Griffin Kelton, Design Leader

Griffin Kelton

Open to opportunities
Raleigh, NC linkedin.com/in/griffinkelton griffinkelton.com

I'm a Design Leader with 13 years of making innovation practical. Product design, UX engineering, human-centered design, business strategy—across Enterprise SaaS, e-commerce, education, and client consulting. I pick up new industries and problems fast. Genuinely fast. I lead and grow high-performing teams, write production code when it matters, and help organizations turn design into a measurable business advantage. I've worked in-house and in client services. I know the difference, and I'm comfortable in both rooms—with a C-suite stakeholder, a cross-functional product team, or a junior designer who needs a real conversation about their growth.

Core Expertise

What I actually do.

Bridging human needs, business strategy, and production-ready systems.

Direction

Strategy & Leadership

  • UX strategy, deep user research & usability testing
  • Executive stakeholder alignment & client relationship management
  • Client engagement & consulting delivery
  • Empathetic team leadership, mentorship & career development
  • Product development & roadmap alignment

“More on this soon.”

Design

Craft & Execution

  • Human-centered design, design thinking & journey mapping
  • Service design & service blueprinting
  • Accessible, inclusive design built to WCAG 2.2 standards

“More on this soon.”

Code

Technology & Scale

  • UX engineering — semantic HTML, CSS, TypeScript, Vue & Storybook
  • DesignOps & enterprise design systems
  • Generative AI product design & responsible AI patterns

“More on this soon.”

And yes, I wear bow ties.
Experience

What I've actually done.

The work that shaped how I think.

Panorama Education –

Director of Product Design

  • Led human-centered design across CCR, Integrations, and Unified Product squads—owning UX strategy, research cycles, and cross-functional alignment with product and engineering from discovery through delivery.
  • Core member of the Technical Leadership Team: shaped annual planning, responsible AI adoption, and org-level product investment decisions.
  • Introduced Customer Value Index (CVI) and UX Lite to connect user experience directly to business retention metrics. These contributed to a $5.8M ARR client save. I built them because gut feelings weren't cutting it as a business case for design investment.
  • Led design for multiple generative AI features from concept through beta to GA. I wrote the AI–Figma design system playbook because we kept solving the same component governance problem from scratch on every squad—now teams don't have to.
  • Launched a company-wide Career Progression Model and Growth Dimensions framework. Clear paths. Equitable. Because "do good work and hope someone notices" isn't a career plan.
  • Scaled the Tangrams design system; tightened design-to-engineering workflows across Figma, Storybook, and Chromatic to improve delivery velocity and team consistency.
  • Shipped production-ready components, built high-fidelity prototypes, and mentored teams at the intersection of design craft and technical execution—a lane most people pick one side of.
  • Drove adoption of Panorama's Operating Model across product, design, and engineering—better cross-functional clarity, real team autonomy, higher delivery quality.
Terra Dotta –

UX Manager

Terra Dotta was a Smashing Boxes client; brought me on full-time after the engagement.

  • Defined an inclusive UX strategy grounded in WCAG 2.2, neurodiversity principles, and human-centered design—then actually made it operational, not just a slide deck.
  • Standardized design-to-engineering handoffs and deliverables. Less friction, better shipped work.
Smashing Boxes –

Director of UX & Design

  • Led UX research and service design across 12+ client portfolios—discovery, journey mapping, service blueprinting, synthesis, and solution definition for clients with real complexity and tight timelines.
  • Owned client relationships from kickoff through delivery: setting expectations, presenting strategy, navigating scope, and making sure clients left with more confidence in their product direction than when they arrived.
  • Grew team performance, client retention, and project profitability by raising the bar on consulting craft—sharper facilitation, stronger communication, better strategic framing.
  • Mentored designers and researchers on what great work looks like inside a client engagement. Not just a beautiful Figma file.
Second Nature –

Director of Digital Experience

  • Led end-to-end redesign of the e-commerce experience—UX, UI, architecture, content strategy—resulting in a 60% conversion lift and CTRs roughly double the industry average. Making air filters seem sexy turned out to be a viable strategy.
  • Built a cross-functional UX and content platform that the team was still using long after I left.
Earlier Work

More where that came from.

The marketing years — where I learned how business actually thinks.

Brand Building & Content Marketing Consultant — Independent consulting across multiple client engagements (03/2010 – 07/2018)

Director of Marketing — Social House Vodka (01/2017 – 07/2017)

Partner, Lead Marketing Strategist — Adena Studios (07/2015 – 12/2016)

Concept Store Design Strategist — Starbucks HQ (11/2012 – 01/2014)

Education

What I studied (at school).

The formal part. The rest I taught myself.

Bachelor of Arts in Marketing, Minor in Biblical Studies — Cedarville University

Skills & Tools

I'm pretty technical.

In rough order of how surprised people usually are.

01 / EXPECTED

What every design lead should have cold.

Figma · Sketch · Miro · MURAL · Adobe Creative Cloud · Zeplin · Lovable

02 / SEMI-EXPECTED

Where most designers stop. I kept going.

HTML · SCSS/CSS · JavaScript · TypeScript · Storybook · SEO · Martech architecture · Codebuff · CSPO

03 / WAIT, REALLY?

Yeah. I know. I'm a little much.

Vue · Angular · Chromatic · Git · Windsurf · Cursor