welcome to the field

Julee Peterson

This journal contains client work and is password protected.

on leading design — and still doing it

I grow designers who help people actually change.

I lead product design teams and keep my own hands in the craft. For 15 years I've turned research into strategy, hired and mentored designers and researchers, set the bar on a shared design system, and shipped the work myself when it counts. The throughline is always the same: delight, growth, and habits that stick — for the people who use the product, and for the designers who build it.

Currently Staff PM & Designer, Cloverleaf Education MS, User Experience Design Based in Cincinnati, OH · remote-native
15yrs
in digital product: front-end dev → UX research → product design → product management
5yrs
designing behavior-change coaching software used by Fortune 100 enterprises
1
design system owned end-to-end, measured by component adoption in shipped code
2
roles in one head: I write the strategy doc and design the pixels it describes
how I lead

Growing designers, not just designs

As a lead at Cloverleaf I hired and managed designers and researchers, built the team's practices, and held a high, joyful craft bar while keeping my own hands in the work. The role I want next is more of exactly this: a team whose growth I get to shape.

I hire and build teams

I've hired and managed designers and researchers at Cloverleaf, growing the function from the ground up and developing the designers and researchers on it. I know how to spot talent and give it room to compound.

I grow people at every stage

Meaningful feedback, deliberate career paths, and space to think bigger. In a former report's words, I create "a collaborative space that helps me think bigger" and help people "leverage new skills and spaces."

I set the craft bar without being the bottleneck

Shared design-system standards, critique rituals, and written principles, so quality scales past any single person, me included. High bar, low ego, no gatekeeping.

Player-coach, always

I lead through the work, not above it. I still prototype, still ship code, still sit in the details. It keeps my feedback grounded, my standards honest, and my designers unblocked.

the case book · pick a chapter

Selected work, in chapters

Six chapters of design-leadership and hands-on work from Cloverleaf, an AI-powered coaching platform, leadership first. Pick one from the table of contents, or turn the pages in order. Client names and internal figures are generalized to respect confidentiality.

Table of Contents
Chapter One
Design leadershipHiring & mentoringTeam building

Building the design function

Shaping design collaboration and rituals — first as one of three leads at Openfield, then building the function at Cloverleaf.

RoleDesign lead — Openfield & Cloverleaf ScopeDesign culture, rituals, hiring, mentoring StatusTeam hired, mentored, promoted

Where it started

Culture doesn't happen by accident. At Openfield I was one of three design leads responsible for how the studio collaborated: the critique culture, the working rituals, the practices that kept a small team's quality high. That's where I learned that design culture is something you design, deliberately.

Building the function at Cloverleaf

I brought that playbook with me. I joined Cloverleaf as a senior designer when design was small and scrappy, and grew it into a team, hiring designers and researchers and shaping how we work: critique rituals, career levels, an RFC process, and a monthly product showcase that made everyone's work visible across the company. Most of all, I invested in the people: helping designers and researchers sharpen their craft, take on bigger scope, and move their careers forward.

The best thing I can design is a designer who no longer needs me in the room.

How I grow people

Feedback the same week, not the same quarter. Deliberate paths for each stage. And room for people to think bigger than their current title, because that's where the next level actually comes from.

Leading in the AI era

Part of the job now is defining what design even is as the tools change monthly: which problems AI owns, where human judgment still wins, and how a team keeps a high, joyful bar while moving faster. I lead that conversation rather than wait for it to settle.

[ADD IMAGE]
Team rituals: critique, showcase, RFCs
[ADD IMAGE]
Career levels / growth framework

Outcomes & signals

  • Two companies of design-culture work: one of three leads shaping collaboration and rituals at Openfield, then building the function at Cloverleaf.
  • Hired, managed, and grew designers and researchers, investing in their craft and their career growth.
  • Built rituals that outlast me: critique, career levels, RFCs, and a company-wide monthly product showcase.
  • In teammates' words: I create "a collaborative space that helps me think bigger" and help people "leverage new skills and spaces."
Julee Peterson · Field Notes · p. 01
earlier work · agency years

From the archive

Five years at Openfield leading UX for education-technology clients, and four years in brand and digital art direction before that.

Wiley · WileyPLUS

Student experience redesign

Led research and redesign of the assignment experience: diary-style homework probes, co-creation workshops, and two rounds of moderated testing across 12 students from 10 institutions. The core insight was that students need time to mentally prepare before starting, and it reshaped the entire landing experience.

"I really liked how the system was updated, it looks much cleaner and more professional."Student, usability testing round 2
iClicker

Desktop app redesign

Led UX across the instructor and admin product line, including a full redesign of the flagship desktop app around the classroom mental model, and built the design library that made design and development faster. That library was the seed of my design-systems practice.

Openfield · Practice lead

Accessibility leadership

As Accessibility Lead, I built the practice into how the studio worked, then took it public with a published article series on inclusive design and accessibility regulations. The argument: UX means all users, and inclusive design should be second nature, not a checkbox.

how I work

A field guide to what you get in one head

Research is the engine, not a phase

MS in UX Design and a decade of practice: probes, co-creation, moderated testing, and the quieter craft of mining what users already told you in support tickets, sales calls, and data.

I read data honestly

Not just finding the number that confirms the hypothesis. I define what would change my mind before I ship, and I write it down so the team can hold me to it.

