Susan Reese

UX Design Project Manager : Palo Alto, CA : Talent Bridge/Temp-to-Perm

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:01:53 EST

UX Design Project Manager (User Experience Team)

Aquent’s mobile client is seeking an exceptional User Experience Project Manager to support their UI/UX team. This role is responsible for developing and managing end-to-end project plans and ensuring on-time delivery of UI and visual design from the User Experience Team.

The Project Manager provides hands-on management during design, development, testing, implementation and post implementation phases of digital product design. The Project Manager will be managing multiple projects across the team at any given time, and will be expected to schedule and facilitate meetings for design reviews/sign off to support project milestones.

Job description:

• Drive the design schedule and process for both near and long term products. Create and execute project plans for the timely creation, review, approval and delivery of UX deliverables.

• Develop project milestones and collaborate with UX Director to prioritize and define the timeline and project goals.

• Schedule and facilitate all creative review meetings. Summarize meeting minutes and action items from meeting and follows up on completion.

• Collaborate cross-functionally within the design team to ensure all project deliverables are met, on time, and high quality.

• Communicate progress and issues of product status, launch readiness, and portfolio between product operation and the design team;

What you'll need to be successful:
• You are very detailed and organized. Live to ship, but you also have the flexibility to think on you feet, adapt quickly to shifting priorities, and do whatever it takes to get things done. Experience maintaining an Excel spreadsheet inclusive of deliverables and tracking the status of all projects.

• You don’t need to be a designer, but you are attuned to the concerns that matter to their work. You are able to orchestrate and customize a project timeline that maintains a positive balance between creative integrity and shipping on time.

• You have experience managing deliverables for creative/ UX teams and ideally experience shipping consumer facing mobile devices (tablet or mobile phones)

• You have the ability to build relationships across the organization, both with the immediate design team, and reaching throughout the company with all stakeholders involved.
• Project management experience, specifically managing software/digital related projects, end-to-end lifecycle.

Temp to Perm opportunity

Information Architect Specialist : Palo Alto, CA : Talent Bridge/Temp-to-Perm

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:01:59 EST

Aquent’s Palo Alto, CA client is in search of a passionate Information Architect who is excited about shaping the future. You can easily simplify a complex design problem into a delightful and engaging experience. You are a self-starter and can seamlessly work in a distributed team environment. You can communicate the value of user experience and UX activities to business, design and technology experts in your sleep.

The IA will be primarily responsible for the site maps and site map related documents (e.g., Menu tree, navigation, etc.). This person will own complex flow designs as well. Portfolio must include site maps and flow chart examples.

The UX Architect’s responsibilities will include:
• Defining and planning the short term and long term User Experience initiatives for a product or suite of products
• Providing expert design guidance and direction throughout the product lifecycle
• Continually working with product teams to gather and synthesize usability related requirements
• Identifying and communicating any issues or risks that could impact product or user experience direction
• Ensuring all user experience deliverables are high quality and fulfill product needs
• Contributing to the existing set of templates, standards and processes that can be leveraged across the team
• Understanding the needs of end users and being the user advocate with all product team members and stakeholders
• Effectively working with Business SMEs, Product Managers and Developers to accomplish your deliverables
• Coordinating all activities of the user experience including functional design, creative and technology.
• Understanding technical impacts and constraints that should be considered with new design solutions and suggestions

Basic Qualifications:
• Bachelor's Degree required - preferably in HCI, Information Technology, Marketing or related degree
• Minimum 3 years work experience in a User Experience role
• Minimum 2 years work experience creating storyboards, wireframes, interactive prototypes and information architecture deliverables
• Minimum 1 year experience facilitating usability tests and other user research methods
• Familiar with technology packages and their impact to creating quality user experiences
• Proficient in prototyping software
• Have a portfolio of your recent work

Senior Interaction Designer : Palo Alto, CA : Talent Bridge/Temp-to-Perm

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:03:23 EST

Our Silicon Valley client has an immediate need for Senior Interaction Designers. This is a key position on their creative services team. The duration is 2-3 months with the possibility of extension and conversion as a full time employee. This opportunity is on-site only. Client is not open to remote collaboration.

