Adam Augustyn
Brooklyn, NY, USAI'm a creative director and multidisciplinary designer based in Brooklyn, NY. I combine strategy and design to translate business goals into elevated and engaging brand experiences. I have worked across an array of activations both independently and within agency teams. My work informs all aspects of a brand, from product development and marketing to customer service and employee engagement. I build bold visual identities into intuitive design systems that scale and flex to cross multiple channels, including digital and print media, packaging, signage, and environmental. My influence on branding has grown to meet market demand for better experiences, products, and services.
I have worked across various industries and markets, from Fortune 500 companies and global brands to business startups and nonprofits. My work touches corporate, fintech, telecommunications, healthcare, consumer electronics, broadcast, entertainment, food and beverage, cosmetics, fashion, luxury, technology, and action sports.
I've been fortunate to work with global branding agencies, in-house design teams, boutique creative studios, and independently as a consultant in and around NYC.
As a designer, I leverage creative problem-solving and strategic thinking to tackle business challenges. I thrive on the creative journey, fostering curiosity and collaboration within teams to bring initial ideas through to concept development, iteration, final execution, and launch. I develop effective creative solutions, backed by data and user testing.
As a leader, I'm experienced in guiding businesses through significant transformation and growth. I bring together leadership and cross-functional teams to define a vision and clarify values, unifying a brand’s purpose and culture. My goal is to help brands connect on a deeper human level, deliver on users’ needs intuitively, and enhance and sustain growing engagement with their audiences.
I have worked across various industries and markets, from Fortune 500 companies and global brands to business startups and nonprofits. My work touches corporate, fintech, telecommunications, healthcare, consumer electronics, broadcast, entertainment, food and beverage, cosmetics, fashion, luxury, technology, and action sports.
I've been fortunate to work with global branding agencies, in-house design teams, boutique creative studios, and independently as a consultant in and around NYC.
As a designer, I leverage creative problem-solving and strategic thinking to tackle business challenges. I thrive on the creative journey, fostering curiosity and collaboration within teams to bring initial ideas through to concept development, iteration, final execution, and launch. I develop effective creative solutions, backed by data and user testing.
As a leader, I'm experienced in guiding businesses through significant transformation and growth. I bring together leadership and cross-functional teams to define a vision and clarify values, unifying a brand’s purpose and culture. My goal is to help brands connect on a deeper human level, deliver on users’ needs intuitively, and enhance and sustain growing engagement with their audiences.
Work Experience
MRM//McCANN
Contract Associate Design Director - Product UI
As a valued member of the Design and Experience team at MRM, I lead design support on the Mastercard account team. Together with UX designers, strategists, product managers, and developers across MRM offices, We concepted a future vision for Mastercard.com; not only an immersive, personalized experience, driven by user intent, but a unified experience tying together +120 websites across Mastercard globally; bringing together all Mastercard customers (Business and Consumer) and effectively guiding them to products, services and solutions.
- Contributed to all aspects of the Mastercard site design and development, from research and ideation, through detailed design and testing, to implementation and learning. Helped drive the roadmap, presenting and evaluating options, and crafting the approach
- Provided leadership and strategic direction for the design team, ensuring the delivery of innovative and user-centric design solutions
- Collaborated with cross-functional teams to define design strategies and align them with Mastercard’s business goals
- Set the vision and the design and experience direction for the website, ensuring consistency, coherence, and adherence to Mastercard’s brand expression guidelines
- Drove the creation of user-centered design deliverables, wireframes, user flows, information architecture, navigation concepts and high-fidelity Figma prototypes for desktop and mobile screen formats
- Advocated for user-centered design principles, accessibility, and inclusive design practices across the organization
- Collaborated with stakeholders to present and communicate design concepts, rationale, and strategic recommendations to the Mastercard team.
