Designing how humans and machines think together.
James Heldridge
Product Designer & Design Researcher
I build human-centered tools for high-stakes environments—currently leading product design at NCITE, a DHS Center of Excellence, where I focus on making AI transparent and decision-making trustworthy.
Open to Opportunities — Let’s Work Together
002 — Case StudyView Case Study
K12 Risk Assessment
A threat assessment platform that school districts actually complete—designed for counselors, not compliance. Built to surface risk early and guide intervention.
+User interviews
%Shorter completion
%Higher completion
001 — Research
Designing Agentic Systems
How do you design for AI that acts on its own? Research into trust, transparency, and knowing when to step in.
Wizard-of-Oz sessions
%Error recovery
%Trust improvement
HICSS 2026
Read Research
“Good design makes uncertainty visible, not hidden.”
About
I’m a product designer and researcher focused on how people make decisions with AI in high-stakes environments. At NCITE—a DHS Center of Excellence at the University of Nebraska—I lead design for tools used by school safety teams and federal analysts.
My work sits at the intersection of interaction design, applied AI, and behavioral research. I’ve published at HICSS on trust calibration in agentic systems and built products used across 200+ school districts.
More about me →Expertise
01
Product Design
End-to-end product thinking from discovery through delivery. Design systems, prototyping, and UI architecture for complex tools.
02
AI/ML Interaction
Designing transparent interfaces for AI-driven systems. Trust calibration, explainability patterns, and human-in-the-loop workflows.
03
Design Research
Mixed-methods research including contextual inquiry, Wizard-of-Oz studies, and behavioral analysis for high-stakes decision environments.
04
Front-End Development
React, Next.js, and TypeScript. Building design-faithful interfaces with attention to performance, accessibility, and animation.
Process
01
Start with the decision, not the data.
02
Make uncertainty visible, not hidden.
03
Design for the person who has to act.
04
Trust is a system property, not a feature.