Responsibilities Include:
- Collaborate with a multi-disciplinary design team for user experience planning and development.
- Help generate elegant & innovative design solutions for complex cutting edge mobile & web applications.
- Responsible for documenting applications with wireframes and comps.
- Help design and run usability testing
Qualifications:
- Solid graphic design skills
- Solid Knowledge of OmniGraffle, Visio or equivalent tool
- Knowledge of UI/UX best practices
- Knowledge of Photoshop and Illustrator
- Comfortable adapting and problem solving in a fast paced team environment
Requirements & Experience include the following:
Mobile Experience - phone & tablet - Android (will work first on phone then tablet)
- Will work on wireframes, structure & flow
- Large company pedigree
- Formal design training
- 2-3 yrs. mobile experience
- 5-6 yrs. total UX experience

What is most important is the need for qualified talent. Client is prepared to make decisions quickly to get talent started. Talent must be available to begin immediately.

For immediate consideration, please forward your resume along with a link to your online portfolio. You MUST have a portfolio to be considered.

Senior Interaction Designer : Palo Alto, CA : Talent Bridge/Temp-to-Perm

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:03:23 EST

Graphic Web Designer (3772) : Downtown Los Angeles : Temporary

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:05:35 EST

Aquent’s Downtown Los Angeles Utility Company is seeking a Graphic Designer for a 4-month onsite contract.

Qualifications:
Graphic designer with strong web design experience. Would be able to take a style guide in Photoshop and create new fully designed pages based on the style provided. Must be very detailed oriented. We are looking for someone who can follow a style guide to the pixel and hand off organized, layered Photoshop files to our developer.

Responsibilities:
- Develops graphical layout, design and user interface elements for new Web site projects
- Updates or modifies graphical layout design and user interface elements for existing Web sites
- Participates in collaborative project management and staff meetings with Web team members, clients & IT
- Supports Web Business Technologists and Programmer in developing new site layouts
- Performs related design and coordination activities, e.g., managing photo releases, vendor image agreement & contracts, etc.
- This is an individual and team contributor providing specialized user interface and graphical design knowledge.

Senior User Researcher : Palo Alto, CA : Talent Bridge/Temp-to-Perm

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:08:50 EST

Aquent’s client located in Palo Alto is seeking an experienced User Researcher. Their UX Team is looking for a highly experienced and motivated user researcher to raise the bar on user research. This position will be responsible for designing and conducting user research for various content areas of their mobile, tablet and web digital platform.

This research will inform concepts and design direction, help determine measurable and actionable user experience metrics for various content areas, and generally help teams better understand the behavioral usage patterns which users will engage in when using their devices, as well as, anticipate interaction issues.

Candidates with a deep understanding of Human Factors approaches and perspectives are key for this role, in conjunction with solid experience from executing user research focused on interaction design areas. Demonstrated experience of designing, running and communicating Human Factors oriented research, such as, touch targets, input methods, perceived response times, measurement of cognitive load parameters etc is necessary.

Ability to dive into technical details, and the understanding of how touch UI’s are developed and perceived by end-users is critical for this role. Must have experience working closely with design technology and prototyping, to drive effective user research.

The ideal candidate will have a deep understanding of user research methods and best practices, experience from designing and shipping large software platforms; over several release cycles. The client is a fast moving organization, and the successful candidate will therefore need to be nimble, creative, and have a pragmatic approach to product user research.

Experience from working with first generation software products is highly desirable, as this will help the user researcher to prioritize research activities and proactively identify important areas in the designs which will require user research guidance.

A high-level of ambiguity, solid experience with heuristic approaches will be necessary for this role. This position requires the ability to work with minimal direction, as well as, the capacity to work quickly while delivering high-quality outputs. This position will work on overlapping projects, so strong organizational skills with the ability to multi-task are critical.

Basic Qualifications
· 5+ years of proven success conducting user research in a large-scale software platform settings, or equivalent.
· A strong portfolio demonstrating past work experience and deliverables (e.g.: study plans, reports).
· BS degree in psychology, cognitive science, Human Factors, HCI, or similar.
· Extensive experience operating as a senior individual contributor in a user research role.

