I'm a product interaction designer, UX writer, team lead, user researcher, and game designer who's obsessed with the narrative of it all.
I've worked across the entire UX continuum over the past couple decades, mostly as a UX Lead, and I've found I work best on dedicated product teams, combining a round-table approach to tasks with design mentorship to elevate the people around me, and the projects we work on together.
I'm a sucker for a well-researched persona, a thoughtful user scenario, and an inclusive, moderated usability test.
Check out my UX process! I've been fine-tuning it since 2012.
Max Paprika
My product design workshop is now open!
Experioso is a 1-day workshop on the research and design process, as well as an ongoing consultation package for product teams that don't need full-time design work. I've been giving the workshop for years to kick off my contract work, and now I'm offering it as its own service to help teams better understand how research and design are incorporated into the product development process.
If you're looking to improve how your team approaches gathering user needs, crafting product strategy, designing prototypes, moderating usability testing, or socializing your designs with stakeholders, you should check it out!
Experience!
UX Designer at Inventables
January 2024 — April 2024
Focus: Easel
UX Lead at Prime Therapeutics
March 2022 — September 2023
Focus: Prime PBM (internal)
UX Designer at Aanmelder
October 2021 — July 2022
Focus: Event management
UX Designer at Nike
November 2018 — November 2020
Focus: NikeNow dashboard (internal)
UX & Brand Manager at Color Treats
2015 — 2022
Focus: SalonBot
Product UX Lead at NWEA
October 2013 — January 2015
Focus: Learning Contiunuum
UX & Information Designer at Intel
April 2012 — March 2013
Focus: ACE sales & marketing dashboard (internal)
Game Designer & Creative Lead at Kitewing Studio
2011 — Present
Most recent release: Seasonspree
Creative Cofounder at Revisu
September 2011 — April 2012
Focus: Core product, growth & onboarding
Skills!
Interaction design
User research
Scenario writing
Game design
Custom tool design
UX writing
User flows & wireframing
Prototyping
Usability testing
Data visualization
Presentation design
Design socialization
Workshop facilitation
Team leadership & mentorship
Video editing & production
Design systems
Typography
Branding & logo design
Some of my work!
My favorite recently-published game:
Seasonspree
My favorite user research case study:
SalonBot
My favorite redesign assignment:
Division 2 in-game menu design
My favorite project nobody asked for but everybody needed:
Nike inventory audit wizard
Talks & Presentations!
Tech Sparks Microtalk: The Product Design Process for Non-designers
June 2026 at Rose City Techies
Presentation: The Human Approach to Writing for Humans
September 2023 at the Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon
IGS Microtalk: Creating Custom Development Tools
March 2023 at the Game Developers Conference
Other projects!
Demospree
An annual game demo streaming marathon
The UX Writing Desk
A collection of posts on UX writing & communication
Get in touch!
Max@MaxPaprika.com
Tiny disclaimer: I'm in the process of getting my name changed, so a lot of the work here might have my old name on it.