- Contributed to all aspects of the Mastercard site design and development, from research and ideation, through detailed design and testing, to implementation and learning. Helped drive the roadmap, presenting and evaluating options, and crafting the approach
- Provided leadership and strategic direction for the design team, ensuring the delivery of innovative and user-centric design solutions
- Collaborated with cross-functional teams to define design strategies and align them with Mastercard’s business goals
- Set the vision and the design and experience direction for the website, ensuring consistency, coherence, and adherence to Mastercard’s brand expression guidelines
- Drove the creation of user-centered design deliverables, wireframes, user flows, information architecture, navigation concepts and high-fidelity Figma prototypes for desktop and mobile screen formats
- Advocated for user-centered design principles, accessibility, and inclusive design practices across the organization
- Collaborated with stakeholders to present and communicate design concepts, rationale, and strategic recommendations to the Mastercard team.
July 2023
- March 2024
Manhattan, New York, United States
VSA Partners
Associate Creative Director
Originally hired onto the IBM account, my role at VSA bridged both brand and digital teams to create tools and communications vital to IBM’s global sales enablement team. As ACD, I led and managed teams across design and production to produce various marketing comms for VSA’s clients. My role also interfaced with the VSA executive leadership team to assist in brand and business pitches, establishing the vision for projects and working with managers to define processes and scope to create actionable workstreams, all while maintaining a high quality level for all work. Clients: Charter Communications, AT&T Global, Google, Revolver Brewing Co., Xerox PARC, McGraw Hill, Connections Academy
- Defined the next chapter of IBM’s Watson Health by developing a new brand and identity for Merative: a health and data technology company – a year-long endeavor to establish a new strategy, voice, and vision, building a new system of expression including a new website and materials for broadcast, social, tradeshow
-Lead creative on IBM’s internal promotional campaign to educate and promote IBM’s new public cloud offering for IBM’s Cloud sales team
- Assisted in the layout, design, and production of IBM’s 2019 Annual Report (print and website) The year Ginni Rometty stepped down as CEO after 8 years, replaced by Arvind Krishna, and Jim Whitehurst as President, marking a key transition for IBM’s future
- Built key brand extensions for IBM, utilizing both the IBM design language and IBM’s Carbon System UI kit
- Assigned to the COVID-19 response team for IBM, rapidly developing remote sales communications (IBM efforts amidst a global pandemic) for IBM remote salesforce. These internal tools and communications marked an important shift for IBM as they continue to navigate and promote their technologies and solutions to help define and empower a remote workforce
- Defined the next chapter of IBM’s Watson Health by developing a new brand and identity for Merative: a health and data technology company – a year-long endeavor to establish a new strategy, voice, and vision, building a new system of expression including a new website and materials for broadcast, social, tradeshow
-Lead creative on IBM’s internal promotional campaign to educate and promote IBM’s new public cloud offering for IBM’s Cloud sales team
- Assisted in the layout, design, and production of IBM’s 2019 Annual Report (print and website) The year Ginni Rometty stepped down as CEO after 8 years, replaced by Arvind Krishna, and Jim Whitehurst as President, marking a key transition for IBM’s future
- Built key brand extensions for IBM, utilizing both the IBM design language and IBM’s Carbon System UI kit
- Assigned to the COVID-19 response team for IBM, rapidly developing remote sales communications (IBM efforts amidst a global pandemic) for IBM remote salesforce. These internal tools and communications marked an important shift for IBM as they continue to navigate and promote their technologies and solutions to help define and empower a remote workforce
August 2019
- September 2022
Manhattan, New York, United States
Method
Lead Visual Designer
Directed, defined, and designed new experiences to bring McDonald’s into the digital era. Beginning with a 6 week redesign of an existing mobile ordering app and expanded to 3.5 year engagement with the client. This resulted in the creation of an omni-channel strategic framework and a new digital vision for the company. Our mission was to enhance every customer’s experience with the world’s largest restaurant through creating new digital products, features, and services.
