I lead experience strategy and research for Carnival Cruise Line’s Booked Guest
Technology: The pre-cruise website, the Carnival HUB app, onboard tablets, and
some crew-facing tools. I built the research practice, scaled the design team, and work with
Product, Engineering, and Business leaders (VP-level and above) to align experience
design with business goals. My background is equal parts craft and leadership: I
run ethnographic studies in the field, and I’ve spent a decade building the teams
and frameworks that turn what we learn into direction others can execute.
01 — Leadership, Innovation & Business Impact
Building the practice
Two UX teams, a decade apart: Standing up a UX and research practice from a single
seat, and doing it once before at Univision.
Aligning user needs with business needs.
Building Carnival’s UX & Research practice
Carnival Cruise Line · 2016 – present · Contract UX Designer → UX Manager → Sr. Manager, User Experience
The task
Shape the end-to-end booked guest experience across a digital ecosystem serving 5M+ guests and 36,000 crew. And build the team and research capability to do it.
What I built
Grew UX from one designer to a team of 14. Worked with various agencies during hiring and interview process. Stood up a scalable research practice: Design-thinking methodology, AI-enabled tools, usability testing, journey mapping, and continuous guest-feedback loops. Currently leading efforts to build our Ops practice for Product Ops, Design Ops, and Research Ops.
Executive influence
Partner with VP-level leaders and above to shape strategic decisions. Turn complex findings into clear frameworks and direction that product, design, and engineering teams execute with consistency. Test concepts early in ideation, reducing downstream rework and costly late-stage change.
Developing people
Lead and develop a team of 14 user-experience designers; mentored graphic designers into UX professionals. Big Brothers Big Sisters mentor since 2021.
Building the UX practice at Univision
Univision Interactive Media · 2000 – 2016 · Web Designer → Art Director → Sr. Art Director, Digital Product
Scope
Directed UX strategy and execution for Univision’s core digital platforms and local TV and Radio platforms, including the award-winning 2014 World Cup site and the UVideos OTT app.
Team
Built and managed a team of 5 UX designers across responsive web and mobile, launching products for diverse user segments.
Recognition
Carnival HUB App Best Ship App, Porthole Readers’ Choice Awards
UVideos Best Online & Video App, Social TV Awards
World Cup 2014 Team of the Year, Cynopsis Digital Model D Awards
02 — Guest Research & Behavioral Insights
Research that changes a decision
I choose the method for the problem or question, run it in the environment where the behavior
actually happens, and carry it through synthesis to a decision someone can act on.
Method
When I reach for it
In practice
Ethnographic / contextual research
Understand what guests do and why, in a natural environment with real tasks
5 to 8 day study aboard Carnival ships (user testing and/or interviews); embarkation studies at PortMiami
Intercept sessions
Get feedback from a specific target audience
Set up at a high traffic area on the ship or at PortMiami
Live-product usability testing
See where real tasks break, moderated think-aloud
Carnival HUB app in production or Prototypes
Shadowing & observation
Watch frontline staff–guest interactions unfold
Observations done at the specific ship area relevant to project (e.g. Guest Services desk)
Staff & stakeholder interviews
Frontline reality and business context
Shoreside stakeholders, onboard crew from specific departments; embarkation employees
Surveys
Put scale behind qualitative themes
E.g. 91-response fleet staff survey on shore excursions
Synthesis
Turn observation into direction
Affinity mapping, proto-personas, journey maps, problem statements, MoSCoW
CASE STUDY: Digital Boarding Pass
PortMiami, Terminal D · Carnival Sunrise · Feb 2026
The question
Does the newly launched Digital Boarding Pass work better for guests and terminal staff than the printed pass, and what’s blocking adoption?
Method & why
Ethnographic intercept interviews against the live product in production. Short one-on-one and group sessions at the terminal, plus staff interviews in the break room.
Participants
38 guests across 30 sessions (14 aged 20–35, 16 aged 35–55, 8 aged 55+); mostly iPhone; several first-time cruisers; some cross-brand. 8 terminal staff across 6 sessions, tenure 2–10+ years.
Synthesis
Broken down by journey stage: Discovery, download, content, terminal experience.
The insight
The pass itself tests as “easy, fast, familiar”, Guests compared it to airline passes; staff say scanning beats printed barcodes. Adoption, not usability, is the problem. Awareness comes from a pre-cruise email. Higher-tier and older guests lag. One person often downloads for the whole group.
Decisions it changed
Add the terminal letter to the pass. Its absence was the single most-repeated pain point. Define a manager-escalation path for name mismatches so staff never take a guest’s phone to manager's desk (usually done with paper boarding pass version). Fix specific bugs (Gold-tier white-on-white text on iPhone, oversized Android icons, barcode opening a separate screen). Prioritize surfacing the pass inside Online Check-In and evaluate how to get high tier and older guest adoption.
Outcome
Staff adoption was immediate with minimal training (“scanning has been beautiful”). Guest feedback was positive, with actionable feedback on content (Teminal letter missing).
Shadowing agents at Port of Miami.
CASE STUDY: Shore Excursions
8-day sailing · Carnival Horizon · Sep–Oct 2025
The question
How do guests really research, decide on, and book shore excursions, and where should the Carnival HUB app Shore Excursion (Shorex) feature redesign focus ahead of the new XL-class ships?
