I've mapped out my values, the ones I've always designed from, and the thread that runs through every project. You can see who you're getting, and I've got my own North Star to go by. Here's the framework and the belief at its center.

To be clear, I've always known what I'm about, but I never mapped it out, for myself or for anyone else.

My resume always lists my skills and experience, but it doesn't show how I think or what I won't compromise on. So this time, while redesigning my portfolio for the umpteenth time, I started with this self-defining exercise. A framework that names the thread running through everything I've worked on, from a federal research platform to the commercial website for one of the world's largest tech companies.

I'm sharing this for reasons that aren't modesty. Knowing yourself is one of the most powerful tools a designer can have, and anyone can run this exercise for themselves too. Plus, it also works as my pitch to a hiring manager by outlining who they're getting before we've even met. And it's also for me, too. If I start to drift, doubt the work, or doubt myself, this is what I'll come back to.

Before the framework, here are three examples of how it shows up in my practice.

I'm a humanist technologist. I love tech and design in the widest sense. Products and websites, transportation and architecture, the shape of cities, art and music, biotech, and the tools that still feel like science fiction. The tech itself holds me, the way the toy aisle would for a kid. Sometimes it's a small delight, sometimes it's big and impactful. I owe it to the people it runs through to be considerate, because tech doesn't exist without them.

I start from the person. Good design is user-centered. It starts from a real understanding of who the work is for, and adapts to them. They shouldn't have to bend to fit the product. So I'd want to figure that out before anything else. When I designed a public health site in the early days of the pandemic, our target market was everyone, and the whole country was scared. So its tone needed to feel calm and trustworthy, the way a doctor with a good bedside manner would. When a project has trouble pinpointing its core audience, its foundational information later becomes a sore spot that may be hard to remedy.

I observe before I advocate. On a commercial site for one of the world's largest tech companies, a straight design argument would've gone nowhere. So I watched how the organization made its decisions, then made the case in terms it already cared about, brand consistency, and the trust that rides on it. That reframing got a stuck conversation moving again. What looked like a design problem was really an organizational one. Patience is the strategy.

Those are just examples. The framework itself, ten values across three pillars, is the work of a whole career. I write it in "we" on purpose, because it's how I work with a team as much as how I think on my own.

Pillar 1: Convictions. What we won't compromise on.

Humanity first. Technology carries whatever soul we put into it. It's us, turned into systems and screens, and like us, some of it's made with heart and some of it's made cheap. At best, it clearly reflects the person using it. Humanity first means designing with heart and kindness, for the real people the work is for. Everyone's part of one human race and worth lifting up.

Democratic design. Honest and clear, built so real people can use it without translation. If a system needs explaining, it's not because of the human at the other end; it's the design that's faulty.

Inclusion is context, not compliance. Different languages, different abilities, different relationships with technology. We design for the full range of real people.

Design with integrity. No dark patterns. No manipulative friction. We know exactly how those tricks work, and we won't use them.

Pillar 2: Lenses. How we see and think.

Applied empathy. Human-centered design gives you the structure. Empathy adds the depth and richness that structure alone can't reach. It draws on behavioral psychology, neuroscience, user research, and years of practiced instinct, so we understand how people think and feel and design from there.

Observe before advocating. We watch and listen before we push anything, paying close attention to what nobody's saying out loud. That patience produces solutions that survive contact with reality.

Strategic sight. Design is problem-solving, and the real problem may not be the obvious one. It could be organizational, a matter of stakeholders and constraints. So we map the project before we start designing.

Pillar 3: Standards. What we hold the work to.

Built to outlast. You don't design a home for what's hot right now. You design it knowing you'll live in it for years. The best work ages the same way, still useful long after the trend's gone, the way people still reference Dieter Rams or midcentury modern today. Thinking ahead is part of the craft, and it serves the people who use the work and the budgets behind it.

Invite interaction. Does it invite touch? Is it straightforward to use? Will it delight the user? None of that's a bonus. It's the baseline.

Earn trust. Prove it. We don't polish what has no substance, and we don't make claims we can't back up. We collaborate honestly and deliver consistently, and let the results speak.

This is the map I hold myself to. If I lose the thread, it points me back. And at the center, the thing the other nine grow out of, is the simplest one. I see a failed design before I see a failed human.

The thread's already in your work, whoever you are. It's worth finding. What drives yours?

—-

A note on process. I used Claude as a collaborator throughout — not to generate my values, but to pressure-test them. Claude pushed back, spotted contradictions, and helped me find clearer language for ideas I'd been carrying for years. The thinking is mine. But if I'm going to write about integrity in the same article where I list it as a core value, I should probably practice it.