Helped build a team of cross-disciplinary designers, personally interviewing and screening 80+ candidates
Functioned as a part of successful agile process, working in collaborative cross-functional teams of visual, interaction, technological designers, working iteratively in short defined sprints to achieve product milestones, for both MVP and mature product evolution cycles
Built a scalable / flexible system of design components through the practice of atomic design to aid adoption and ensure coherence and consistency between channels and across touch points
Underwent a crash course in user interface design and the role of the interaction discipline across a wide array of digital displays, technologies, and hardware, taking into account best of industry practices to ensure access and inclusivity for a wide range of user age groups and demographics
Produced low fidelity click-through prototypes using InVision to quickly validate proposed design solutions
Lead and participated in key stakeholder workshops at McDonald’s HQ in Chicago to establish a strategic vision for and define the role newly established Global Digital Group within the broader organization.
Helped senior leadership cast project teams, scope and schedule product sprints to meet business objectives
Mentored senior and staff designers; helped define goals and set tasks to ensure progress on desired career paths
Helped build a team of cross-disciplinary designers, personally interviewing and screening 80+ candidates
Functioned as a part of successful agile process, working in collaborative cross-functional teams of visual, interaction, technological designers, working iteratively in short defined sprints to achieve product milestones, for both MVP and mature product evolution cycles
Built a scalable / flexible system of design components through the practice of atomic design to aid adoption and ensure coherence and consistency between channels and across touch points
Underwent a crash course in user interface design and the role of the interaction discipline across a wide array of digital displays, technologies, and hardware, taking into account best of industry practices to ensure access and inclusivity for a wide range of user age groups and demographics
Produced low fidelity click-through prototypes using InVision to quickly validate proposed design solutions
Lead and participated in key stakeholder workshops at McDonald’s HQ in Chicago to establish a strategic vision for and define the role newly established Global Digital Group within the broader organization.
Helped senior leadership cast project teams, scope and schedule product sprints to meet business objectives
Mentored senior and staff designers; helped define goals and set tasks to ensure progress on desired career paths
March 2014
- November 2017
Manhattan, New York, United States
Yahoo!
Contract Brand Director
I was hired to assist in the rebranding of Yahoo, Inc. under the leadership of CEO Marissa Mayer.
My role at included:
- Worked closely with the VP Creative Director & SVP to conceptualize and organize presentations for the CMO and CEO
- Conducted both a brand audit and competitor research for the internal team
- Immersed myself within the various departments (i.e. Desktop, Mobile Product, Marketing, Advertising, Sales, etc.) to understand the complexities of the environments in which the new identity needed to function
- Sketched and concepted logos, as well as applied studies to websites, mobile apps, print campaigns, and broadcast applications
- Managed teams of both branding designers in the NYC office, and the marketing/advertising art directors in the Sunnyvale, CA. HQ, all who contributed concepts for the new identity
- Conducted casting, styling, location-scouting a 3 Day photoshoot in Los Angeles to provide supporting materials for the new identity and upcoming mobile products
- Pressure-tested and designated rules for the new identity
- Updated collateral materials for various departments within the company
- Collected all brand materials and assets into both brand and style guides
My role at included:
- Worked closely with the VP Creative Director & SVP to conceptualize and organize presentations for the CMO and CEO
- Conducted both a brand audit and competitor research for the internal team
- Immersed myself within the various departments (i.e. Desktop, Mobile Product, Marketing, Advertising, Sales, etc.) to understand the complexities of the environments in which the new identity needed to function
- Sketched and concepted logos, as well as applied studies to websites, mobile apps, print campaigns, and broadcast applications
- Managed teams of both branding designers in the NYC office, and the marketing/advertising art directors in the Sunnyvale, CA. HQ, all who contributed concepts for the new identity
- Conducted casting, styling, location-scouting a 3 Day photoshoot in Los Angeles to provide supporting materials for the new identity and upcoming mobile products
- Pressure-tested and designated rules for the new identity
- Updated collateral materials for various departments within the company
- Collected all brand materials and assets into both brand and style guides
April 2013
- November 2013
JDK Design
Senior Designer
My role as Senior Designer included:
- Worked closely with creative director & design director to develop and execute design concepts
- Assisted and mentored designers, junior designers, and interns
- Managed multiple clients (projects & relationships) independently from concept through to presentation
- Participated on projects and managed designers for JDK's Burlington, VT & Portland, OR studios
- Facilitated industrial design team to create physical and digital comps for products, packaging, and retail designs.