Method & why
Ethnographic interviews plus brief usability testing on the live Shorex feature, run across sea days and port days so behavior could be observed in context. Triangulated with desk shadowing and a fleet-wide staff survey.
Participants
10 guest interviews (couples, families, small and large groups; first-time cruisers and first-time app users); 19 shadowed sessions at the Shore Excursions desk; 3 Shorex crew interviews; 91-response staff survey across the fleet.
Synthesis
Affinity-mapped into themes across the planning → purchase → post-purchase journey. Staff-survey open text coded and quantified: accessibility surfaced 248 times, ADA 89, app performance 212.
The insights
Guests use the app to research but some book at desk. Specific excursion detail is missing, they want crew reassurance, and they can’t split payment. Group decision-making is the norm with no tools to coordinate. Accessibility questions are constant. First-timers are anxious about getting back to the ship on time.
Decisions it changed
A recommended priority order for the redesign: Include detailed excursion information (photos, stop-by-stop detail, travel-vs-activity time) into the app; reviews in-app; live availability counts; favorites and share; port-info pages; ADA detail; coupons and flash sales in-app.
Outcome
A prioritized list of features spanning guest and crew needs, framed as input for XL / ACE-class readiness. Several previously descoped concepts were re-activated with evidence behind them.
Set up near Shore Excursions desk.
03 — Design Thinking Facilitation
Workshops, shown as artifacts
Full-day, cross-functional design-thinking sessions I design and facilitate. From
empathy through a prioritized, user-tested prototype in one room.
EmpathyDefineIdeatePrototypeTestPrioritize
The workshop structure, each stage followed by group readouts.
Ideation: Crazy 8s to one big idea.Four groups, collaborating to solve the same problem
Design Thinking Workshop: Embarkation Team
Full day · UX team (facilitator) + Product team + Carnival Embarkation team
The problem
Online Check-In had grown long and complex. The brief: brainstorm and prioritize enhancements to the Online Check-In experience.
The room
Four mixed groups of product people and frontline embarkation staff, so every persona in the room had lived the problem from a different side.
The structure
Ice-breaker → design-thinking briefing → Empathy (proto-personas: guest + agent / crew) → Define (needs, pain points, problem statements, How-Might-We) → Ideate (Crazy 8s → one big idea) → Prototype (paper user flows) → Test (cross-group think-aloud, three rounds) → global MoSCoW prioritization.
Output
Proto-personas, prioritized problem statements, three rounds of tested paper prototypes, a global MoSCoW board, and stakeholder-highlight summaries.
The lesson
The workshop’s own problem statement evolved through the activities. The team found the higher-leverage problems sat outside the original Online Check-In scope. Guest education surfaced as the biggest need.
Full day · UX team (facilitator) + Product team + stakeholders and employees across teams
The problem
Identify needs, goals, and challenges around technology and the HUB app, then ideate, test, and prioritize solutions.
The room
Cross-functional by design, split into four groups.
Output
Four main ideas were prototyped and tested with participants. Adjacent concepts also captured.
Must haveessential
Should haveimportant, not essential
Could havenice to have
Won’t havenot now
Every workshop ends with a MoSCoW prioritization, done by the main stakeholders (Excluding UX and Product teams).
04 — Speaking & Teaching
Teaching the practice at scale
A curriculum I built and teach inside Carnival, a company-wide empathy talk, and seasonal
instruction at BrainStation, all aimed at making human-centered design a shared
language, not a specialist function.
UX Series
A three-part webinar I organized with the goal of creating a culture of empathy, innovation, strategic thinking, and a user-journey centric mindset across the organization.
Series 1
Discovery & Define: Laying the Foundation
April 2025
Project setup (5 Whys, RACI, risk matrix, roadmap vs. timeline), stakeholder and user interviews, proto-personas, journey mapping, social listening, product positioning, problem statements.
Series 2
Ideation & Prioritization: From Insights to Solutions
August 2025
Divergent methods (How-Might-We, Crazy 8s, SCAMPER, mind-mapping), convergence and MoSCoW, affinity mapping, Lean Canvas, roadmapping strategy and MVP definition.
Series 3
User Test & Beyond: Testing Solutions for Development
November 2025
Hypotheses, tasks and user flows, wireframe and prototype prep, moderated usability testing, and development and post-launch measurement. AI-enabled workflows throughout.
eWOW Webinar Session: Developing Guest Empathy via UX Methods
Carnival Cruise Line · 2024 · company enablement talk
An introduction to user experience and the design-thinking process for non-designers: Empathy, define, ideate, prototype, test, mapped onto the guest journey from booking to debarkation.
UX Instructor and Panelist
BrainStation · 2024 – 2025 · seasonal
Hands-on instruction during live UX courses.
UX Instructor at BrainStation.Career panel at BrainStation.
Human-centered design webinars & workshops
Carnival Cruise Line · ongoing
Championing human-centered design across Guest Technology through recurring webinars and UX-led research efforts.
Experience Strategy and UX leader with 20+ years shaping guest experiences across the
travel and media industries. I have a proven track record of translating behavioral
research, guest insights, and competitive intelligence into strategic direction for
product ecosystems serving 5M+ users globally, leading multidisciplinary teams,
influencing executive stakeholders, and defining experiences that drive innovation and
measurable business outcomes.
My path ran from print design at the Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald,
through 16 years at Univision building digital product practice, to Carnival Cruise Line,
where I grew
the team more than tenfold.
