Scope: 

Design work spaces for collaboration and trust

Challenge and goal:

The Energetics Technology Center (ETC) was opening up a new business incubator to help startup companies accelerate and meet their needs during the initial phases of growth. The goal was to design collaborative spaces for the incubator so that Army Research Lab scientists, engineers, and technical researchers could successfully collaborate on their intellectual property with entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and university professors to launch startups.

Approach:

We interviewed ARL researchers,  scientists. We also interviewed Logan Powell, the Open-IDEO Meetup coordinator, who runs Hack-a-thons from collaborative spaces and who also designs similar collaborative spaces. Based on our user research we crafted personas of potential users who would be using the space: Entrepreneurs, mentors, investors, and researchers.

We did a series of Fly-on-the-wall observations by visiting several incubators including Emerging Technology Center, The Ground Floor, Fast Forward (JHU Technical Ventures), BetaMore, 1776, and the MedTech Cluster. There, we evaluated how the spaces were used, the ratio of private and collaborative spaces, and balance between productive and playful spaces. We took note of what areas received the most usage and which parts the least.

Our team also visited analogous spaces other than incubators, such as a Baltimore public school pre-school, and the MICA Social Design spaces. We were curious to see how small children and graduate students used their spaces to collaborate and play.

The most important part of our research was synthesizing the initial findings and research insights. We captured our findings in sticky notes format and then categorized them into groups. Leveraging this design thinking exercise, we pinpointed the main patterns that we discovered; privacy, trust, and outlets- which informed our solution.

Solution:

The first element of our design is the trust which is nothing beyond creating an atmosphere that collaborators in the space could leverage to build trust quickly and establish a rapport. This design element manifests itself in furniture selection, layout, and budgeting for adequate workshopping space, group work, etc.

Another important factor was privacy. Given the early startups, our very protective of their IP and they tend to be suspicious of other teams. We focused on creating spaces that creates a sense of privacy by engineering soundproof barriers and elements. Besides material and physical space, we used aesthetics and layout design to convey the message of privacy to the user. We also used modular walls and structures that give the user the flexibility to quickly change the layout from private to group area.

Last but not least was designing for outlets for the frustrating highs and lows of an average workday. Given that entrepreneurs face lots of obstacles especially during the first few months of formation of their company, we intended to design for fun and joyful elements that provide an opportunity for the users to take the break and take their mind off of their work. These outlets can be mini gyms, ping pong tables, punching bags, etc.

Collaborators: Keith Gordon, Meredith Shelby, Katie Rose

Scope: 

Economic infrastructure, strategic talent management, entrepreneurship

Challenge & Goal:

Baltimore, a city that has been a pioneer in health care delivery and discovery, has great potential to become a hub for medical technology startups. Despite having access to talent trained by top educational institutions like Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland, and Loyola University, as well as strategic location of the city, it has thus far experienced slow growth in medical technology innovation. The goal of this project was to provide recommendations and solutions to the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute (Mtech) on ways to create an ecosystem in Baltimore to attract medical technology innovators.

Approach:

We interviewed more than twenty startups in the med tech field in the greater Baltimore area as well as incubators and accelerator places that house early-stage startups. The goal for the discovery period and research was to identify the challenges and shortcomings that these entrepreneurs face during design, prototyping, development, marketing, and other stages of enterprise formation. 

Solution:

Based on the research findings, we learned that the current issue in Baltimore is an infinite sequence of lack of resources (size) and bottlenecks with no true origin. We need to provide capital and experienced labor to reach a tipping point and attract talent and innovators.

