Staff Designer · 20+ years · SF Bay Area Open to work

I take products from 0 1.

A staff designer with the skillset of an engineer. I take products from idea to shipped and own the whole stack — research, UX, design, front-end, and the data pipelines behind it. 20+ years in UX; lead-level work across LinkedIn, Mercedes-Benz, Amazon Care, and Intuitive Surgical.

LinkedIn · DCIM
Case-study artifact
20+ yrs · previously
LinkedInMercedes-BenzAmazon CareIntuitive Surgical KESTREL — independent
Recognition
Best in KLAS 2021 · Apixio HCC Identifier Webby Nominee 2018 · Well+Good Webby Nominee 2013 · Oscura
01 Selected work products

Lead-level product work.

Products across automotive, medical devices, health-tech, and infrastructure — the kind where getting it wrong isn't an option, and I owned the outcome, not just the screens.

DCIM · infrastructure
DCIM 3D suite model
01 / INFRASTRUCTURE
LinkedIn
Design Engineer
DCIM — data-center infrastructure

Founding member of LinkedIn's Infrastructure UX team — designing and building the internal tools that keep the data centers running.

  • DCIM Burndown — capacity and power planning across the global fleet.
  • Floorplan — a suite reconstructed from its CAD file, with power, cooling, and network layered on.
  • InOps & InDemand — device-lifecycle workflows and demand forecasting across $1.4B+ in annual infrastructure.
Data-dense UXDesign + build
Read the case study →
Active Parking Assist · MBUX
Mercedes Active Parking Assist HMI
02 / AUTOMOTIVE HMI
Mercedes-Benz
Senior UX Designer
GeN6 automated parking

Principal UX designer for GeN6 automated parking — computer-vision and sensor-fusion parking that finds a space and steers into it, keeping the driver oriented and in control.

  • Owned the parking HMI end to end — space search, surround view, and guided maneuver.
  • Built a proximity and trajectory language readable at a glance.
  • Also redesigned Modes — in-vehicle AI personalization in the 2025 S-Class.
Automotive HMIAutomation UX
Read the case study →
in-home nurse dispatch
Amazon Care in-home nurse dispatch
03 / HEALTH-TECH
Amazon Care
Senior UX Designer
Clinician–patient intersection

I led the clinician–patient intersection at Amazon Care — the virtual visit, the hand-off to in-home care, and the tools on both sides that make the connection work.

  • Designed the moments where patient and clinician meet — visit, decision, and hand-off.
  • Made the in-home nurse dispatch trackable, like watching a ride approach.
  • Helped define the roadmap to scale the service toward millions of patients.
Service designClinical UX
Read the case study →
surgeon proficiency
Surgeon proficiency telematics
04 / MEDICAL DEVICE
Intuitive Surgical
Design Lead
Surgeon tooling & engagement

The tools that keep da Vinci surgeons proficient after training — practice, telematics-based remediation, resources, and remote CEU — so a trained surgeon stays on the robot instead of reverting to traditional laparoscopy.

  • Led a team of three across the full surgeon-engagement surface.
  • Measured proficiency against a baseline and routed weaknesses to targeted drills.
  • Cut surgeon churn 23% — pre-AI, years before that analytics became standard.
Design leadershipMed-device UX
Read the case study →
02 Independent studio KESTREL

And on my own — I design, build, and ship whole products solo.

Under my studio, KESTREL. Every one of these is live software I took from brand to deployed app by myself. Real links, real sites.

03 How I work

One person, the whole stack.

I take a product from a rough idea to something real — research it, design the experience, build the front-end, and wire the data pipelines behind it. Internal tools or production for the masses. Detailed, curious, data-driven, and entrepreneurial about all of it.

01

Idea → research

  • Frame the problem worth solving
  • User research + data
  • The art of the possible
  • Systems & service thinking
02

UX & design

  • Product & UX design
  • Complex, safety-critical & data-dense
  • Prototyping & interaction
  • Design systems
03

Build & ship

  • Front-end — HTML / CSS / JS, SVG, 3D
  • Data pipelines & integration
  • Gen AI + CLI in the loop
  • Deploy — internal or production

I can push pixels like a designer and write code like an engineer — and having both is exactly what lets me point generative AI at the grunt work of each, keeping me efficient at both crafts. Stakeholders refine on a real, working product early, not a mockup, and it ships in fewer sprints.

Designed across
WebSoftware productsWearablesMobile devicesRoboticsChatbotsAI voice assistantsAutomationDesign systems
Let's talk

Let's talk about the role.

Open to staff product-design roles — ideally 0→1, where design and engineering meet.

tim@heykestrel.com → Download résumé ↓