Karl G. Vochatzer

 

Email:              karl@vochatzer.com

Phone:             512.940.9392

Nationality:      United States of America

 

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

August 2005 to present

Company:      LSI Logic – Austin, Texas

Role:         User Experience Designer

                        

-Creating the user experience design of enterprise storage management software by designing the graphical user interfaces and conducting usability evaluations.

 

-Lead designer for the current versions of the SANtricity Storage Manager software and also for the next generation product that converges our two leading products into one common and cohesive user experience.

 

February 2005 to May 2005

Client:       Prudential Real Estate and Relocation – Scottsdale, Arizona

Agency:    Ajilon Consulting

Role:         User Experience Design Consultant

                        

-Designed the user experience design for enhancements to the O2 Phase 2 Relocation Center web-enabled applications, and wrote the functional and behavioral specifications of those designs (including task flow diagrams and web page mock-ups).

 

-Consulted and contributed on user experience design and usability principles for other projects such as the redesign of the Prudential Home Connections web site and the initial design of the Prudential Global Service Platform (GSP) project.

 

June 2002 to September 2004

Client:       Lockheed Martin Information Technology – Baltimore, Maryland

Agency:    Global Commerce and Information

Role:         User-Centered Design and Usability Consultant

                                                

-Analyzed, researched and consulted on user experience design and usability issues for the Social Security Administration (SSA) web sites and applications.

 

-Facilitated joint application design (JAD) sessions with end users and systems developers to determine requirements for the Case Management Processing System (CPMS) of the disability process, and created graphical user interface (GUI) designs of CPMS to meet those requirements.

 

-Conducted task analysis and created GUI designs for the Electronic Folder project and for the Policy Implementation Processing System (PIPS).

 

July 2003 to August 2003

Client:       Sabre – Southlake, TX

Role:         Freelance Usability Consultant

 

-Conducted a comprehensive usability expert review of six Sabre web sites and applications and made design recommendations for the issues I uncovered. The results were compiled with two other usability experts. The Sabre sites were: Evoya, Agency eServices, Agent 59, .Res, Virtually There, and GetThere.

 

February 2002 to March 2002

Client:       Medialab Solutions BVAmsterdam, The Netherlands

Role:         Freelance Usability Consultant

                                          

-Conducted a usability expert review of the AquaBrowser associative search engine as applied to the Dutch National Library web site and made design recommendations for the issues I uncovered.

 

April 1999 to January 2001

Company:      Netpliance (then TippingPoint; now 3Com) - Austin, Texas

Role:         Lead User Experience Designer and Usability Program Lead

 

-Created the user experience designs for all content and applications of the i-opener Internet Appliance, an Internet appliance targeted specifically for novice users.

 

-Communicated the designs to visual designers, application developers, tech writers and executive management through specification documents, sketches, wireframe prototypes, site maps, and presentations.

 

-Ensured implementation of the designs with the development team, and tracked any deviations in the development code for correction.

 

-Managed the usability program for i-opener by conducting usability evaluations to ensure a quality user experience and by contracting usability professionals whenever necessary.

 

January 1998 to April 1999

Company:      c2o Interactive Architects (an EDS Company) - Dallas, Texas

Role:         Information Architect and Strategist

                                                

-Information Architecture (IA) for a variety of web sites such as Elle Magazine, Travel Holiday, and Sony Metreon. Tasks included designing the structure, organization, navigation, and nomenclature of site content for clients, and creating paper and HTML prototypes of the site content, layout and user interaction models.

 

-Usability Engineering and Evaluation of client projects. Tasks included conducting user-centered design methodologies including user and task analysis, GUI design reviews, and usability tests of the information architecture of web sites.

 

-HCI Strategy Consultation. Tasks included participating in a multi-disciplinary team to research corporate client and user group needs, and gathering user requirements and business process information for the online strategy of client web sites and applications.


June 1993 to January 1998

Company:      Sabre (formerly a subsidiary of American Airlines) - Fort Worth, Texas

Role:         Lead GUI Designer, User Researcher, and Usability Engineer

 

-Co-founded the Sabre Business Travel Solutions (BTS) organization, and re-engineered the corporate travel management process within the industry. Awarded patents in the USA (patent no. 6,442,526) and internationally for the co-invention of the Sabre BTS corporate travel management system.

 

-Researched corporate travel management within Fortune 500 companies in the USA and England (for localization), conducted user and task analyses, converted research results into product concept prototypes, gathered user feedback on concepts, and transformed feedback into business requirements.

 

-Iteratively designed the graphical user interfaces and conducted usability evaluations for the Sabre BTS product suite, and then authored the GUI specifications for development.

 

-Prior to co-founding Sabre BTS, conducted usability tests, design walk-throughs, and heuristic evaluations on travel industry software and hardware products in the Usability Design Center.

 

February 1992 to March 1993

Company:      IBM Corporation - Charlotte, North Carolina

Role:         Human Factors Scientist

 

-Conducted usability evaluations and consultation services for IBM software, hardware and documentation in the Human Factors Lab of the Charlotte facility.

 

EDUCATION

Master of Science Degree (1991)

Iowa State University - Ames, Iowa

Cognitive Psychology with an emphasis in research design

 

Bachelor of Arts Degree (1987)

Baylor University - Waco, Texas

Psychology

PUBLICATIONS

Isensee, S., Kalinoski, K., & Vochatzer, K. (2000). Designing Internet Appliances at Netpliance. Book chapter in Information Appliances and Beyond. Edited by Eric Bergman. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers.

 

Dark, V. J., Vochatzer, K., & VanVoorhis, B. A. (1996). Semantic and spatial components of selective attention. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 22, 63-81.

 

Vochatzer, K. G. & Blick, K. A. (1989). Levels of processing and the retention of paired associates. Perceptual & Motor Skills 69, 349-350.

 

CONFERENCE PAPERS AND PRESENTATIONS

Vochatzer, K. (1999). Design challenges of the i-opener information appliance. Presented at the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society (HFES) annual meeting. Houston, TX.

 

Dark, V. J. & Vochatzer, K. (1992). Selective processing in a pronunciation task: Examining the time course of facilitation and inhibition in semantic priming. Presented at the Midwestern Psychological Association annual meeting. Chicago, IL.

 

Vochatzer, K. & Dark, V. J. (1991). Semantic context enhances the perceptibility of words. Presented at The Iowa Academy of Sciences annual meeting. Dubuque, IA.

 

Silver, N. C., Gibbs, H. S., Vochatzer, K. G., & Witt, L. A. (1990). Sex and racial differences on the lethal behaviors scale. Presented at the Southwestern Psychological Association annual meeting. Dallas, TX.

 

Vochatzer, K. & Blick, K. (1989). Levels of processing and the retention of word meanings. Presented at the Southern Society of Psychology and Philosophy annual meeting. New Orleans, LA.

 

RELEVANT COMPUTER AND SOFTWARE USAGE

-Microsoft Windows operating systems

-Microsoft Office: Word, Excel, Power Point, and Outlook

-Microsoft Visio (designs, site maps, and task flow diagrams)

-Macromedia Dreamweaver (HTML editing, prototypes/wireframes, and storyboards)

-Adobe Photoshop (basic graphics editing for GUI designs and storyboard comps)

-Other tools used in the past for designing and prototyping designs (e.g., Microsoft Visual Studio, Microsoft Visual Basic, Lotus Notes and various image capture and editing software)