From the office of
Rick Murphy

Summary

A results-driven Creative Director with two decades of experience leading high-performing creative teams and shaping iconic global tech brands. Specialises in impactful brand visuals, data-informed UX, AI-enhanced workflows and directing global campaigns. Built Google's developer marketing creative team from the ground up, scaling it into a thriving 14-person studio that significantly boosted user engagement and business growth.

Work

Feb 2015 to now
Google
Creative Director, Developer Marketing

Built and led Google's developer-focused creative team, shaping its brands and driving user engagement through campaigns and data-driven UX.

  • Team leadership & growth Transformed a solo design role into a 14-person multi-disciplinary studio, establishing Google's first creative team dedicated to developer audiences, and owning partnerships with numerous creative vendors and a roster of global agencies including R/GA, Instrument and Koto.
  • Product branding & visual identity Creative direction and maintenance of visual identities for Google's developer products, including Android, DeepMind, Firebase, Firebase Studio, Angular and Google for Developers. Building 20+ brand identities from the ground up, I ensured widespread adoption by creating and distributing strategic toolkits for all internal and external press use.
  • Global events & campaigns Directed creative for Google's flagship I/O conference and numerous annual product-focused events. Built design production pipelines that support campaigns across 70+ of Google's developer social and YouTube channels.
  • UX & web platform leadership Drove significant improvements in clickthrough rates and performance across major web properties including Google I/O and the Android websites, by leading an in-house team focused on data-driven UX design, analytics and user testing.
Feb 2007 to Jan 2015
BuddyTV
Design Lead & Front-end Developer

Drove the product design, covering branding, UI and UX, plus the front-end development for a pioneering TV streaming platform, leading to its acquisition by Vizio.

  • Pioneered the smart TV in 2007 Unified the user experience for TV streaming across multiple devices, solving content fragmentation for users before smart TVs became standard.
  • Drove the complete design lifecycle Led all UX design and development, from user testing and wireframing to hands-on front-end coding in HTML, CSS and JS, and the final product branding.
  • Product integration in all Vizio smart TVs Delivered a core product experience that was a key factor in the company's acquisition by Vizio, for integration into their TV product.
Apr 2002 to Jan 2007
University of Kansas
Web Designer & Developer

Served as UX designer and front-end engineer for the KU Special Education department, designing, developing and deploying user-focused web portals.

Apr 2002 to now
Freelance
Editorial Illustrator & Creative Director

Operated my own business as a freelance creative director and editorial illustrator, with features in publications including WIRED and HOW Magazine, while also producing spot illustrations for a range of corporate clients.

Skills

Creative leadership & strategy: team leadership, creative strategy, brand identity systems, creative operations, cross-functional stakeholder alignment, campaign and event creative direction, data-driven design and user testing.

Design & content execution: logo and icon development, UX/UI and interaction design, video and motion graphics, social media creative, illustration and visual design, AI-enhanced creative workflows, engineering development in HTML, CSS, JS and Python.

Education

Sept 1998 to May 2002
University of Kansas

Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA), Industrial Design. Focused studies in product design and interaction design.

University of Kansas swimming team, NCAA. Full-scholarship athlete and All-American freestyle sprinter.

Contact

rickmurphynyc@gmail.com
rickmurphy.nyc