HD Welcomes Amber Davies – UX Designer, to the Team!

The HD team has grown once again! Following a successful 12 months, and having recently achieved our record month and quarter, we have further expanded the team with Amber Davies who joins us as a UX Designer and Marketer. Amber has a particular interest in the medical field and the impact of both well considered, and those not so well-considered devices on the user, stemming from her own personal experience from using a medical device daily. Take a look at Amber’s background below.

Hi! I’m Amber, I’m 23, from Mid-Wales. I graduated from Cardiff Metropolitan University this summer with a First-Class BA (Hons) in Product Design having paid particular focus in my final year on the role of empathy in medical design.

My course was very multidisciplinary consisting of modules and live client briefs spanning across the whole design process from digital to inclusive design.

What are your interests outside of work?

Outside of work I enjoy spending time with family and friends, travelling (when allowed), creating social media content, advocating for inclusivity, and setting myself fundraising challenges for charity from completing a skydive to running a half marathon.

What interested you in design / medical design?

Living with a condition myself and subsequently, a need to wear a medical device daily – I soon grew an appreciation for well-designed products and importantly, their impacts as well as of course, an awareness for the arguably worse impacts of those products that are perhaps not so well considered. I recognised that these feelings and experiences apply to design as a whole, therefore, wanted to utilise my experiences paired with my education to play a part in improving those user experiences.

What was the pathway to your role?

During my time at University, I made it paramount to gain as much experience as possible in addition to my studies. Gaining this experience not only allowed me insight into the design and medial sectors but also, allowed me to learn off and network with others and ultimately, begin considering my own path. I was then able to feed this experience from a number of roles within varying companies, paired with my university experience, back into my final major projects and Dissertation Thesis. I was able to tailor this to meet genuine user needs in areas that were not only of interest to me but, that utilised a variety of skills within the design process too. Through a combination of the above, I met David Mills on LinkedIn which was followed by a series of conversations to identify whether my skills and path aligned with the needs of Haughton Design’s.

What interested you in Haughton Design?

As a graduate, I was attracted to the size of the company and its close-knit seeming nature – I felt that this would be a great opportunity to learn, gain further insight and also feed into a number of areas. HD’s variety of projects, past and present, both within and outside of the medical sector really interested me as well as the variety of backgrounds that the company’s team consisted of. Having developed a design process as part of my thesis, HD’s medical and non-medical specific workflows were also of interest to me. Something uplifting and nice to experience at this time was HD’s embracing and innovating attitude toward ongoing circumstances.

On a more personal level, I really liked how personable HD and the team were as a whole through showing a genuine interest in me, my background and how I could enhance the dynamic.

How was finishing University / starting at a role during a pandemic?

Unexpected, to say the least! However, as cliché as it sounds, I think the process allowed me a lot more focus on my final major projects and helped me learn a lot about myself in terms of my work too. By finishing University in lockdown, I learned techniques and programmes for remotely working both individually and as part of team – skills that were incredibly useful when it came to initially communicating with HD through to starting at my role. I understand that it has been a difficult time for everyone and in particularly daunting for graduates but, I think the key has been to remain adaptable with a can-do attitude.

Through this attitude from both parts, I was lucky that for the short period that restrictions allowed, I was able to squeeze in a visit to the office to meet the team and gain a better feel for the company and subsequently, make the move to Stafford.

I’m incredibly grateful for HD’s approach and really look forward to getting stuck in at the company!