Conducted a comprehensive UX audit across Cisco.com, Cisco U., and the Cisco Learning Network to identify usability gaps and inefficiencies across the learning and certification ecosystem.
Coming Soon
Chase Digital Banking Experience
Designed a self-service digital guidance experience that helped customers confidently complete everyday banking tasks through guided walkthroughs across web and mobile.
Coming Soon
Case Study Four for Client
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Coming Soon
Executive Boardroom Presentation@ Globe Telecom
Built high-fidelity, multi-device prototypes for an international executive presentation, driving stakeholder buy-in and positioning the concept as the leading direction.
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Case Study Six for Client
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Services, Skills, Abilities
What I do best?
I love figuring things out. New teams. New industries. New technology. Every project starts the same way for me — a new set of constraints, and the fun part is figuring out how they fit together.
20+ years designing products means I've picked up a wide range of skills and ways of working, and I use all of it at every stage of a product — from the first messy sketch to the details nobody notices until they're wrong.
Tools have changed a lot along the way, but AI is the biggest shift yet. It's not just a new tool in the kit — it's changed how I think through a problem, and I've rebuilt my process around it.
Built for Complexity
01. Enterprise UX
I design workflows for dense, high-stakes software — the kind built for claims adjusters, ops teams, and bank stakeholders, not consumer apps.
FedEx
JPMorgan Chase
T-Mobile
Multi-stakeholder workflows
End to End Journey
02. Digital Products
I take products from discovery to shipped features that are grounded in research and testing, not just wires.
Product strategy
UX research
Prototyping
Design-to-dev handoff
Building with AI Workflows
03. AI-Assisted Product Design
I use AI throughout every stage of my design workflow—from research and discovery to prototyping and final delivery—to move faster, explore more possibilities, and focus more time on solving the right problems.
Cursor (Agent mode)
Claude
Figma
Rapid prototyping
At Scale
04. Systems Thinking
I work inside design systems with real respect for what they protect — extending them, building on them, and staying in step with the teams who own them, across multiple corporations.
Component libraries
Design tokens
Documentation
Cross-team governance
Beyond the System
05. Brand Identity
I build brand systems — identity, illustration, and visual language that give a design system a reason to exist.
Identity systems
Illustration
Brand strategy
Visual language
Small, nimble teams bring out my best work. I see myself as the bass player of the group, there to elevate everyone else's talent, not compete with it.
DISCOVER TO DELIVER
How I Work
End to end is my preference. I love the kickoff, the ambiguity, the moment before anything is decided — when the problem is still messy and nobody's committed to a direction yet.
But I'm just as comfortable jumping into an existing project mid-stream. Reading the room, understanding what's already been tried, picking up where someone else left off without missing a beat. Every stage of the process is familiar ground, whether I started it or inherited it.
AI is changing how products are built, but great products are still built around people.
I'm interested in using AI where it creates speed, insight, and better decision-making, while ensuring every experience remains understandable, trustworthy, and human.
I built frankpaints.com and this site entirely using Cursor and Claude, directing them the way I'd direct a junior designer, not letting them run unsupervised. AI without a human driving it produces something like clip art, technically fine, but flat, and full of half-truths dressed up as good answers.
Rapid Prototyping
What used to take me days now takes hours.
AI-Augmented Research
I don't use AI to replace research. I use it to make room for more of it.
Strategic Product Thinking
I use AI to accelerate execution, so more of my time goes to solving the right problem.
Cross-Team Alignment
I've watched a prototype convince a room faster than any deck ever could.
I'm a Product Design Lead based in San Rafael, CA — twenty years turning complex problems into experiences that actually work, from first concept to final deployment.
Recently at Amdocs Studio, I led UX for FedEx on a parcel management overhaul and for T-Mobile on an AI-powered digital assistant. I've also led design for Cisco, Globe, and MUFG on enterprise platforms where clarity and scale matter.
For the past two decades I've designed for mission-driven brands including Chase, Disney, EA, and more — working across brand, product, and enterprise systems at every scale. Few designers hold both ends of that spectrum. I do.
AI changed what one person can do. What it didn't change is judgment. Knowing when to design for it and when to design with it, that's still a human call.
1
Who I am
I'm Frank Barnhardt, a Product Design Lead based in San Rafael, CA. Twenty years of turning complex problems into experiences that actually work — from first concept to final deployment.
2
What I do
I work across the full design stack — brand, product, and enterprise systems. With AI in the workflow, one designer can now do what used to require a team. I use that deliberately.
Design Systems + Enterprise UX
AI-assisted Product Design
Digital Products
Brand Identity
3
Who hires me
End-to-end design lead for teams that need strategy and execution in the same person.
Project managers who need high-skill, low-ego delivery
Engineers who need a partner that speaks their language
Creative directors who need ideas that sell before they're built
Stakeholders who need to trust the person in the room
5
How I work with AI
I built a four-level framework for how AI participates in product design — not as a trend, as a practice. Most designers are still figuring out what AI is. I'm already designing systems around what it does and where it breaks.
"AI is a material, like paint or code. Use it when it makes the work better. Put it down when it doesn't. That judgment is the job."
AI as productivity tool
Human in the loop
Agents in systems
Right tool, right job
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Getting started
If you're building something in healthcare, AI, or anywhere the design stakes are real — I'd like to hear about it. Send me an email and tell me what you're working on.
I'm currently open to full-time roles and select consulting engagements — particularly in healthcare AI, AI-native products, and enterprise UX.
