https://jaredpickering.com/home daily 1.0 2025-11-19 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1607480523596-6HH8CUZIC0TW1YPKH58R/thumbCovid.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/d46659c3-8b05-403b-a165-33b559f298c5/cachedImage+Edited%281%29.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1585757205340-AW06QNUXG61TLLBXQ0CA/IMG_1760.jpeg https://jaredpickering.com/contact daily 0.75 2025-03-05 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/ad780aad-3b7d-4839-9392-8f99824f5fe1/3D7A0255.JPG https://jaredpickering.com/employee-wellness-program daily 0.75 2023-07-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1586022666927-V618MPASGSMH4A38MIPS/Adjustments.jpeg Employee Wellness Program - Design Process I had a rough idea of what kind of interface I wanted to work with, so I gave my best attempts at sketching out a rough layout. My incredible artistic abilities are made very apparent here. My process consisted of early research into the types of users that would bring the most network traffic and create an intuitive interface around that demographic. I opted for more simplistic, eye-catching elements that would eliminate the clutter of descriptive text. There needed to be a good amount of text elements to describe each selection, but each had to be arranged in a way that was not visually overstimulating. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1586291382532-N8RU1DR1O8XWGB6M6BE5/IMG_0130.jpeg Employee Wellness Program - Design Language One of the trickier tasks laid out for me was to take all the work I had created and port it over to the design language of Healthy Contributions. Given only a color palette, I managed to give my prototype the look and feel of the Healthy Contributions website while keeping all my work consistent from brand to brand. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1585782480669-DXLB93UXREOIX7610717/screen3Mobile.png Employee Wellness Program - The Team My team consisted of a group of product designers, developers, and project managers tasked with different aspects of the project. This diverse group allowed me to gather more input that went into my design. I spent most of my collaboration over email and Slack to stay up to date with content changes and feedback on my designs. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1598303869204-PG5STCVVX2NS21CCW8B9/Annotation+2020-08-24+161722.jpg Employee Wellness Program - The Challenge The task at hand was to create a user interface for a wellness benefit selection screen. I was tasked with creating a prototype for a project years in the making. The logistics of the project and the desired results were made clear, and the main tasks became creating the user-facing website and testing it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1586380704893-R8SCE74H2MBQYX1R7UCG/AF-empWellness-Draft4copy.png Employee Wellness Program - The Results My final prototype submission can be viewed here. The team seemed very happy with the results and offered quite a lot of great suggestions throughout the project. Given more time, I would have liked to learn more about what tools and abilities Figma could have offered me. I picked up learning both Adobe XD and Figma in about a week, and felt that I would have liked to learn more about the program throughout the course of the project. This was my first dive into a real world project, and I feel like I got exposure to new levels of team collaboration, design, and software testing. https://jaredpickering.com/videos daily 0.75 2025-11-10 https://jaredpickering.com/snapchat-user-research daily 0.75 2023-07-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1588713968863-U975X6EJGRCWKNO997QF/NewDesign.png Snapchat User Research - The Research My goal was to try and understand the deeper meaning of User Experience as it pertained to changes in software. I wanted to understand more about where Snapchat went wrong in their design choices and how testing methods prior to launch may have prevented the backlash. I spent a good amount of time reviewing literature relating to software redesign and the processes that go into research beforehand. I also found research done on predispositions to rejecting change in keyboard layouts. What this essentially boiled down to was the learning curve when experiencing new software. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1588714287137-LNT2BWCJQIUQTAGNF206/image-asset.jpeg Snapchat User Research - The Procedure Participants were students at the University of Iowa and given tasks to complete in a quiet environment at the main library. The tasks included sending a Snapchat to another account, viewing a Story posted by said account, finding the same Story again to view again, and adding a different account to the friends list. Each of these tasks were timed, tracked for number of taps required for completion, and averages for each task were reported at the end of the study. This was then followed up with a survey for participants testing the new interface changes. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1588713443090-XZ57HR4TZEU37YKNTAQG/results.jpg Snapchat User Research - The Results My final project report can be viewed here. What I found was that the average timing and time spent per task was not drastically different. Though this was the result I was expecting, the surveys really provided the greatest insight into the role UX plays in good software design. Though the Snapchat redesign had been out for a little while at that point, most avid users still had a lot of dissatisfaction with the changes. This was well past the point of “getting used to it,” leading me to conclude that the redesign of Snapchat had really fractured its user base. