For the past 8+ years, I have worked at the intersection of customer experience research, product design, and business strategy— predominately working to design transportation systems and places that encourage more sustainable behaviors.
Seeking to understand the needs of all stakeholders and customers, I help organizations navigate towards systemic and sustainable (environmental and financial) growth.
links to selected work
Designing a B2B SaaS solution to manage streets safely & sustainablyRe-designing civic services to be more equitable AND sustainable
Nudging sustainable consumer decisions with behavioral design
Reducing commuter emissions through data-driven decision-making
Measuring the impact of street transformation pop-ups
Publishing best practices on designing streets for kids
Re-designing streets to save pedestrian lives
Launching the first-ever lifespan methodology for e-scooters (link to report)
core skills
Sustainable service design
Visual design (Adobe CC & Figma UI)
Urban design for all ages & abilities
Agile management
Market strategy
Making the case for safety
UX research
Measuring & evaluating impact
Iterative prototyping
let’s connect
@katgowland on all socials
e: katgowland1@gmail.com
A multi-disciplinary humanity-centered-designer at the intersection of research and strategy— passionate about cities, behavior change, and addressing the climate crisis.
quicklinks to selected work
Co-designing a safe & sustainable way to manage trafficA roadmap for a equitable resident-government relationship
How to measure the impact of street transformation pop-up projects
Best practices on designing streets for kids
What must be considered in an e-scooter lifespan methodology?
Painting streets to save pedestrian lives
key skills & interests
Measuring & evaluating impact
Making the case for safety
Iterative prototyping
Participatory research & testing
Agile management
Visual communication design
Sustainable service design
Urban design for all ages & abilities
Market strategy
let’s connect
@katgowland on all socials
e: katgowland1@gmail.com
Reducing commuter emissions through data-driven decision-making
Project Lead, with IIT Institute of Design (ID), 2022, for IIT Sustainability Department
Context
Through an Agile Management course at IIT Institute of Design, I worked on a team of four to create a transportation emissions tracker for the IIT Sustainability Department Our team sought to develop a prototype to address the following question:
How might the IIT Sustainability Department understand and influence commuter decisions in order to track progress towards net-zero emissions?
Contributions
Using Github, Zenhub, and Mural, the team was able to effectively work in a fast-paced and aligned manner, improving competence and confidence individually and together, with minimal synchronous meeting time.
In one of our early sprints, the team created a service blueprint on Mural to align on what needed to be done to achieve our goal.
We then collaboratively built the management system, managed coordination with the client, created and managed a survey with a pilot population of the IIT student body, and created a working prototype of an emissions tracker.
Given prior understanding I had about secondary resources we could leverage emissions assumptions per mode from, I took on the bulk of the responsibility to build the working prototype: a carbon emissions tracker for IIT student commuters.
Capabilities
Sustainable service design | Agile management | Measuring & evaluating impact | Iterative prototyping
Outcomes
This tracker was shared with the IIT Sustainability Department and is used to fill a gap in their organizational capabilities today.