Hello!

Hello!

I am Jo Barnes, a designer
from marvellous Melbourne, Australia

I'm an experienced and well-rounded product and information designer, dedicated to creating hospitable, easy-to-use interfaces that facilitate smooth everyday transactions and rich learning experiences.

I particularly love working with patterns, systems and flows and to make complex information accessible and optimally useful.

What I can do for you


I've an abundance of experience designing in a broad range of contexts—including education, community services, product design, human resources, information technology, publishing and ecommerce. I've worked end-to-end managing the full design process on many projects, and contributed as a design specialist on others. I am happy to contribute wherever I can to creating user interfaces that help people get things done efficiently and, wherever possible, enjoyably!

  • Research, strategy & testing

    • Requirements gathering
    • Value proposotion design
    • Contextual research
    • User research and testing
    • Functional testing
  • Digital design & development

    • Sketching and wireframing
    • UI mock-ups and prototypes
    • Functional specifications
    • Accessible, flexible, cross-platform web interfaces
    • CMS websites - including Squiz Matrix and WordPress
  • Content & IA strategy

    • Content planning and templates
    • Information architecture (IA) planning and testing
    • Search engine optimisation (SEO)
    • Social media strategy
  • Training & documentation

    • Style guides and pattern libraries
    • Intranets, wikis and knowledge bases
    • Training documentation
    • One-on-one and small group training
  • Forms & template design

    • Database user interface customisation
    • Accessible web, PDF and Word forms
    • Template design
    • Admin interfaces for managing content
  • Publication & document design

    • Newsletters
    • Reports
    • Magazines
    • Books
  • Illustration & image editing

    • Illustration and art direction
    • Photo restoration
    • Iconography
    • Infographics
  • Branding & identity

    • Logo design
    • Branding strategy
    • Umbrella / family branding
    • Adapting existing branding to new applications
  • Promotional design

    • Presentation design
    • Flyers and posters
    • Menus and catalogues
    • Signage and wayfinding

My 8-petal process : FLOURISH

FLOURISH is an 8-step, lean and flexible process toolkit that I can adapt to any context or project, big or small. I validate with stakeholders and test with users at many stages throughout the process to ensure that the outcome stays aligned to needs.

Of course, if I am working with a team that already has an established process I can fit in with that too! I am very flexible.

  • Foundations

    This is the seeding stage: establishing what is to be grown, germinating an idea and/or identifying the problem/s that need to be solved and opportunities available. It usually involves interviewing stakeholders, reviewing existing materials and previous research, user surveys or true intent tests, establishing scope, and feasability / viability reviews.

  • Learn & prepare

    This involves learning more about the specific problem/s and their context through user research, as well as industry and competitor research. Preparing task flows and user journeys. Setting up analytics.

  • Organise & define

    Synthesising research, project planning, resource allocation, return briefs. Information architecture planning. Setting-up project tracking and communication tools.

  • Unbridled ideation

    Generating ideas for solutions, keeping an open mind and keeping it loose and flowing. This may involve sketching, brainstorming, storyboards and collaborative design workshops.

  • Refining through prototypes

    Once preferred directions have been chosen, this stage involves refining and better articulating these ideas through rounds of refined prototypes - including gathering feedback from stakeholders, testing with users and making fixes and improvements based on this.

  • Implement & systematise

    Building templates, UI components, pattern libraries, image libraries, integrating into CMS, populating content and QA testing.

  • Set sail & track bearings

    Launch product, marketing, monitor feedback and analytics, measuring success and identifying where there is room for improvements.

  • Habitate & renovate

    Build knowledge base and resource libraries, face-to-face training for site maintainers, continue to monitor user feedback, continue to make iterative improvements and fix bugs.