Leadership & Process
1. Team Management
Led a team of 3 junior designers/developers
Established clear workflow processes
Managed deliverables and timelines
Ensured consistent design quality
2. UX Design & Development
Designed Complex Visualisations, such as a Geographic Information System (GIS), thermal heatmap, timeline chart, sensor location mapping, and passenger flow tracking.
Developed the UI Components of the complex visualisations mentioned above using a modern front-end stack (HTML, SASS, Javascript/Typescript with Angular framework).
3. Cross-functional Collaboration & Agile Implementation
Coordinated with solution architects from the front-end and back-end teams.
Successfully introduced Agile methodology to the development team.
Worked closely with the QA team.
Liaised UI/UX deliverables with stakeholders.
Thermal Screening System: Hawaii International Airports
Disclaimer: To comply with my non-disclosure agreement, confidential details have been excluded, and the screenshots have been altered accordingly.
Lead UX Designer | USD 37.5M COVID-19 Response Project
Project Impact
Led the UX design for a critical COVID-19 screening system deployed across Hawaii's five international airports. The solution enabled efficient identification of passengers with elevated temperatures, processing thousands of travellers daily while maintaining strict health safety protocols.
The Challenge
At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Hawaii's airports needed to:
Screen large volumes of passengers efficiently
Identify individuals with elevated temperatures (>100.4°F)
Process data in real-time with high accuracy
Maintain smooth passenger flow
Ensure privacy compliance
Key Challenges & Solutions
1. Mastering Multi-Sensor Data Visualisation
One of our most complex challenges emerged when designing how to visualise data from numerous sensors while simultaneously highlighting individuals with elevated temperatures. With hundreds of sensors deployed across five airports and constant passenger flow, we risked creating a complex interface.
The key breakthrough came when I approached the problem from the perspective of airport staff who needed to make quick, accurate decisions. Rather than displaying raw data from every sensor, I designed a layered visualisation system. The primary layer showed a simplified airport map with clustered "hotspots" sensors indicating areas where elevated temperatures were detected. Staff could then click on these hotspots to access detailed sensor data and specific passenger information.
Solution Overview
As a lead UX designer, I designed a comprehensive thermal screening system that:
Processed real-time thermal data from multiple sensors
Integrated facial recognition for accurate tracking
Visualised complex data through intuitive interfaces
Managed 30+ complex workflows.
Supported airport staff decision-making
Recognition & Impact
3. Transforming Team Culture
Perhaps our biggest challenge wasn't technical at all - it was cultural. When I proposed implementing Agile methodology, I faced significant resistance from a team comfortable with traditional workflows. Instead of forcing change, I took a strategic approach.
I began by introducing small, manageable changes. I started with daily stand-ups, demonstrating how quick morning meetings could prevent hours of misalignment later. When team members saw their productivity increasing, they became more open to other Agile practices. I gradually introduced JIRA for task tracking, sprint planning, and retrospectives.
The transformation was remarkable. Within 6 months, the team that had initially resisted change was now enthusiastically running their own sprint planning sessions. This shift in methodology not only helped us deliver the project on time but also left a lasting impact on how the team approached future projects. Most importantly, they achieved this without increasing their workload - instead, they gained better control over their tasks and improved their ability to predict and prevent potential issues.
Through these challenges, I learned that being a UX lead isn't just about creating intuitive interfaces, but also about understanding human behaviour, both in terms of end-users and team dynamics. Each challenge provided an opportunity to demonstrate how thoughtful strategic thinking could solve problems beyond the screen.
Facilitating Sprint Retrospectives: A cornerstone of our Agile practice that transformed team dynamics. Through structured reflection, we celebrated wins, tackled challenges, and captured key learnings. This collaborative forum went beyond process improvement, fostering team cohesion through peer recognition and open dialogue. My leadership of these sessions helped establish a culture of continuous improvement and mutual appreciation.
This progressive disclosure approach reduces the complexity of interaction by providing interface layers that incrementally introduce content and function based on the customer’s progress through the application
2. Solving the 'Echo' problem
During initial system testing, we encountered what our team called the 'echo' problem - the same person being flagged multiple times as they are detected by the same or nearby sensors, creating unnecessary UI "noises" which might affect the user judgement. Rather than treating this as a minor inconvenience, I saw it as an opportunity to fundamentally improve the system.
I led a collaborative effort with the development team to implement a real-time grouping algorithm. This solution not only eliminated duplicate detections but also improved system performance by reducing the number of images to be displayed. What started as a bug fix evolved into a key feature that significantly enhanced the system's accuracy and speed. The solution was so effective that it was later adopted as a standard feature for similar projects.
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