Writing is a design tool

Strategy docs, voice principles, falsifiable bets. The fastest way to align product, engineering, CS, and content is a document clear enough that the meeting becomes optional.

Player-coach by nature

I've hired and managed designers and researchers, and led across product management, product marketing, content, and program management, focused on growing designers and championing their advancement, all while keeping my own hands in the work.

Ship to learn

From paper prototype to production PR, I bias toward the smallest thing that generates a real signal, then document the longer trajectory so small never means short-sighted.

Accessible, always

Hit areas, contrast, focus states, and plain language are in the definition of done. That's a habit from years of accessibility leadership, not an audit at the end.

my story

Every chapter added a layer

I didn't plan a hybrid career. I just kept following the user across the org chart.

2008–2016 · Jumping Pixel

Freelance web design & front-end development

My own freelance practice, building client sites end to end: wireframes, design, and hand-coded HTML and CSS. Where I learned how things actually get built, a mental model that quietly paid dividends for the next two decades.

2010–2016 · Geometry Global

Digital art direction & UX

Brand and campaign work for John Deere, Nestlé, Kimberly-Clark, Philips, and Sherwin-Williams. Won ADDY Gold and Silver awards and a Bronze Effie, and earned my MS in User Experience Design at night along the way.

2016–2021 · Openfield

UX design, accessibility & design-culture leadership

Five years deep in research and design for ed-tech, finishing as Accessibility Lead / Senior UX Designer, where I began managing and was one of three leads shaping how the studio collaborated: critique, rituals, and design practices. That playbook is what I later brought to Cloverleaf.

2021–present · Cloverleaf

From senior designer to product leadership

Five roles in five years: Senior Product Designer → Group Manager of Product and Design → Group Manager, then Senior Group Manager, of Customer Insights & Design Thinking → Staff Product Manager & Designer. Along the way I hired and managed designers and researchers, and today I own product strategy and design for core coaching experiences and ship code alongside the engineers.

Next

Where this is headed

I'm looking for a team where behavior change is the product, and where one person who can research, design, write, and ship is more useful than three who each do one of those.

what teammates say

Letters from the brag box

Unprompted notes saved over the years, from the engineers I ship with to the founders I report to. Shared with their permission.

"What you have accomplished has literally entirely redefined my conception of how much someone in your role can accomplish."

— Product & engineering leader, Cloverleaf

"You're such a badass and get SO much important stuff done just on your own initiative. So glad I get to work alongside and learn from you."

— Engineer, Cloverleaf

"A responsive rockstar when it comes to project questions, direction, and design."

— Engineer, Cloverleaf

"Thank you for bringing more structure and clarity to how we do product. You have accomplished so, so much, from product monthly updates to PM levels to RFCs."

— Co-founder, Cloverleaf

"Your ability to actively listen, thoughtfully respond, and drive ideas into solutions is such an asset to Cloverleaf."

— Executive, Cloverleaf

"A relentlessly fierce advocate for all forms of accessibility, and working to educate our teams so we can join you in creating a better experience for ALL users."

— Product designer, Cloverleaf
beyond the work

A little about me

Julee and her fiancé at an event, smiling in front of a wood-paneled wall
My fiancé and me. Mac's portrait is below; he insisted.

The maker streak runs deep. I started my career building websites by hand, and after fifteen years of wireframes, research reports, and strategy docs, I've circled back to where I began: making things. These days that means a design file in one window and Claude or Cursor in the other, turning ideas into working software before the meeting about the meeting can get scheduled. This site is one of those projects. So is the small graveyard of experiments living at jumpingpixel.net, a domain I keep because every tinkerer needs a junk drawer.

What actually gets me out of bed is solving people's problems. I'd love to claim that's a noble choice, but I work at a company that measures personality for a living, and my assessment results are unanimous: I'm just wired this way. So I lean into it. If something I made makes someone's day easier, better, or a little more enjoyable, that's the job. Everything else is craft in service of it.

Off the clock, I get my hands dirty on purpose. I'm a gardener, a few years into building up my beds, and it's the best antidote I've found to a day of staring at screens. I bake, and I'll claim this one outright: I have mastered the macaron, the most temperamental cookie in the business. Summers are for the bike, where I set new mileage goals and go find trails I haven't ridden yet. And somewhere down the road there's a dream that ties it all together: a small farm with a farm-to-table restaurant, where the growing, the making, and the feeding happen in one place.

I live in Cincinnati, Ohio with my fiancé and our cat, Mac, who supervises my home office with the confidence of someone who has never shipped anything. Fifteen years in product taught me which work I like best: the kind where you watch a real person have an easier day because of something you built. That's why behavior change keeps pulling me back in. Software rarely changes a life in one dramatic moment. It does it the way people do, a little bit every day, on purpose.

A backyard vegetable garden with a living archway, marigolds, and raised beds
The garden, a few years of compounding interest in.
Mac, an orange and white cat, napping while hugging an arm
Mac, holding my fiancé hostage.
Chocolate cake topped with hand-torched meringue peaks
Chocolate cake, meringue torched by hand.
Green ombre cake with chocolate drip, piped succulents, and monstera leaves
The jungle cake. Yes, the leaves are edible.
Custard tart decorated with piped green wreaths and berries
Holiday tart, wreaths piped freehand.
Red-glazed cake ringed with piped frosting, blueberries, and mint
Berries and mint, because garnish matters. Macarons not pictured; they go too fast.