Creative Director & Creative Team Leader for Brand, Digital Product, UX/UI, eCommerce and Omnichannel Design
Brand Roster
Skills
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I’m a Creative Director who has done the work I’m tasked with managing. My priorities are being a devoted servant leader and a trusted partner to my stakeholders.
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You’d never get in a car and drive until you think you’re where you wanted to go, right? I excel at identifying destinations and providing great routes for getting there.
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I’ve been a designer. I’ve been a FED. And I’ve been an Adjunct Professor of Digital Image Design at Columbia College Chicago. I love leading creatives.
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You can’t make more hours in the day, but you can optimize the heck out of them. I have a clear and proven path for doing just that.
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Measurable post-launch success based on routine analytics reviews and refinement.
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Excellent cross-team communication skills. I’m as at home presenting to the C-suite as to clients, as to cross functional partners.
What floats my boat
A great story, tents, campfires & clothes that smell like them. Old homes, antiques & decor, restoring vintage boats, campers, travel, road trips, photography, nature, adventure…And most of all, creative collaboration.
Hi, I’m Alana.
I’m a Chicago-based Creative Director and creative team leader with experience across brand, digital products, UX/UI, e-commerce, content, photography, video, packaging, retail and print.
As Global Creative Director for Claire’s and Icing, I led a team of 22 talented creatives across Chicago and Birmingham, UK. Together, we produced marketing for both international brands across e-commerce, social media, digital campaigns, photography, video, packaging, in-store signage and print.
I later built and led the creative department at Alma Lasers, a B2B medical device company. I created the department’s processes from the ground up, mentored a growing team and helped establish a more focused and consistent brand strategy.
Most recently, I created The Complete Camping App, an iOS product that helps campers discover parks, plan trips, organize gear, track weather and manage the details of a camping trip. I conceived the product, defined its features, designed the user experience and interface, developed the visual system and guided it through development, testing and launch.
Building the app has drawn on nearly every part of my background, including product strategy, UX/UI, information architecture, content design, prototyping, quality assurance, analytics, marketing and AI-supported development. It has also strengthened my ability to balance customer needs, technical constraints and business goals while keeping a complex product moving forward.
My path into creative leadership began with hands-on work. I started as a tour photographer, moved into graphic design and built experience across nearly every part of the creative process. That background helps me understand the realities my teams face, give useful direction and create systems that support good work instead of getting in its way.
I’m a strategic leader, but I still enjoy being close to the work. I can guide the big picture, solve a difficult UX problem, review a campaign, improve a workflow or step in when a team needs another capable set of hands.
Why I love what I do
The best part of creative leadership is helping talented people do work they are proud of.
I enjoy bringing order to complicated projects, helping stakeholders feel heard and giving teams the clarity they need to move forward. I’m process-minded, but I know real projects rarely follow a perfect plan. Good leadership requires structure, judgment, flexibility and trust.
Most of all, I love mentoring creatives. I’ve learned a great deal throughout my career, and I value every opportunity to help someone strengthen their skills, solve a problem or grow into their next role.
Things I say often
“Form follows function.”
“Start with the problem we are trying to solve.”
“Learn from it and move forward.”
I’m curious, persistent and comfortable figuring things out. When I do not know the answer yet, I keep asking questions, testing ideas and working the problem until I find a practical way forward.
I’m currently pursuing an in-house creative leadership role in the Chicago area where I can build strong teams, improve the way creative work moves through an organization and help turn business goals into thoughtful, effective work.