techspatula.com portfolio of Ruth McAfee
UX / content / interaction design
techspatula.com is the portfolio of Sydney based UX, content, and interaction designer, Ruth McAfee
- Projects
- Case studies
- Resume
- Contact
14 Gordon Street
Petersham NSW 2049
email: ruth@techspatula.com
www.techspatula.com
au.linkedin.com/in/ruthmm
December 2023 – December 2025:
Commonwealth Bank of Australia
Leading the delivery of a reimagined, assisted customer onboarding experience to meet newly drafted regulatory requirements for both individual and entity customers, within an active internal CRM renewal project involving updated architecture and a new design language. A senior, autonomous role characterised by rigorous research, experimentation with AI, cross-functional collaboration, knowledge sharing, and confident UX storytelling.
March 2022 – December 2023:
Telstra
Delivering customer experience enhancements in the authenticated and omnichannel flows of telstra.com. Interpreting complex and often highly nuanced business requirements as intuitive digital interactions for humans to use, no matter who they are or how they got there. Supporting, and leading across multiple missions in UX, design strategy, process and management, research methodology, design systems, and content.
August 2021 – February 2022:
Sitback UX Design & Web Development Agency
Leading the scoping and delivery of UX research and insights through to fully realised information architecture, service blueprinting, remote workshop design and facilitation, wireframes and associated documentation for a diverse range of customers.
Customers included:
Dept. of Education - Learner profile discovery
Dept. of Customer Service - OneCX website consolidation – customer research and IA
Dept. of Education - Out-of-classroom learning discovery
Esri Australia for Brisbane CC - Flood awareness maps discovery
June – July 2021:
ARQ Group
Delivered UX strategy with multiple levels of fidelity during the proposal-discovery phase of a large project for Ambulance Victoria.
January 2021 - March 2021:
NSW Dept. of Customer Service
Delivered customer improvements informed by rigorous research and aligned to business goals. I streamlined the information architecture, redesigned content, validated opportunities, and supported change communication of simplified yet diverse and scalable customer journeys. I presented research findings and recommendations to cross‑functional teams and senior stakeholders within an agile delivery environment.
November 2018 - May 2020:
pega.com
CERTIFIED SYSTEM ARCHITECT (CSA) Pega Systems
Certification date November 2018
Pega software powers business in the areas of customer relationship management, digital process automation, and business process management. Specialist consultant to consultant to cross-functional client and Pega-led agile teams.
Customers included:
Office of the Children’s Guardian - Accreditation & Monitoring solution
Dept. Planning & Environment - PSIMS Phase II – Planning Services Information Management System
Optus - Digital Case Management (NBN rollout)
RAMS - Mortgage Retention Unit (digital transformation)
Transport for NSW - Student Drive Subsidy (SDS)
Toyota Finance Australia Limited - Quantum (digital sales automation)
June - September 2018:
sapientrazorfish.com
Consultant at Sydney University, refining the information structure and simplifying content pathways in the faculty IA, from a customer perspective. Dropping in as phase I (proof of concept) rolled into phase II (MVP) production, I was responsible for research continuity, authenticity of findings, documentation, and ensuring WCAG-compliant, consistent content design across faculty templates.
April - June 2018:
hosthavas.com.au
Defining page patterns and reusable components (using Atomic principles of design) for progressive transition to the new business.gov.au website with structured content and logical user-defined pathways to improve readability. Contributing to information architecture and universal design language.
April 2016 – March 2018:
syfte.com.au (startup aquired by Designit in 2018)
A senior member of a small team specialising in Human Centred Design, UX research, product, service and interaction design, content and experience strategy, and participatory design.
Highlights include:
February 2015 - March 2016
dxlab.sl.nsw.gov.au
A new role promoting technology, experimentation and research, igniting curiosity and engaging new audiences through innovative exploration of the library’s digital archive with an emphasis on discovery and visualisation.
Highlights include
Responsibilities
August 2007 - 2009, August 2010 - February 2015:
Within digital marketing our team was responsible for sydney.com, visitnsw.com, vividsydney.com getconnected.dnsw.com.au and 17 international sites returning YOY growth of greater than 50% 2011-2014. With sydney.com ranking 6th most frequented Australian tourism website* it attracted 1.5 million unique visits every month.
I used specialised front and back-end software applications for graphic design, prototyping, wireframes, coding, code management, source control, debugging, cross browser and device testing, usability and accessibility testing, analytics, documentation, reporting, and sharing.
Highlights include
Responsibilities
April 2005 - August 2007:
Maintenance, administration and development of all LexisNexis Australia and New Zealand websites, intranets, and bulk email.
Reporting to head office in Dayton Ohio, I helped develop and implement test strategies to meet the requirements of usability, appearance and accessibility during the UAT stage of the new LexisNexis online global platform.
Wrote documentation to support and train over 40 non-technical content editors spread across the Asia-Pacific region.
2004 - April 2005:
CreativEngine (now Bluearc)
Responsibilities included design and development of new webpages, email templates, and graphics; editing and updating legacy sites; liaising with clients; testing and bug-fixing. Larger clients
include: Clearasil
for Men, Willoughby
Council, Spinners, Brandenburg
Orchestra, Galderma - Treat skin Cancer, BlueScope Steel, PowerSponsorship.
2003 - Present:
I provide end-to-end web solutions from to discovery to delivery, IA and UX, to UI and front-end development, DNS and hosting services.
techspatula.com is 100% hand-coded and self-managed.
2002 - 2003:
LiquidVision (startup)
Responsibilities included pitching concepts and art direction, webpage and interaction
design (including flash), html and javascript editing. Clients include, Freedom, Revlon,
Merck Sharp & Dohme, OFM Investment Group, Actil.
2001:
MarchFIRST (now defunct)
Director's Assistant and Production Artist for sites including
Dentsu, Visa.com, the 2001 San
Francisco International Film Festival and start-up charity littlekidsrock.org.
Nielsen Norman Group UX Certificate
Certification DateAug 2017 – Present License 1018838:
IBM Build Chatbots with Watson Conversation
IBM Bluemix Essentials
IBM Watson Conversation Service Foundations
SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY (USA) Multimedia Studies Program: September 1999 - August 2001
completed "Certificate in Internet Design and Technology". Awarded Robert Bell Outstanding Achievement Award 2001
WELLINGTON POLYTECHNIC DESIGN SCHOOL (New Zealand)
awarded "Diploma of Textile Design".
IBM Watson, HTML, CSS, XHTML, DHTML, XML, JavaScript, jQuery, JSON, AJAX, GA, GTM, GitHub, Sass, ASP, VBScript, Python, Processing, PHP, Responsive design, Bootstrap, Foundation, IBM Cloud, CLI
Sketch, Adobe Creative Suite, Axure, UX Pin, Balsamic, Sublime Text,
Google Drive, MS Office, Confluence, Jira
various CMS (most recently including Drupal, Wordpress and Squiz Matrix),
Windows XP, Macintosh OSX
Organic gardening, travel, technology, music, and fitness.
*According to Hitwise web statistics for 2014