Elysia Garbade

With over 20 years of experience in UX and design, I have a proven track record of leading teams to deliver innovative and user-centered products. I’m a design leader with a diverse background, from Frog Design agency work in San Francisco, Social Impact NGO work in India, Fintech Startup multi—hat wearing in Berlin and WealthTech with Charles Schwab. I have a vast breadth of experience to pull from which allows me to find product/market fit through clients eyes, strategize a design approach with product and engineering in addition to conceive, ideate and deliver on best in class Product Designs to millions of clients. I have coached and led teams for 8 years, growing them from scratch or inheriting and reforming. I love building strong trust, cultivating growth and teaching career strategy. I coach from beginners to Team Managers. I love building relationships. My sweet spot is in building products that are client facing with Lean UX. This includes • Product/Market Fit • Design Thinking workshops • Project managing/scoping design within projects • Building processes btwn product, design and technology • Design best practices, methodoigies and experiences • Building and growing UX Research Practices • UX for Startups (how to do Guerilla style to reap best impact) • Working with Designers for non-designers Some items of interest from my experience: - I have spearheaded a Segmentation strategy to unify company strategy. I wove together Market Research, Business Strategy and Product to identify values and experience overlap for personalization and scale. - I have driven and strengthened the design system to provide continuity to strengthen brand, while tailoring to most important values of design for User Segment. (Launch of Redesigned Native and Desktop Schwab Retirement Experience). - Evangelized Human Centered Design that changed employees way of working and thinking throughout the company by teaching UX Bootcamps, building UX Research capabilities, supporting diverse discipline needs with Design Strategy mentorship and support and managing and growing a team of 17 designers. - Curious and Driven - which means I love digging in to the work (in whatever software) rising above the details to think of the complex to distill, and constantly push teams to build efficient, lovable products that strive to pull in AI and think bigger than what is today. Please reach out, I'd love to help with your questions and solve a big ole juicy problem!