Preferred Qualifications
· Strong background in Human factors related user research, with demonstrated results.
· Having shipped multiple releases of software platform products, preferably consumer products, such as, tablet or smartphone platforms.
· Excellent mix of qualitative and quantitative methodologies
· Solid understanding of the software development cycle

Powerpoint Designer : Irvine, California : Temporary

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 18:30:03 EST

Our Irvine client is seeking a very strong contract Powerpoint Designer. Candidate must sit on-site in Irvine. This is an on-going need.

Seeking a candidate with a corporate background and clean style.

Web Applications Developer : Wilsonville, Oregon : Temporary

Mon, 14 Jan 2013 13:00:08 EST

Aquent’s technology client located in Wilsonville, Oregon is seeking a Web Applications Developer for a 1-year contract. This role is on-site only.

Job Description:

•Work in a fast-paced marketing environment to deliver the technical components of a compelling customer web experience using a combination of server-side and client-side technologies including Perl, JavaScript and CSS.

•Work closely with marketing teams, offering technical input on project scoping.

•Generate new website features and help maintain a large and long-lived code base

•Develop unit tests for new features

•Understand and apply new web, html5 and mobile technologies, as necessary

•Function as part of an Agile team (estimating, retrospectives, etc.)

•Ability to demonstrate client-side functionality in JavaScript, including familiarity with jQuery framework

•Ability to demonstrate web features with CSS including authoring tools like SASS/Compass

•Demonstrate ability with Linux web server environments

•Demonstrate ability with creating, implementing and consuming Web Services

•Ability to demonstrate familiarity with SQL (MySQL) and noSQL (Mongo, Couch) databases

•Demonstrate ability to debug and troubleshoot technology problems rapidly and work with third party software

•Demonstrate ability to write and execute test scripts

•Ability to demonstrate knowledge of software version control systems (Subversion, Git)

•2-5 years web development

•Experience in coding Adobe Site Catalyst or Ektron a plus

**Must be able to provide example of previous work for evaluation**

Android Software Engineer, Music Team : Palo Alto, CA : Temporary

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 18:00:05 EST

Our mobile client is Palo Alto, Ca is seeking an Android Software Engineer for their music division.
The Music Team is responsible for building the clients for Music. This service utilizes server software components to mobilize a customer's music.

The role for this position is to create mobile applications on Android to support this service. You'll be involved in the full software development life cycle, from requirements definition to customer delivery. Technical responsibilities include: software design, effort I estimation, implementation, unit testing, integration, and bug fixes. Our Software Engineers own their product and work closely with the Quality Assurance group to ensure a successful end user experience.

Desired skills:
• BS/MS in Computer Science or any equivalent • Work experience with object-oriented programming (C++, Java, and/or Objective C) • Android experience

Linux Developer : Torrance, California : Temporary

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 18:30:05 EST

Our Technology client located in Torrance, California is seeking a Linux Developer for 3 month contract.

Responsibilities:
- Work as a lead Linux developer for customizing distributions for our target boards
- Help integrate open source and third party software components with custom Linux platforms
- Lead activities to customize, troubleshoot, and optimize above software components
- Transfer knowledge of above activities to team members and junior engineers
- Participate in design, development and debugging software components in-house
- Compile necessary documentation for software architecture and design

Requirements:
- Strong knowledge of kernel level configuration
- Experience with customizing kernel level modules and drivers
- Experience with porting Linux kernel and libraries to a different SoC or architecture
- Strong C/C++ programming knowledge with hands on experience
- Hands on experience with scripting languages, Pearl, Java, and XML
- Ability to modify and customize system build processes
- Knowledge of audio, video and multimedia streaming technologies
- Experience with developing, customizing libraries for above technologies
- Experience with communication I/O development using USB, WiFi, BT, Ethernet, I2C, GPIO and Serial.

Duration/Assignment
- Initial engagement is expected to be about 3 months
- Contractor is required to be working with the team onsite in Torrance

iOS Developer : Torrance, California : Temporary

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 18:30:05 EST

Our technology client located in Torrance, Ca is seeking an onsite iOS Developer for a 2-6 month contract beginning immediately.

