Sara Shuman

Conversational AI UX Designer

Experience

From pioneering conversational AI to designing production Voice UX experiences.

I’ve spent my career helping organizations transform complex AI capabilities into natural, intuitive customer experiences. From designing production Alexa+ Voice User Interface (VUI) experiences to creating interactive AI conversations at StoryFile and USC Libraries, my focus has remained the same: making conversational AI feel more human.

Today, I specialize in conversational AI, Voice UX, AI product design, LLM evaluation, and multimodal experience design.

Conversational AI UX Designer

Amazon Alexa+, Jun 2025 – Present (Contract)

Designed production conversational AI experiences for Alexa+, leading end-to-end Voice User Interface (VUI) design across the subscription lifecycle, including enrollment, onboarding, purchase, cancellation, recovery, and subscription management. Expanded Alexa+ experiences across the U.S., Canada, and seven European countries while partnering with engineering, product, and legal teams to deliver production-ready multimodal experiences. Also evaluated LLM-generated responses to improve conversational quality, naturalness, and the overall customer experience.

Principal Conversational AI UX Designer

USC Libraries, Jan 2023 – Feb 2026 (Contract)

Led the design, prototyping, and usability testing of USC Interactive Interviews, an AI-powered video conversation platform that preserves historically significant stories through natural dialogue. Also designed the AI-powered Chat Search experience for USC Libraries, improving how students, faculty, and researchers discover information through natural language interactions.

LINK: USC Digital Repository – Interactive Interviews   View Case Study

Conversational AI UX Designer

Amazon Alexa+, Apr 2024 – Jul 2024 (Contract)

Contributed to the early development of Alexa+ by evaluating, scoring, rewriting, and labeling AI-generated responses across multiple conversational dimensions. Helped improve conversational quality through dialogue design and AI training while crafting natural, concise, and engaging voice interactions aligned with Alexa’s brand voice and customer experience goals.

Senior AI SaaS Product Designer

Phoenix Labs AI, Jul 2024 – Dec 2024 (Contract)

Designed Firebird, an AI-powered SaaS platform for creating interactive podcasts and video conversational AI experiences. Led the UX for dashboards, subscription workflows, analytics, and AI avatar creation tools while applying AI-first design principles and iterative usability testing to improve customer adoption and product usability. VIEW DESIGN WORK

Head of Product Design

StoryFile, Mar 2020 – Dec 2022

Served as a player/coach at an AI startup, leading a small design team while driving the end-to-end UX for Conversa, StoryFile’s AI-powered SaaS platform for creating interactive video conversational experiences (“Videos that Talk Back”). Improved customer adoption and increased free-trial-to-paid conversion through iterative UX design, usability testing, and conversational AI optimization.

WATCH 60-MINUTES VIDEO: https://youtu.be/aWT4zueWAt8

Before and After Dashboard Views

Digital Creative Director

Oracle, Jan 2010 – March 2019

Led Oracle’s interactive design organization of 25+ designers, driving UX strategy and digital experiences across global web properties, demand generation, landing pages, email campaigns, and mobile applications. Championed usability, customer-centered design, and cross-functional collaboration to improve engagement and business outcomes.