About Me
As a side job at Cal Poly — where I studied Print/Graphic Communications — I worked in the College of Science & Math IT department, troubleshooting students' and professors' hardware and software. The same questions came up day after day, and I'd watch what people were trying to do and how they tried to do it.
After a few detours through marketing and business, watching Ready Player One convinced me to use my design brain on new interactions in virtual space. Now, after working with machine-learning services, I spend my career as a UX researcher interrogating automated decision-making — when I'm not working remotely from a van traveling North America with my dog, chasing waterfalls and Roadside America.
On the side
Tools on the bat utility belt
Just what I'd reach for first to get the job done.
- Zip-ties & gaffers tape
- Multi-tool card
- Compass
- North America museum pass
- Eye drops & decongestant
- Doggie bags, every pocket
- Figma / FigJam
- Qualtrics · Typeform · UserInterviews
- AI prototyping & IDEs
- Salesforce · Salesloft · Braze
- Jira · Trello · Confluence
- Zoom / Meet — not Teams, please
- Tableau
- Heap · Mixpanel
- Looker · Snowflake · Sigma
- Airtable · Smartsheet · Zapier
- Gemini CLI · Claude Code · OpenCode
What collaborators say
“Dillon exhibits a rare balance between the analytical and the empathetic approach to problem solving, which serves him well as a quantitative analyst…”
I had the pleasure of working with Dillon for nearly 4 years as he transitioned from contract work, to a UXR intern, and into his current career as a UXR and Data professional. He exhibits a rare balance between the analytical and the empathetic approach to problem solving, which serves him well both as a qualitative researcher and an (extremely tech savvy and curious) quantitative analyst.
Dillon is great at cross-collaborating, routinely meeting with leaders and ICs across the company to understand not only what our users need, but what our teams need to solve real problems. Oh, and he can do it all from anywhere. He is a paragon of the dedicated remote worker who adds to team culture while pushing the company forward. I loved being a part of that as his manager!
Working with myself and our Director of Product, he proposed and executed full-scale documentation of goal-based user analytics tracking using Heap for a product that had never been properly tracked in 8+ years. One of his most impactful studies analyzed the reasons why key user relationships were not occurring in our platform; his holistic approach led to viable solutions to dramatically improve our top of funnel in referral conversion that nobody had cracked in 7+ years.
Dillon is the person I want on my team, no matter where I work, not only because he's a wiz, but because he's honest, ethical, and well intentioned in everything he does.
“Dillon has a way of making all the magic happen without leaving me feeling like I'm out of the loop. He's incredibly knowledgeable…”
I'm not always sure what our tech team is doing, but Dillon has a way of making all the magic happen without leaving me feeling like I'm out of the loop. He's incredibly knowledgeable and is an amazing problem solver, but besides his obvious technical ability, Dillon is a dream to work with.
He's communicative, creative, adaptable and an attentive team member. Not only did he do an amazing job single handedly creating our website, but he also had an incredibly kind way of pointing out legacy practices of ours that were in need of update. I cringe to think what our online presence would look like today without Dillon Chi.
“Dillon was always very quick to find a solution to challenging situations. He worked very hard to make sure things were done well…”
I had the privilege of being a supervisor to Dillon Chi working at Cal Poly. Dillon has always been dynamic, bringing great creativity and insight to our Information Technology team. He was always very quick to find a solution to challenging situations.
He worked very hard to make sure that things were done well and efficiently. As employee, I could always count on Dillon to give me a valued perspective other than my own. I can see Dillon's passion for using his creativity as a profession. He is passionate about doing whatever it takes to reach his goals. As an employee of a University, it is most gratifying to see students go after their dreams. Dillon is a shining example of this.
Presenter & workshops
- SAP (internal) — Designer Enablement'21
- JobScan × ACCD — Beating the Resume Bots: Getting past Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS)'20
Recognition
Press & interviews
Awards & fellowships
- Graduation with Distinction — 1 of 13, GPA 3.89 @ ArtCenter'21
- UX Research Fellowship @ ArtCenter × Cedars-Sinai'21
- Excellence in Art @ EA Rose Valley Jam'20
- “Best Use of Activ5 SDK” @ SD Hacks'19
- Student Leadership & Development Grant @ ArtCenter'19
Drop me a line.
I'm interested in the confluence of artificial intelligence and human interaction — let's connect, especially if you're part of a social-good non-profit. Fully remote, always open to a video coffee chat.