- Collaborated in team brainstorming sessions with clients
- Worked closely with account and project managers to ensure projects were completed on time and on (or under) budget
- Functioned with a strategic team to develop concepts and execute naming, copy writing, competitor audits, and trend research
- Tutored staff on new media presentation tools including training for Keynote, iBooks Author, and Adobe InDesign's interactive capabilities
- Worked closely with creative director & design director to develop and execute design concepts
- Assisted and mentored designers, junior designers, and interns
- Managed multiple clients (projects & relationships) independently from concept through to presentation
- Participated on projects and managed designers for JDK's Burlington, VT & Portland, OR studios
- Facilitated industrial design team to create physical and digital comps for products, packaging, and retail designs.
- Collaborated in team brainstorming sessions with clients
- Worked closely with account and project managers to ensure projects were completed on time and on (or under) budget
- Functioned with a strategic team to develop concepts and execute naming, copy writing, competitor audits, and trend research
- Tutored staff on new media presentation tools including training for Keynote, iBooks Author, and Adobe InDesign's interactive capabilities
April 2010
- March 2013
New York, New York, United States
JDK Design
Freelance Designer
Engaged by JDK to brand 2 new mobile brands for Virgin Mobile, as well as to complete a packaging overhaul for Belkin. Subsequently I was put on staff as a full-time senior designer.
December 2009
- April 2010
New York, New York, United States
Lippincott
Freelance Designer
Engaged by LIPPINCOTT to create graphic assets for various clients including Samsung, Dell, WalMart, Sam's Club, Wells Fargo, Meredith, Chartis, Comcast Xfinity, etc.
July 2009
- December 2009
New York, New York, United States
WL2 STUDIOS
Lead Designer
Lead designer for WL2 STUDIOS to brand a personal health care line of products for Bath & Body Works.
February 2009
- April 2009
New York, New York, United States
Desgrippes Gobé
Freelance Designer
Contracted by Executive Creative Director, David Israel to create brand identity and visual language concepts for various clients including AIGA NYC, American Express, AOL, Bayer, LG, LifeScan, Miller Brewing Co., Steiner & Associates, Saucony Shoes, Telefonica, etc. Also involved in generating presentations, product photography, product designs, and packaging mechanicals.
September 2005
- October 2008
New York, New York, United States
Ogilvy & Mather
Freelance Designer
Enlisted by Creative Director, Barry Deck to work with a team of designers engaged in the global re-branding of Coca-Cola, including the identity of new Coke products. Created graphic elements used in the brand language. Helped unify the brands look and set guidelines for the language across various media. Assisted in creating presentations and mechanicals for the client.
June 2005
- September 2005
New York, New York, United States
Crew Design
Creative Director
Managed creative department for Point-Of-Purchase marketing firm. Teamed with marketing and R&D to develop creative in-store marketing solutions. Collaborated with other corporate design agencies to meet goals. Clients included Anheuser-Busch, Coors, Frito Lay, Gatorade, Glaceau, Hasbro, Lucas Films, Honeywell, PepsiCo., Terra Chips, Tervis Tumbler, etc. Designed stationery, advertisements, instructional materials, renderings, prototypes, production die lines and company website. Assigned tasks to freelance illustrators, 3D renderers, photographers. Set up and maintained all company computers and network.
December 2003
- June 2005
Kent, Connecticut, United States
Education
University Of Connecticut
Bachelor of Fine Arts, Communication Design
PROFESSORS: Edvin Yegir, Mark Zurolo, Randall Hoyt, David Frisco
GRADUATED: Suma Cum Laude, 3.43 GPA
GRADUATED: Suma Cum Laude, 3.43 GPA
September 1998
- May 2002
Storrs, Connecticut, United States
London College Of Communication
Study Abroad Program
Studied traditional book binding techniques and modern book design.
Awarded a Letter of Distinction for Modern Book Design
Awarded a Letter of Distinction for Modern Book Design
January 2001
- June 2001
London, United Kingdom