Hello!
I am Jo Barnes, a designer
from marvellous Melbourne, Australia
I'm an experienced and well-rounded product and information designer, dedicated to creating hospitable, easy-to-use interfaces that facilitate smooth everyday transactions and rich learning experiences.
I particularly love working with patterns, systems and flows and to make complex information accessible and optimally useful.
What I can do for you
I've an abundance of experience designing in a broad range of contexts—including education, community services, product design, human resources, information technology, publishing and ecommerce. I've worked end-to-end managing the full design process on many projects, and contributed as a design specialist on others. I am happy to contribute wherever I can to creating user interfaces that help people get things done efficiently and, wherever possible, enjoyably!
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Research, strategy & testing
- Requirements gathering
- Value proposotion design
- Contextual research
- User research and testing
- Functional testing
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Digital design & development
- Sketching and wireframing
- UI mock-ups and prototypes
- Functional specifications
- Accessible, flexible, cross-platform web interfaces
- CMS websites - including Squiz Matrix and WordPress
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Content & IA strategy
- Content planning and templates
- Information architecture (IA) planning and testing
- Search engine optimisation (SEO)
- Social media strategy
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Training & documentation
- Style guides and pattern libraries
- Intranets, wikis and knowledge bases
- Training documentation
- One-on-one and small group training
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Forms & template design
- Database user interface customisation
- Accessible web, PDF and Word forms
- Template design
- Admin interfaces for managing content
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Publication & document design
- Newsletters
- Reports
- Magazines
- Books
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Illustration & image editing
- Illustration and art direction
- Photo restoration
- Iconography
- Infographics
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Branding & identity
- Logo design
- Branding strategy
- Umbrella / family branding
- Adapting existing branding to new applications
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Promotional design
- Presentation design
- Flyers and posters
- Menus and catalogues
- Signage and wayfinding
My 8-petal process : FLOURISH
FLOURISH is an 8-step, lean and flexible process toolkit that I can adapt to any context or project, big or small. I validate with stakeholders and test with users at many stages throughout the process to ensure that the outcome stays aligned to needs.
Of course, if I am working with a team that already has an established process I can fit in with that too! I am very flexible.
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Foundations
This is the seeding stage: establishing what is to be grown, germinating an idea and/or identifying the problem/s that need to be solved and opportunities available. It usually involves interviewing stakeholders, reviewing existing materials and previous research, user surveys or true intent tests, establishing scope, and feasability / viability reviews.
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Learn & prepare
This involves learning more about the specific problem/s and their context through user research, as well as industry and competitor research. Preparing task flows and user journeys. Setting up analytics.
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Organise & define
Synthesising research, project planning, resource allocation, return briefs. Information architecture planning. Setting-up project tracking and communication tools.
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Unbridled ideation
Generating ideas for solutions, keeping an open mind and keeping it loose and flowing. This may involve sketching, brainstorming, storyboards and collaborative design workshops.
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Refining through prototypes
Once preferred directions have been chosen, this stage involves refining and better articulating these ideas through rounds of refined prototypes - including gathering feedback from stakeholders, testing with users and making fixes and improvements based on this.
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Implement & systematise
Building templates, UI components, pattern libraries, image libraries, integrating into CMS, populating content and QA testing.
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Set sail & track bearings
Launch product, marketing, monitor feedback and analytics, measuring success and identifying where there is room for improvements.
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Habitate & renovate
Build knowledge base and resource libraries, face-to-face training for site maintainers, continue to monitor user feedback, continue to make iterative improvements and fix bugs.