Hello!

Photo of Corey Stone

I'm Corey, dad of 4 (got a bogo twin) + 4 🐕 (long story) and Lead Product Designer & Strategist with 2 decades' experience simplifying complexity and streamlining inefficiency. I'm action-biased and flexible with process, but in general, I:


  • Empathize
    via user
    research.

  • Ideate
    with sketches & prototypes.

  • Evaluate
    by A-B or usability testing.

  • Iterate
    until it meets user & biz goals.

I'm also a zero-to-1 thinker with experience at 3 startups plus founding ~10 apps. See my work below or grab my résumé if you need it. Thanks!

Screenshots of the clinician UI and responsive patient UI for a mental health-tracking SaaS application.

Lead Designer at Mental Health B2B SaaS Startup

At Owl.health, I designed new features, analytics dashboards, and high-fi interactive mockups of future concepts that helped secure $15M in Series B funding.

View Owl Case Study
HERO Keyboard for iOS.

Founded HERO Keyboard

HERO is an iOS app that I conceived, designed, marketed, and managed contract developers to build. In English, just 9 letters are used 80% of the time, so my patented design makes them bigger and centered where your thumb likes to be. The result? Finger travel is reduced by 35%, or "3 feet per tweet."

View HERO Case Study
Screenshots from design and vision work for Chegg Skills' adult learning experience.

Reenvisioning Chegg's Adult Learning Platform

On a team of 2, I designed future visions, internal tooling, and the current responsive web app, including 3 AI-powered features and an updated left nav that increased student success 8%.

(Case study in-progress – sorry!)
Personas, user flows, and task / user analysis from ACT Test Registration project.

Reinvented ACT Test Registration & B2C Portal

MyACT is ACT.org's responsive e-Commerce portal where ~3 million students/year register ACT tests, view scores, and explore careers, colleges, and majors. The result? Task time decreased from 30 to 7 minutes, great user feedback, and revenue-per-registrant expected to increase.

View ACT Case Study

Related: ACT Design System

Fullout app in player mode.

Founding FullOut, a B2C hybrid app

For my current pre-launch side project with a dev partner, I do all the product vision, strategy, and design for the hybrid React-based SaaS that streamlines the messy multi-person process of creating, collaborating on, and teaching a cheer or dance routine. It'll also include a 3-sided marketplace and other helpful tools.

A screenshot, flow map, and persona from my work at SchooLinks.

Fast-paced EdTech B2B SaaS Startup

As the senior-most designer on a team of 3 at SchooLinks, I quickly designed new features, improved existing ones, and helped increase their UX maturity.

View SchooLinks Case Study
Enterprise health and safety tracking SaaS app.

User Research & Design of Internal Enterprise SaaS

As the UX Specialist for a global multi-office civil engineering firm from 2013-2016, I researched and designed internal enterprise SaaS web apps, native tablet apps, and legacy systems that increased efficiency, productivity, and profits.

View Kleinfelder Case Study
KU.edu web presence.

Leading the KU.edu Web Presence

I led the 2012 redesign of the million-page KU.edu web presence into a new responsive CMS, plus designing the home page, top-level pages, unit templates, and award-winning Admissions site.

View KU.edu Case Study
↖ Hover & click it!

Animation

Here are a few vector animations I made in Rive.app (which DuoLingo uses):

  1. Chat loading animation
  2. "SkillMate" AI chat icon
  3. Button icon in my new app
Photo of Todd

“Corey is super creative, thoughtful, innovative, responsible, ethical and an all-around decent, good egg.”

- Todd Cohen, former Director at KU

Photo of Andrea

“Corey is very collaborative, creative, and super fun to work with. He has a knack for solving tricky problems. I was always impressed by his ability to describe ideas, and willingness to brainstorm.

- Andrea Baker, VP at CannonDesign

Photo of Mark

“Corey is an excellent designer with strong technical chops. He is able to proactively move projects forward with minimal guidance and oversight. He is not afraid to tackle complex problems and always brings a fresh point of view. He can think big and enjoys brainstorming big ideas, but he can also patiently navigate his way through the weeds. His humor and style help to diffuse hectic, tense, and dynamic situations. Bottom line — he's a craftsman, he's fun to work with, and he gets stuff done.”

- Mark Kopulos, Staff Product Designer at Sofar Sounds

Photo of Mark

“I cannot recommend Corey highly enough. His approach to design is not only creative but also deeply intelligent and understanding of a product’s users. Corey consistently brings out innovative ideas that not only address past challenges but also pave the way for future advancements. In addition to his design prowess, he is a fantastic collaborator and team player. He effectively communicates his ideas, actively seeks feedback, and readily incorporates suggestions from stakeholders.

- John Norwood, Construction Tech & Innovation National Manager at Terracon

Photo of Paul

“At Chegg, Corey provided exceptional mentorship that significantly enhanced my growth as a UX designer. His ability to listen and teach created a supportive environment, and his constructive feedback encouraged critical thinking ultimately allowing me to produce effective designs. His patience, knowledge, and engaging personality made him a pleasure to work with, and I am incredibly grateful for his guidance. Corey is an invaluable asset to any team or designer looking to learn and grow.”

- Paul Williams, UX/UI/Web Designer

Photo of Kaitlynn

“Corey has a way of bringing an idea to life by turning the brainstorming of a concept team into a clear product design. He understands the customer and is always creating great solutions that both delight the customer and save money and time for the company. He is also a great team member, always bringing ideas to the table along with a sense of humor.”

- Kaitlynn Griffith, VP at College Board

Photo of Ben

“Corey continually raised the bar in intelligent UX design, prototyping, A/B testing, and maximizing conversions. He has an impressive depth of knowledge in UX research and a rich understanding of marketing, customer funnels, and value laddering. Corey is a fantastic team player, always sharing knowledge.

- Ben Mossman, Lead Solutions Architect at ACT

Photo of Rebekah

“As his manager at Kleinfelder, I appreciated Corey's willingness to learn new things and take on challenging projects. He is a very talented UX Designer with a good eye for incorporating what is really important into his design. He does not hesitate to ask questions. Corey is responsible and reliable – I never had any concerns that he would complete a project on time or produce a quality product.”

- Rebekah Stevens, BA Manager at Kleinfelder

Photo of Derek

“Corey’s always looking for the best ways to enhance a design, jumped right in when learning new research and collaboration tools, has a thorough understanding of the user-centered design process, and was able to thrive in very challenging circumstances. I’d highly recommend Corey for any senior or leadership position within user experience or product design.”

- Derek Darby, former UX Director at ACT

Photo of Sri

“Corey is always user focused in his designs! His designs take into account the constraints and business goals and still are very user friendly. I have always found him to be super friendly and a great team player. His communication skills are amazing and he can easily express what his designs are trying to achieve. Super fun to work with as well!”

- Sri Rao, Sr. BA at ACT

Continuous Learning

Even though I've been doing this a long time, I always strive to improve my design skills and design-adjacent knowledge. Some courses I've taken include:

  • Irrational Labs' Behavioral Design Bootcamp
  • Seth Godin's altMBA
  • Seth Godin's This is Strategy
  • Reforge's Product Strategy
  • Reforge's User Insights for Product Decisions
  • Bernadette Jiwa's Story Skills Workshop
  • Deque's WCAG Web Accessibility Certification


And my weekly news/pod diet includes:
Lenny / Dive.club / Seth's Blog / Growth.design / Nielsen Norman / UX Tools / Ethan Mollick (AI) / Justin Jackson

Our old pal Seth Godin.