Executive design lead / Product transformation

Redesigning products, teams, and the decisions between them.

I lead senior product design teams through high-stakes redesigns where customer clarity, operating model, and measurable business impact all have to improve at once.

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Selected works

Projects organized by business outcome.

Each deep dive follows a problem-solution-impact framework, with the visual redesign treated as one part of a broader operating change.

Activation Growth

Enterprise Onboarding Redesign

Unified fragmented setup flows for a B2B analytics platform moving upmarket.

Before11-step setup with 38% completion

After4 guided milestones with 61% completion

Problem: Admin teams needed 11 screens and three support docs before their first dashboard was live.
Solution: Led product, data, and engineering through a guided setup model with progressive disclosure and role-based checklists.

47.2% faster first value31.6% fewer support tickets$8.4M influenced expansion pipeline

Retention Lift

Mobile Banking Service Recovery

Reframed failed-payment experiences for a regional bank with 2.8M customers.

BeforeDead-end error screens

AfterActionable recovery paths

Problem: Customers were abandoning sessions after generic error states and calling branch support.
Solution: Introduced diagnostic messaging, safe retry paths, and a design QA model for high-risk transaction flows.

18.9% drop in call volume22.4% recovery conversion4.7/5 post-resolution CSAT

Revenue Expansion

Commerce Merchandising System

Modernized internal tooling for category managers at a global retail marketplace.

BeforeSpreadsheet-led planning

AfterShared operating cockpit

Problem: Teams relied on spreadsheets to coordinate launch calendars, margin targets, and promotion QA.
Solution: Built a workflow taxonomy, redesigned bulk-edit tooling, and coached three squads through design system adoption.

12.8% higher promo margin6.3 hours saved per launch73% adoption in quarter one

Trust & Compliance

Healthcare Consent Platform

Created a consent and permissions experience for a care coordination product.

BeforeLegal-first forms

AfterPatient-readable controls

Problem: Patients and care teams could not see what data was shared, why it mattered, or how to change it.
Solution: Designed plain-language consent patterns, stakeholder review rituals, and reusable regulated-content components.

39.5% fewer consent errors2 audit findings closed28 reusable patterns shipped

Leadership & mentoring

Building teams that can reason in public.

My leadership work centers on decision quality: how teams frame tradeoffs, critique evidence, and teach each other to raise the standard without slowing delivery.

Strategy turns into rituals

I translate ambiguous executive goals into decision cadences, scorecards, and operating rhythms that help teams move without waiting for permission.

Mentoring is portfolio management

Designers grow fastest when craft feedback, product judgment, and career bets are intentionally balanced across their body of work.

Evidence beats preference

I make research, analytics, and market signals visible early so design critique stays anchored in customer and business reality.

Design process methodology

A repeatable path from ambiguity to adoption.

Frame

Define the business tension, customer promise, and decision owner.

Model

Map journeys, service boundaries, metrics, and constraints.

Prototype

Make competing strategies visible through testable product stories.

Pilot

Ship focused pilots with analytics, research, and adoption criteria.

Scale

Codify patterns, rituals, and governance so the work compounds.

Stakeholder testimonials

Trusted by product, engineering, and executive partners.

Mara helped our leadership team see design as a growth system, not a service function. The onboarding work changed how every squad talks about value.

Priya RamanChief Product Officer, VellumIQ

She raises the bar without theater. Teams leave her reviews with clearer tradeoffs, stronger stories, and concrete next moves.

Owen BarclayVP Engineering, Northline Bank

The strongest part of the engagement was how quickly she built trust with compliance, data science, and front-line operators.

Celeste IbarraGM, CareGrid Platform

Speaking / publications

Writing about design leadership that changes business behavior.

Design metrics that survive the quarterly business review How to coach senior designers through ambiguous strategy work A practical template for problem-solution-impact case studies

Contact

Bring me into a redesign when the stakes are bigger than screens.

Advisory, interim leadership, workshops Team critiques and mentoring systems Case study audits and executive narratives