Hi. 👋
I’m a mission driven user experience designer who specializes in innovative new-to-world products, multimodal design, service design, research and rapid iteration, and design strategy. I have 18 years of UX design experience: 8 years inventing AI-powered consumer technology at Amazon plus 10 years leading award-winning social ventures in the organic food and agriculture space.
As a strong communicator, voracious learner, and proven leader, I thrive in fast-paced collaborative environments where experimentation, critique, and complex problems abound.
I’m open to opportunities to shape products or experiences that promote health & wellness, social equity, meaningful relationships, sustainability, democracy, and creativity.
Designing multiple pillars of a disruptive new retail category —stay tuned!
Nov 2022 to present
Amazon Glow is a futuristic video calling device with a projected play space that lets kids read, create, and play with family and friends no matter where they are.
I led design & strategy for Glow’s creative arts & reading experiences, leveraging Glow’s IR cameras and projector to invent interactive activities that bridge digital and physical, including interactive books, paper crafting, and machine learning augmented storytelling. When Glow’s dedicated UX research team dissolved, I led the democratization of this essential function by first assessing then addressing the team’s process, coaching, and resource needs.
April 2021 to Nov 2022
As the lead designer, I set the product vision and created a multi-year roadmap to achieve a multimedia, input modality-fluid, ad-supported, personalized, aggregated news experience across all Alexa enabled surfaces. By spearheading a redesign of our publishing pipeline, I enabled the business to scale from 13 to 100+ providers, increased security, reduced time to publish, and paved the way for personalization and automated content moderation.
Oct 2019 to Apr 2021
I collaborated with top engineers to translate the Alexa Design System into Alexa Presentation Language, a JSON-based markup language that allows any Alexa experience creator — even those with minimal design knowledge — to create multimodal experiences that automatically scale and adapt to a broad range of device types and capabilities.
May 2019 to Oct 2019
I simplified the Fire Tablet interface to help customers discover new and relevant digital content while easily accessing their owned content. I improved personalized recommendations by making it easier to provide unambiguous feedback.
Mar 2018 to Dec 2018
I drew from generative research to conceptualize, prototype, and test hardware configurations and features that became pillars of Amazon’s first fitness product, Halo. The flagship body composition analysis used a smartphone camera, computer vision and machine learning to estimate body fat percentage and visualize progress over time.
May 2017 to Feb 2018
As an Alexa Framework designer, I structured, authored & reviewed the Beta Alexa Design Guide, the industry’s first multimodal HIG. The guide continues to be used to train thousands of designers, product managers, and developers to create multimodal experiences. I also laid the groundwork for Alexa multi-device management experience based on in-home studies.
Jan 2016 to May 2017
Echo Hero Skills
While advancing the Alexa Design Guide Beta, I temporarily embedded in the Alexa Skills team to support a rapid revamp of 15 top brand Hero Skills slated for a major press release. The Skills team was so convinced of the value added by UX involvement that they immediately secured UX headcount.
The first generation Echo Show is an Alexa-enabled touchscreen display that presents visual information to complement Alexa’s responses, plays video and makes video calls with other Echo Show users. I designed the out of box experience for this first-in-category device.
Mar 2016 to Dec 2016
Dash Button is a device the size of a pack of gum that uses Wi-Fi to instantly order items you have pre-selected from Amazon. I designed a bluetooth setup flow to reduce registration errors, created a multiple item order experience, and streamlined the button label design process.
Sept 2015 to Feb 2016
Early Career
Before working at Amazon, I practiced human centered design as a social entrepreneur, creating products and services to help immigrant farmworkers and young farmers overcome barriers to farm entry.
At 19, I co-founded the first online marketplace to match prospective farmers with organic farms seeking interns and apprentices. Our site served 30,000 active members and 3,000 farms throughout the US and 57 countries.
As a Fulbright Fellow, I partnered with Paraguay’s leading microfinance organization to globally replicate its self-sufficient farm business school model. Since 2008, the model has been successfully replicated by more than 60 schools, in 34 countries.
I founded and led an award-winning land-based farm business incubator with unified marketing and distribution operations. I helped pass legislation to legalize farm internships and partnered with local credit unions to create new financial instruments.
Awards & Press
Inventor Award | Sept. 2022
Awarded to those who have one or more Amazon patent applications filed with the US Patent Office.
Article | Jan. 2017
The Seattle Times has the largest circulation of any newspaper in Washington state and the Pacific Northwest region. Read the article
AIGA Seattle Pour Back Award | Feb. 2014
The Pour Back Award recognizes creatives doing exceptional design for good in the Pacific Northwest.
BALLE Local Economy Leaders Fellow | 2013 Cohort
BALLE (now Common Future ) Fellows are at the forefront of rebuilding communities from the ground up through creative economic development strategies that enhance the staying power of locally owned businesses.
Article | July 2012
The New York Times has won more Pulitzer prizes than any other newspaper. Kirk Johnson has covered the American West for more than a decade. Read the article
Farm to Table Feature | July 2014
Edible Seattle is the only magazine devoted exclusively to food in the Puget Sound region.
Change Agent | Dec. 2011
The Christian Science Monitor features select "change agents" in its ongoing series "People Making a Difference: ordinary people taking action for extraordinary change." Read the feature article.
Grand Prize & 2 Audience Choice Awards | Feb. 2011
SVP Fast Pitch is a business pitch competition for innovative nonprofit and for-profit social impact entrepreneurs – organizations that are solving today’s important social problems and making a positive impact in the Greater Puget Sound area.
U.S. Student Grantee | Aug. 2007
The Fulbright Program, founded by United States Senator J. William Fulbright in 1946, was established to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries through the exchange of persons, knowledge, and skills. It awards U.S. citizens scholarships to study, conduct research, or exercise their talents abroad. It is one of the most prestigious award programs in the world.
Recommendations
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“Intelligence, Rigor, Leadership: Sarita has continually impressed me with her ability to break down complex topics, synthesize solutions, and clearly communicate with peers and stakeholders. She's a natural and independent leader who has earns the trust of peers and stakeholders and they seek her guidance on a variety of topics. Her curiosity enables her to deal with a level of complexity and ambiguity that's not for everyone.”
Tim Gray, Sr UX Mgr
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“Sarita is very open and passionate about learning things in different areas, which I think is the fundamental requirement for creativity. She thrives in ambiguity, finds high level analogical patterns and applies them to new problems. She's also a great partner: vocally self-critical, contemplative, thoughtful, self-aware, constantly evaluating how she communicates and how she could improve."
Rob Haitani, Sr UX Mgr
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“Sarita provides decisive optionality for the teams she supports. This is unique among UX designers that I have worked with. She has the ability to put herself in the shoes of customers, content partners, and internal Amazon stakeholders and produce designs that cater to each party in a balanced way. By providing multiple options with coherent perspectives, she makes decisions easy for the group.”
Sarah Hobbs, Product Director
Portraits ✍️
