Hi there đź‘‹
I'm @broccolini, VP of Design at AlphaSense, former Head of Design at GitHub.
I’m a designer with an interest in systems thinking, code as a material, and inclusive design. I like to give back to the design community by speaking at conferences, occasionally writing articles and books, and when it’s safe to hang out in person, organizing the NYC chapter of the Design Systems Coalition.
At GitHub: As Head of Design I lead a cross-functional team including Product Design, Customer Research, Brand and Marketing Design, Design Infrastructure, Design Engineering, and Design Operations. My team was responsible for the end-to-end user experience of GitHub's products, and brand direction marketing campaigns and key events such as GitHub Universe.
Since joining GitHub in 2015, I led the Design Infrastructure team which developed GitHub’s design system, Primer, from CSS framework to React and Rails component libraries; and reshaped GitHub’s UX through redesigning the repository homepage, incrementally responsified desktop layouts, refreshed the visual design, introduced new ways to interact with GitHub through the command palette (in beta), and delivered one of GitHub’s most highly requested features—dark mode.
About me: I grew up in the UK and started my career in print design. In my early 20's I went back-packing to Australia and ended up living there for ~8 years, and became a citizen. I worked in government and then for a small agency that specialized in environmental and social change projects. I ended up moving to the U.S. in 2011 by way of a startup bus hackathon competition. After a few years working in tech in San Francisco I moved to NYC to work for Etsy, where I was part of a small team that built a new design system. I still live in New York with my husband and 2 cats—Leia and Chewie.
Current interests: I’m learning about what makes great leaders, reading sci-fi books, ~~learning about~~ collecting low profile mechanical keyboards, and forever interested in color.