Triangle UXPA’s Career Fair is a free two-day mini-conference designed to help you grow your career. The event will have sessions with insights from experienced UX professionals, portfolio reviews, and plenty of networking opportunities. We’re looking to help students, career changers, and current UXers define or refine their career path and help local companies get the right people to the right UX jobs!
This will be a virtual event via Hopin.
Wednesday, May 26th
5:45pm - 6:30pm A Day In The Life Lightning Talks
6:45m - 7:30pm Ask The Experts Panel Discussion
Track A: Portfolio Reviews
In this session, we'll pair designers interested in having their portfolios reviewed with professionals and other designers to provide feedback and next steps.
In this session companies throughout the Triangle will give brief presentations about the work and culture of their companies.
Speakers
Vince Conzola - Principle Interaction Designer at RedHat
Vince is a Principal Interaction Designer at Red Hat where he collaborates on the design and development of cloud management and migration tools software. Vince will discuss what it's like to work in product UX at Red Hat and about their open source design system, PatternFly, and how attendees can leverage this in their own designs.
Tyler Berg - Product Designer at Viget
Tyler is a multidisciplinary product designer with experience in front-end development and product strategy. Tyler will discuss Specializing in Product at an Agency. A digital agency can mean a lot of different things, and every organization is different. What does it mean to specialize in product design while working at an agency that offers a variety of services? What skills do you need for a product design role?
Linda Brown - Executive Succession & Development Partner, at IBM
Linda Brown is an Executive Succession & Development Partner supporting Research and Cloud & Cognitive Software at IBM. Linda is co-founder and program manager of the IBM Pathfinder Mentoring Program. For the past 17 years, IBM has hosted a mentoring program with NC State University, pairing IBMers with NC State students in engineering, design, business, and technical communications for 1x1 mentoring. We highlighted the value of being co-located, offering the opportunity for face-to-face interactions. When the pandemic hit, we had to turn the whole program virtual. Linda Brown, Executive Succession & Development Partner, and program manager of the IBM-NC State Pathfinder Mentoring Program, will discuss the changes that were made to continue to provide a positive experience for the students.
Michelle Chin - Principal DesignOps Manager
During Michelle’s time at Citrix, her career has evolved from various senior-level product designer roles to design manager to her current role as Principal DesignOps Manager. She supports the Citrix Product Design Org with horizontal programs so they can keep doing their very best design work. In her topic she will discuss how finding a new job isn't only about the work you'll be doing. It's also about who you're working with and how well the company can support your career growth. Michelle will talk about those aspects and how to look for them in your next job search.
Panelists will discuss their career paths and answer questions about a variety of topics including tips to find jobs, interview techniques, and industry insights.
Panelists
Huifang Wang - Senior Manager of User Experience Design at SAS
Huifang Wang is a Senior Manager of User Experience Design at SAS Institute. She holds Masters degrees on Computational Linguistics and Cognitive Psychology. She has 25 years of experiences working in the field of user experience design and research in big enterprise companies. She’s passionate about representing users and their needs in the company’s product development cycle. She currently manages a team of talented designers and researchers working in different solutions areas. She loves to lead, inspire, nurture, and learn from those that she works with every day. She is hiring a User Experience Designer – job posting coming soon.
John Romano - UX Director at Globant
John is a UX generalist and director. He's worked in marketing communications but his love is in product development. He has a broad range of experience in mobile apps, desktop apps, and web. Ask him anything. Don't be shy. He loves talking shop.
Courtney Starr - Senior Design Director at WillowTree
My experience as a designer has evolved over the years from branding and identity, to print design, to where I am today focused on shaping digital things for people’s use as a Senior Design Director at WillowTree. My key responsibility is to help my team solve meaningful problems, reach their creative potential, and do world-class work.