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1588713916671-W46UL1Z2FK3G09CN0COT/OGdesign.png Snapchat User Research - The Challenge This project was designed to understand the research methods used in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), and more specifically to understand how drastic redesigns can impact user experience and efficiency. My goal was to test the timings of the controversial Snapchat update of 2018. https://jaredpickering.com/capstone-project daily 0.75 2020-05-19 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1589913840035-XCPQEZ2U6WH651HEENNR/Annotation+2020-05-19+134123.jpg Capstone Project - The Results Our final Tableau dashboard is hosted here. My team and I presented our final findings and design for our final grade, and it was received well. I’m very happy with what we accomplished, including our testing methods and improvements on feedback. I learned a lot in how to conduct user testing, how to present data in a user-friendly manner, and public speaking skills. As mentioned before, one of our biggest hurdles was our third team member. Though overall I feel like things were accomplished smoothly, we had many issues with her ability to contribute. My partner and I even raised concerns to our professor in an email about how much of her grade would be riding on our work. I got a greater understanding how best to work with the team I am given rather than blame quality of work on under-performing members. Our method of task distribution ensured that our quality of work would be higher than if we had just assigned tasks at random. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1589225268848-IAT6RXIEQBTAM9DIFQW8/dashboard.png Capstone Project - The Challenge My team’s task was to create a final dashboard using Tableau that would host our data cleaning work. Our project was divided into different stages, including creating a Python script to unify and clean datasets, designing personas for user testing and influencing our design, and conducting research on our first dashboard design. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1589225934147-QLP8DBEPJB9YJLBUELKK/persona.png Capstone Project - The Team My randomly-assigned team consisted of myself, a good friend of mine, and a nurse working night shifts. That last team member proved to be a bit of a hurdle, as she was unable to meet at reasonable times in person and tended to get back to us at odd hours. My other team member and I spent good amounts of time collaborating in person and found ways to divide up tasks in a way that work accommodated each person’s schedule and ability. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1589225662033-I2R5CR3B7BMGCGEWGKF8/maps.png Capstone Project - First Design Testing This stage of the project was meant to put user research methods to the test. Our class invited in half a dozen grad students to sit down and run through tasks given to them. We asked our participants to narrate what they were doing as well as fill out a survey at the end of our tasks. This gave us valuable input on our layout and design, along with screen and audio recordings, highlighting where we needed to make changes. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1589832492728-AXK01D3Y7N9T8NROKG8Y/sketchUI.jpg Capstone Project - Design Process Once done with data cleaning and the process of importing the sets into Tableau, our goal was to design an interface of visualizations that provided us with the necessary data for task completion. I sketched a rough layout of what visuals would compliment our data sets best and replicated this in a Tableau dashboard. https://jaredpickering.com/covid-app daily 0.75 2021-01-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1599689044941-H42X7AKTXB51FD2UYV51/combinedPersona.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603235678568-KDJKWVAR8F9RDAM5OIWO/homeScreen.png COVID-19 Tracing App “For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you.” ― Ira Glass https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603235154652-8LQOG2TLS1UA99BUAOPN/originalDesign.png COVID-19 Tracing App My original approach really fell short the more I kept looking at it. Those who I had look at the interface were confused what the “Significant exposure” banner was meant to convey, and overall the page was feeling a bit cluttered with poor use of space. I was unhappy with how much I was losing confidence in my design abilities. Nonetheless, I pressed forward with a little bit of feedback. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186747202-8PGSCFR7ME31D4R9DAC6/Paper.Sketches.1.png COVID-19 Tracing App 1. Splash screen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186744023-J1P6PYZ7HLHI1RLAQVHD/Paper.Sketches.2.png COVID-19 Tracing App 2. How it works https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603480448839-Y5AKBYLWTW19VKUT9TWD/splashScreen.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603480451259-QLRD47OV6TBDE53JZG6D/Steps.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186741090-C38OE9IKCS5VJL1JYNRM/Paper.Sketches.3.png COVID-19 Tracing App 3. Confirm iOS privacy and tracing notification settings https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603480504693-6HBWVXT4W68FGP3G1K3B/notifications.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186748374-B3XSV5L8Z7YMF66L5O59/Paper.Sketches.4.png COVID-19 Tracing App 4. Confirmation screen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603740668563-0OOGME7MQBODGFGDMR1B/confirmation.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186742369-I5ZDGIJ8YZ5LGDYAAOS2/Paper.Sketches.5.png COVID-19 Tracing App 5. Main screen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603740773058-0GX9Y6B8R21JEU2SWGK9/homeScreen.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186749420-BUXICPFYOI54PMVUES05/Paper.Sketches.6.png COVID-19 Tracing App 6. Pop-up menu https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1603740910328-ZFH3WZKWBP5DNHJTLQJ2/mapPage.png COVID-19 Tracing App https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e83caa7a6479966db49837c/1600186750676-6LHDY291OKBZBQ0QF80H/Paper.Sketches.7.png COVID-19 Tracing App 7. 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