Portfolio

Marketing and Comms

Telling your story by appealing to the heart and mind.
I collaborate with engineers (subject matter experts) to understand the technical details and PMs and customers to understand the pain points, then quickly hone in on the story: “how is this different from other solutions” and “why do I care”.

Blogs

Ghost-writing: The most brilliant minds may not be the most brilliant communicators. At Broad, I helped bring content supplied by Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) alive. See Rare genomics with seqr in Terra.

Personal blog: Exploring topics at the intersection of science and society, Allie’s Milkyway Cafe serves up “great ideas from this galaxy and beyond.”

Case Studies

Outstanding science should stand out in the crowd, not get lost in the ethernet.

I write original content to be interesting and accessible with a nice side of enticing graphics… and the occasional snark, if it’s appropriate.

See Draper’s Inherently Secure Processor.

Press Releases

With the right words, even the most technical writing can blossom into a stellar press release. I wrote this press release based on a jargon-dense, 30+ page patent that had more equations than words. The release generated more earned media than any other release in 2017.

See This Spacesuit Comes with a “Take Me Home” Button.

Technical Documentation + Education

Whether helping students or end-users, communicating ideas and processes clearly and strategically is key.

Information architecture

Clear communication isn’t just nice-to-have—it’s essential infrastructure that multiplies engineering impact and accelerates scientific discovery. Helping bring big data analytics to bear solving Big Problems requires bridging the gap between software developers and your customers. And that means more than just writing that passes a ChatGPT check.

Making complex systems usable

See, for example, Overview: Research in the Cloud on Terra and Paying for your cloud analysis in Terra Support for examples of articles I’ve written.

Full case study of all the ways docs can boost your bottom line on YouTube.

K-12 Learning Resources

There’s nothing cooler than talking to elementary aged kids about black holes and getting them to learn a bit of math and chemistry on the side. I spent more than six years at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center writing, developing, and promoting STEM education materials for grades K-12.

Want to get people excited? Our small but mighty team worked closely with NASA scientists and external educators to develop lesson plans, posters, and web pages that get students excited while meeting current science and math standards.

See You Be the Astrophysicist on NASA's Imagine the Universe website.

Breakthrough Onboarding

I’m a creative communications ninja who turned an hour-long death-by-powerpoint into 30 minutes of active learning to transform seasoned researchers into Terra converts.

This three-minute video describes how I created a clever mock study from scratch to help hundreds of users onboard with a hands-on tutorial that had them running an analysis in the platform in half an hour.

If you're struggling with onboarding that doesn't lead to adoption, maybe you could use some creative onboarding, too!

Check out the story (elevator pitch or long-form here.

Project Management

I have outstanding organization skills and attention to detail (and I don't need ChatGPT to tell me to write that). I write effectively and concisely (thanks, liberal arts education!). That project with many moving parts and partners that's sitting in the to-do pile? I'll take it. With great enthusiasm. I have vision and energy in abundance: great qualities when leading a team.

Docs as Infrastructure

When users can't find or understand the docs, everyone loses. I transformed our documentation, making information more readable and findable while ferreting out inefficiencies and identifying where docs and communication could boost the bottom line.

See Communication Linguine: Docs that drive ROI.

Website Overhaul

Do you know how hard it is to convince a 75 year old organization to change?? I spearheaded a complete redo of a an ancient website in six months - a project that had been simmering on the back burner for years - coordinating demands and requests from board members, 100+ org members, and a wonderful designer to get the job done.

See the results at ecrs.org.