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AJ

01·Case Studies · Chapter 01

The decisions
behind the ship.

AI-powered software, frontend platforms, regulated fintech, agency systems, and Fortune 500 design systems. Each case reads the same way: Challenge, Role, Approach, Impact, Lessons. Judgment first, artifacts second.

AJ Barnett

2026 · Product Engineer

Ask A.J. AI Portfolio Agent

Designed and engineered a recruiter-facing AI agent with streamed responses, server-side OpenAI integration, request safeguards, fallback models, cached answers, and graceful degradation.

Challenge
The portfolio needed to show AI product engineering as a working system, not just a claim in copy.
Role
Product Engineer
Approach
  • Kept provider calls, secrets, validation, retries, and fallback behavior server-side.
  • Streamed application-owned NDJSON events so the browser never depends on provider-specific event names.
  • Added request validation, origin checks, local rate limiting, duplicate request protection, token caps, and graceful fallback answers.
  • Structured the knowledge source so future retrieval can build on curated portfolio facts.
Impact
Ask A.J. gives recruiters a direct way to understand AJ's work while demonstrating production-minded AI interface design.
Lessons
“An AI product is the whole system around the model: context, trust boundaries, latency, failure behavior, and cost.”
EXPLOREDRAFTREVIEWREFINESHIPJUDGMENT

Stack

AIOpenAIReactTypeScriptTanStack StartNDJSON
1
live AI agent
5
availability layers
0
client-side secrets
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CDW

2022, 2026 · Senior Software Engineer I / Technical Lead

Legato Design System

Evolved an enterprise design system supporting 10+ product teams and 15+ applications across the CDW portfolio.

Challenge
A shared UI foundation had to serve dozens of engineers, product teams, and product surfaces without becoming the bottleneck that every team quietly worked around.
Role
Senior Software Engineer I / Technical Lead
Approach
  • Treat tokens as a language, not a stylesheet, semantic layers that translate design intent into code contracts.
  • Ship primitives + composition slots instead of prop-heavy configurations.
  • Publish accessibility and motion decisions as part of the component contract, not as a follow-up ticket.
  • Make Storybook the single source of truth, docs, states, and interaction tests live next to the component.
Impact
The system moved from a component library that teams debated to shared infrastructure they built on. Reviews shifted from styling arguments to product decisions.
Lessons
“Systems win when they lower ambiguity. Documentation is a product. The best API is the one that lets a caller write intent, not configuration.”
COMPONENT SYSTEM · 170+ ASSETS

Stack

ReactTypeScriptStencilStorybookNxTokens
170+
UI assets
20+
engineers supported
10+
product teams
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Midland Trust

2020, 2022 · Software Engineer

Fintech Portals, Client, Payment & Pro

Owned workflow design and production React/TypeScript delivery for regulated IRA and banking-related portals.

Challenge
Self-serve IRA and payment workflows in a regulated industry, where every state, error, and edge case is a promise to the user and a compliance decision.
Role
Software Engineer
Approach
  • Designed workflows in Balsamiq, mocked in Photoshop, then implemented the same flow end-to-end in React/TypeScript.
  • Modeled the domain in PostgreSQL and Sequelize so the UI never lied about state.
  • Treated loading, empty, error, and edge states as first-class UI, not exception handling.
  • Shipped web and Ionic mobile from a single product intent.
Impact
Three portals, client, payment, and pro, running the daily operations of a regulated trust company, owned by a small team that could reason about the whole system.
Lessons
“Financial software is a trust product. Every UI decision is a compliance decision. The path from workflow diagram to production code is the actual job.”
ARCHITECTURE · DESIGN FOR CHANGE

Stack

ReactTypeScriptPostgreSQLExpressIonic
3
portals shipped
Annual
banking training
1
team, end-to-end
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Priority Marketing

2016, 2020 · Web Developer

50+ Custom WordPress Websites

Delivered 50+ bespoke WordPress builds: custom themes, responsive design, SEO, GSAP animation, and hosted deployment.

Challenge
Fifty-plus client sites, each a real business with real editors, all shipped at agency cadence without turning into fifty maintenance liabilities.
Role
Web Developer
Approach
  • Custom themes hand-built around the editor's workflow, not the developer's convenience.
  • GSAP used surgically, motion that supported the story, never decoration for its own sake.
  • SEO and performance baked into the template layer so editors couldn't accidentally regress them.
  • Deployment discipline: the boring parts done reliably, every time.
Impact
A body of sites that stayed maintainable long after handoff, proof that volume and craft aren't at odds when the templates carry the discipline.
Lessons
“Great CMS work is 20% templates and 80% empathy for the editor. This is where I first understood that systems are built for other humans.”
CMS · BLUEPRINT → PRODUCTION

Stack

PHPWordPressGSAPSEOApache
50+
sites shipped
100%
custom themes
Editor-first
authoring
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Caldwell & Kerr

2015, 2016 · Junior Designer → Senior Frontend

Automotive Campaigns, The Origin of the Product Instinct

Progressed from design production into senior frontend at Caldwell & Kerr (formerly Moore & Scarry, later Affinitiv), high-cadence automotive advertising where I learned visual hierarchy, conversion, typography, and how to earn a user's attention. This is where the engineering instinct was forged.

Challenge
High-volume automotive campaigns where every pixel was asking the user for a decision, and every deadline was tomorrow.
Role
Junior Designer → Senior Frontend
Approach
  • Learned visual hierarchy by shipping under pressure, the eye follows weight before words.
  • Owned the frontend end of campaigns: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and enough PHP to keep the pipeline moving.
  • Progressed through four roles by treating each brief as a product, not a task.
Impact
The foundational literacy every interface engineer needs, hierarchy, conversion, typography, attention, earned inside real deadlines with real accountability.
Lessons
“Craft is a discipline. Typography is the quiet architecture of trust. User attention is the scarcest resource in every product I've built since.”
HIERARCHY · CONVERSION · ATTENTION

Stack

HTMLCSSJavaScriptPHPHierarchyConversion
4
role progressions
Agency
cadence
Origin
of product thinking
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RealiDreams

2010, 2015 · Founder & Creative Director

Founder, Independent Studio

Ran a studio delivering websites, branding, logos, print, motion, and 3D logo animation.

Challenge
Running a studio meant every discipline, brand, web, motion, 3D, print, plus the parts nobody teaches: scoping, delivery, and getting paid.
Role
Founder & Creative Director
Approach
  • Treated every client engagement as a product with a beginning, middle, and shipped end.
  • Built brand systems and websites as one coherent artifact, not separate deliverables.
  • Owned scoping, delivery, and support, the full lifecycle, not just the fun part.
Impact
Five years of shipping real work for real clients, with no one to escalate to. The habits from this era shape how I show up for product teams today.
Lessons
“Nobody is coming to save the ship. You are the ship. Product thinking starts with the client's business, not the artifact.”
EXPLOREDRAFTREVIEWREFINESHIPJUDGMENT

Stack

BrandWebMotion3D
5
years
Full
ownership
Studio
operations
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End of the case studies

The rest of the story lives in the journey.

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