TO MY BRAIN
Welcome.
Hello. I'm a product designer. I live for the curiosity of the world, whether its exploring a city, tinkering on a D&D World or problem solving a user issue. In my professional career, I've led the design and creative direction of products, teams, and design systems. I am currently creating solutions at Cohesion. If your curious come say Hello.
About.
I started in architecture before I started in software. My design education was Colorado State, my real education was 8 years at Hoerr Schaudt and Wolff Landscape Architecture in Chicago, where I learned that good design isn't about aesthetics first. It's about understanding how people actually move through, use, and feel in a space.
That mindset never left.
When I made the pivot to digital, I wasn't chasing a trend. I recognized that UX and architecture are solving the same problem from different angles. Both are about designing systems that serve people who didn't ask to be served by a system. I formalized the transition through a UX/UI apprenticeship at Thinkful, then brought everything I had into product.
For the last five years at Cohesion, I've been the kind of designer who doesn't stay in their lane. I work across product, marketing, sales, customer success, and engineering because that's where the real design problems live. Not in Figma. In the gaps between teams. I've built design systems that give engineers confidence, driven alignment in rooms where nobody agreed, and shaped how a B2B SaaS product communicates itself from the first sales touchpoint to the last support ticket.
Good design, to me, is organizational as much as it is visual. It's knowing which conversation to start, who needs to be in it, and what to put in front of people so they can actually make a decision.
Resume.
Lead Design at a fast pace B2B SaaS startup environment, specializing in Product Design and roadmap Concepts across three engineering teams for web and mobile platforms. Instrumental in launching over 20 new features during my tenure.
Spearheaded the redesign of cohesion branding, standardized marketing materials, and orchestrated a comprehensive website overhaul, resulting in a remarkable 500% increase in organic website traffic.
Led collaborative efforts with engineers to standardize UI components and theming settings, streamlining the code base and laying the foundation for a design system.
Collaborated closely with stakeholders to formulate design strategies and roadmap upcoming features, aligning them with user feedback and client-centric concepts.
Designed and shipped product experiences across web and mobile, partnering with engineering and customer-facing teams to turn roadmap concepts into usable interfaces.
Built marketing sites and brand-forward web experiences for clients across architecture, SaaS, and small business.
Supported planting design, documentation, and client presentations for large-scale civic and institutional landscape projects in Chicago.
Contact.
Form not configured. Email hottman.aj@gmail.com.
Product DesignerCheckout redesign.
Home/Projects/Checkout redesign
Reducing friction in the purchase path while preserving trust and clarity for first-time buyers.
Describe the user problem and constraints you inherited from the previous experience.
Document how you explored alternatives — sketches, flows, usability tests, or analytics.
Explain what shipped and how it maps to user and business goals.
What you would iterate next with more time or data.