Dr. Kenya Oduor - Managing Director of Lean Geeks
Dr. Oduor is the Managing Director of Lean Geeks, a firm focused on evaluating, defining, and designing complex applications, products, and processes. Kenya has a doctorate in Human Factors. Her training in Human Factors, included coursework in cognitive and applied experimental psychology and industrial engineering. Her training coupled with her experience give her the ability to help teams define the set of activities and processes necessary to create solutions that are at the intersection of meeting business expectations and user needs.
Thursday, May 27th
5:45pm - 6:30pm Keynote A
5:45pm - 6:30pm Keynote B
6:45pm - 7:15pm Salary Survey Sneak Preview
Track A: Keynote(s)
by Cyd Harrell
In this informal talk, Cyd condenses her extensive mentoring experience to show you how to take the career step from mid-level to senior as a designer working in organizations. How do you keep your edge as a practitioner as you step into leadership responsibilities? How do you become a pragmatic advocate for UX? How do you develop a resume and portfolio that speaks to the next level? How do you deal positively with organizational politics? How do you show up as a senior person both internally and in public? She'll discuss all of these tricky areas and there will be extra time to answer your questions.
Speaker Bio:
Cyd Harrell
Civic Design Consultant
Cyd is well known in industry and government for her creative approach to UX research and service design. Since 2012, working with the Center for Civic Design, Code for America, and 18F, as well as independently, Cyd has helped multiple executive- and judicial-branch agencies in the US apply research techniques and user-centered practice to serving the public. Her book, A Civic Technologist’s Practice Guide, is an onboarding guide and survival manual for tech people joining public sector work. When not at the office helping public servants use design for good, Cyd is a mentor for mid-senior UX practitioners. Her favorite tools are metaphor and (metaphorical) duct tape.
Track B: Keynote(s)
by Gretchen McNeely & Pieter Kruithof
Your first manager is important because they help shape your future and, in turn, how you impact the world. In fact, Meg Whitman, former CEO of HPE, emphasized during her talk on leadership on the Stanford Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Podcast that your first manager will have the biggest impact on your ability to develop as a new professional.
“Your biggest influence as you leave school is going to be the person you work for. Do they share the same values? Do you think they're going to be a good mentor and help you learn? Your job in your first five years out of undergraduate school or graduate school is learning.”
Robert Sutton, professor of management science at Stanford University, reinforces the impact of poor managers in his book, Good Boss, Bad Boss: How to Be the Best... and Learn from the Worst.
“Bosses shape how people spend their days and whether they experience joy or despair, perform well or badly, or are healthy or sick. Unfortunately, there are hoards of mediocre and downright rotten bosses out there, and big gaps between the best and the worst.” It’s likely that poor managers may have an even greater impact on recent graduates, who might not have the skills to navigate a “rotten boss.”
Speaker Bios:
Gretchen McNeely
Experience Architect Manager,
Industry X at Accenture
The presenter is a UX researcher and content strategist with 15 years of experience in physical and industrial design, environmental/service design, and digital content. Her areas of expertise include ethnography, information architecture, opportunity identification, product pilots, contextual inquiry, proof-of-concept testing, and branded content strategy. Her additional professional interests include audio and conversational design, wayfinding, and medical devices.
Pieter Kruithof
User Research Lead
Digital Business Automation at IBM
Piet is an award-winning user research professional with deep domain experience in enterprise applications spanning cloud management, automation, and open source. He’s currently the user research lead for IBM’s Business Automation portfolio.
Track A&B: Speaker
by Guiseppe Getto
Guiseppe Getto Associate Professor ECU Founder of Content Garden Inc.
Guiseppe has been a professor for over 15 years and is currently I’m currently an Associate Professor of Technical and Professional communication at East Carolina University. He also founded Content Garden, Inc., a content strategy and UX agency that helps organizations grow big customer and donor bases. He and members of his research team at ECU will discuss the preliminary findings of our 2021 Triangle Salary Survey.
We will be using an online networking and conference tool called Hopin to deliver our live presentations.
This event will be recorded and Triangle UXPA members will have access to the keynotes, a day in the life series and the panelist discussion post-event.
Register on Hopin
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