The responsibilities and requirements include the following:
* Design and develop application on iOS devices with Objective-C language.
* Independently implement graphic and voice based user interface to meet the requirements of design specification.
* Should have hand on experience in developing application using native controls, UI frameworks, interface builder, event handling, etc.
* Should be familiar with iOS inter-application communication.
* Should be familiar with iOS multi-touch event handling and custom gesture recognizer.
* Experience on C++ is preferred.
* Experience in developing applications that require integrating with 3rd party libraries is preferred.
* Knowledge in HMI guidelines on both automobile and smartphone platform is preferred.
* Experience in implementing text-to-speech (TTS) is preferred.

Interactive Designer : Los Angeles, California : Temporary

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 15:30:04 EST

Aquent’s technology client is seeking an Interactive Designer. As an Interactive Designer, you will be responsible for the design and development of innovative, high quality global interactive campaigns, including banners, mini-sites, and email blasts. Strive to learn and adapt to emerging production processes continuously in an extremely fast-paced environment. Collaboratively develop process and workflow.

Work closely with the Front-End Developers, Interactive Producers, and Global Marketing to ensure design objectives and timelines are met. Support marketing efforts by creating interactive design assets for Belkin.com as well as in support of our social media promotions, and so on.

Responsibilities include:
· Support marketing efforts by designing both static and animated online assets including email blasts, static homepage marquees and promo modules, flash banners, mini-sites, and social media components.
· After Effects video editing on as-needed basis.
· Have the ability to adapt existing print/packaging collateral into an interactive medium.
· Demonstrate an exemplary work ethic; be super organized and detail-oriented.
· Collaborate with team members to develop innovative designs.
· Responsible for understanding the marketplace, competition, industry, etc. to ensure optimal design value and interactivity is achieved.
· Adhere to the established budgets and timelines,
· Maintain and evolve the brand through adherence to the brand guidelines.

Requirements:
Four-year college degree in Graphic Design.
A minimum of 6 years of proven experience in interactive design.
Solid proficiency in Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, and After Effects.
Global brand experience is a big plus.
Good written and verbal English communication skills.
Experience:
· Concisely communicate with stakeholders in Branding, Product Management, Marketing, E-Commerce, and Executive Management.
· Perform all other duties as assigned or required.
· Maintain a safe and clean work environment.
· Understand and follow company rules and regulations.
· Perform all other duties as assigned and required.

Interactive Designer : Los Angeles, California : Temporary

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 15:30:04 EST

Aquent’s technology client is seeking an Interactive Designer. As an Interactive Designer, you will be responsible for the design and development of innovative, high quality global interactive campaigns, including banners, mini-sites, and email blasts. Strive to learn and adapt to emerging production processes continuously in an extremely fast-paced environment. Collaboratively develop process and workflow.

Work closely with the Front-End Developers, Interactive Producers, and Global Marketing to ensure design objectives and timelines are met. Support marketing efforts by creating interactive design assets for Belkin.com as well as in support of our social media promotions, and so on.

Responsibilities include:
· Support marketing efforts by designing both static and animated online assets including email blasts, static homepage marquees and promo modules, flash banners, mini-sites, and social media components.
· After Effects video editing on as-needed basis.
· Have the ability to adapt existing print/packaging collateral into an interactive medium.
· Demonstrate an exemplary work ethic; be super organized and detail-oriented.
· Collaborate with team members to develop innovative designs.
· Responsible for understanding the marketplace, competition, industry, etc. to ensure optimal design value and interactivity is achieved.
· Adhere to the established budgets and timelines,
· Maintain and evolve the brand through adherence to the brand guidelines.

Requirements:
Four-year college degree in Graphic Design.
A minimum of 6 years of proven experience in interactive design.
Solid proficiency in Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, and After Effects.
Global brand experience is a big plus.
Good written and verbal English communication skills.

What you’ve done
· Concisely communicate with stakeholders in Branding, Product Management, Marketing, E-Commerce, and Executive Management.
· Perform all other duties as assigned or required.
· Maintain a safe and clean work environment.
· Understand and follow company rules and regulations.
· Perform all other duties as assigned and required.