Meg McMahon

Meg McMahon (they/them) is the User Experience Researcher at the Usability Research Center within Harvard Library. In their work, they believe in listening to the user when creating new systems and designs. When envisioning the future of a platform or product, they turn to participatory design and collective creativity over innovation.  

In their work, they provide consultation to support library staff as they gather, process, analyze, manage, and report library resource and service data. They conduct UX research and design for the library at large, directly supporting library strategic initiatives, and small, helping a discrete team within the library answer a question vital to their service design. This includes creating, executing, analyzing, and reporting on UX research for the library and creating designs for online systems. 

Meg supports the URC in many collaborative efforts. They advocate for accessible and inclusive practices and audit library systems to create digital solutions that value all users. They support the Harvard Library's Google Analytics strategy and management. They helped form the library's UX research repository and are the primary product manager for the repository. They help create and revise templates for the larger Harvard community for UX research methods. 

Believing in collaboration across institutions and that there is power in sharing knowledge, they are involved with projects outside Harvard Library. They have contributed to Weave: Journal of Library User Experience and Evidence-Based Library and Information Practice. They have worked on the admin team of the Digital Accessibility Working Group within DLF and have contributed to the National Forum on the Prevention of Cyber Sexual Abuse handbook. They have presented at UXLibs, ai4Libraries, DLF, NERCOMP, Designing for Digital, and across Harvard University. 

They graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in May 2020 with an MSIS in Human-Computer Interaction and certificates in Digital Humanities and Diversity Advocacy. Outside of work, their interests include film, comedy, and fiber craft.