Attaining that size, or the critical mass of medical device companies could be achieved by:

Establishing public-private innovation centers to attract mid- to large-sized medical device companies

Encouraging larger companies not in the medical device space to enter the sector through cost-matching or grant-funded partnerships with small companies or startups

Growing local medical device companies with an increased emphasis on late-stage or emerging company funding to help companies beyond the seed-funding stage

Collaborators: Sam Hong, Katharina Schmidt, Joshua Wang, Hao Jia, Jing You, Belinda Peng

Links to the related articles:

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/new-report-gives-guidance-on-growing-baltimore-medical-device-community-300158787.html

https://gbc.org/center-maryland-26/

SECTION 1

Scope:

Urban green infrastructure, communal design

Challenge & goal:

Compared with other major cities, Baltimore has a relatively small number of parks and outdoor activity centers. We found an unused plot of land under the main highway in the city that served mainly as a wasteland with no identified purpose. The goal was to create a new functionality for this land and revitalize the area that it surrounds.

Approach:

We focused on creating a space where people of all socio-economic classes within the greater Baltimore area can unite and have shared experiences throughout the common area, connecting as a creative class. By conducting a series of ethnographic research studies, we learned from the local communities of Bolton Hill and Mount Vernon that this land could be best used by intersecting creative communities. Our primary means of creating shared experiences included art, music, a skate park, and engaging community activities.

Solution:

We identified four main values that this new community center could bring to the community: 

Placemaking – The park will showcase that the surrounding neighborhoods are attractive, walkable, safe, multi-use, and welcoming. The park will also provide skateboarders with a safe and desirable skate park. By turning a blighted lot into usable well-lit space, we will reduce the volume of hidden areas that invite crime.

Community Building – The park will help break down socio-economic divides among residents using shared positive experiences around art, music, and leisure activities, bringing together individuals from across the city and the greater Baltimore area. 

Shared Value Creation – Baltimore residents can get involved in the park curation in several ways, including as contributors to temporary and permanent art exhibits, volunteers, event organizers, or simply participants. 

Human Flourishing – At its core, the park will provide an educational and cultural opportunity for diverse ages, traditions, and lifestyles.  

Collaborators: Richard Best, Julie Bussion

Scope:

Social Design, affordable hotel design, sustainable & minimal design

Challenge & goal :

The goal of this project was to design a touristic complex that provides all the needs of the travelers to Isfahan, Iran while the cost of stay and service is low for the customer.

Approach:

This project started with analyzing different factors that contribute to the cost of hotel stays. Some of the factors are location, service types, size, amenities, etc.

As an architect design for sharing and strategic floor planning were the factors that I could control to bring the cost down. I focused on concepts of minimal design and shared economy to design an affordable hotel in a touristy area called “Chaharbagh” in Isfahan.

Solution:

Since this hotel is intended to be located in the heart of historic Isfahan, I got inspiration from traditional Persian architecture. I designed a central courtyard that manifests as a minimal environment that guest can share and use as a communal space. In addition, this courtyard functions as a microclimate modifier especially in a hot-arid region like Isfahan that connects guests to the natural environment. I focused on optimal floor plan design to design an efficient while functional rooms and hallways. Guest room interiors are minimal yet functional and create an optimal balance between the space and comfort. Common areas are designed to create a sense of community for the guests to be able to shop, dine and socialize.

Scope: 

Product development, design research, innovation, user research, business model innovation, product launch, revenue projection, pilot test

Challenge and Goal:

The goal of the project is to innovate and introduce a product for senior citizens, a group that is underrepresented. Annually, 34.2 million American adults have served as an unpaid caregiver to someone aged 50 or older. The challenge is that people thrust into the unfamiliar role of caregiving often feel isolated, stressed and ill-equipped. The focus of this design project is to create value by bridging the gap between caregivers, care teams, and patients.

Approach:

Through series of user research, we identified a unique value proposition that can be introduced to the market that can create value throughout the geriatrics ecosystem. By providing organizational tools and a platform for caregivers to connect with each other, we can support their emotional and logistical needs. We interviewed and observed more than 30 geriatrics patients, their caregivers, and care providers. We learned that there is a need for a central place to enable different players in different care episodes to collaborate and communicate.

Solution:

We introduced an online community and organizational tool, designed especially for caregivers, that provides them with real-time peer-to-peer support, access to curated resources, and other interactive features to address their unique needs.

Collaborators: Karah Salates, Florcy Morisset, Rebecca Johnson