Connor Harrison

Hi, I'm Connor Harrison 👋

I'm a content and AI conversation design leader with 8+ years across the product lifecycle. I design experiences that stay coherent as users move between IVRs, chatbots, and human agents.

Beyond client work, I'm committed to UX education and mentorship. I contribute to playbooks that support versatile craft, and partner with commercial teams to translate design thinking into new business.

Content Design

Designing digital experiences through language, information architecture, and content governance.

Discover & Define
  • Content audits
  • Journey mapping
  • Competitive research
Design
  • Information architecture
  • UX writing
  • Wireframing
  • Content strategy
Evaluate
  • Content testing
Implement & Scale
  • Technical writing
  • Content governance

Conversation Design

Designing interactions between users and chatbots, voice assistants, and other conversational interfaces, across the full CX journey from entry point to resolution.

Strategy & Scoping
  • AI Benchmarking
  • Conversational Scoping
  • CX Strategy
Prompt & Flow Design
  • Intent Mapping
  • Persona Design
  • Voice & Tone
  • Multimodal Dialogue Design
Train & Evaluate
  • Knowledge Engineering
  • Model Training
  • Bot Testing
Operations & Scaling
  • Agent Readiness
  • Bot Optimization

Case Studies

TELUS Expert Messaging

Content strategy for the first asynchronous messaging app in Canadian Telecom. Customers describe their issue and go about their day while a human expert resolves it. My work spanned IVR prompts, bot triage flows, agent training, marketing collateral, and future-state design.

What I solved

IVR drop-off → Switched to keyword-driven brevity, improving containment rate
Bot-to-expert handoff → Simplified handoff language to reduce cognitive load
Agent consistency → Built content snippets and a rubric to standardize first-message resolution
Content ecosystem → Owned hundreds of bilingual copy artifacts across the full dev handoff
$2.5M Projected annual call-offload savings
400K+ Conversations handled through messaging
6 min Reduction in average handling time vs. voice
+9 pts Lift in First Contact Resolution vs. voice
24/7 Support, with 30% of conversations outside business hours
5 pp Direct FCR increase from content strategy
View Full Case Study (PDF)

More case studies coming soon.

Practice Leadership

⚡
Catalyst Award

Peer-nominated recognition for sparking change and elevating collective success at TELUS Digital.

Playbooks & Governance

Developed internal playbooks for UX Writing, Content Testing, and Conversation Design at TELUS Digital. Built to be opinionated but flexible, so teams had a shared standard without losing room to adapt.

Hiring & Team Building

Hiring manager for three content designers. Replaced static take-home tests with live wireframing sessions to better evaluate how candidates think, which reduced time and cost in the pipeline.

Revenue & Commercial Impact

Directly secured $325k+ in net-new revenue through client placements and contract expansions, and mentored designers on pitching extensions on existing accounts.

Writing & Talks

UX Strategy

External

  • The Orchestration Era: Bridging Content and Conversation Design Growing In Content Conference · 2026

    Full-stack case study on TELUS Expert Messaging, spanning IVR strategy, bot design, agent training, and future-state design.

  • Mastering Conversation Design in the Age of AI-Powered CX TELUS Digital Insights · 2026

    Co-authored practitioner guide covering rules-based, generative, and agentic conversation design across four real client engagements.

  • How Content Designers Can Expand Impact in Discovery UX Y'all Conference · 2022

    Shared frameworks for early-stage cross-functional collaboration and strategic discovery.

  • Introduction to UX and Content Design Boston University, Guest Lecture (COM 523) · 2022

    Covered product lifecycles, role collaboration, and professional career pathways.

  • When Worlds Collide: The Intersection of UX and Journalism Wayfair XD Blog · 2021

    Published analysis on applying journalistic fundamentals to UX curricula and professional practice.

Internal

  • Building the Conversation Design Practice TELUS Digital · 2025

    Three client case studies spanning generative, agentic, and rules-based conversation design.

  • Making it Your Business: Creating & Extending Design Allocations TELUS Digital · 2025

    Strategy for designers to partner with account leadership to drive revenue and extend client allocations.

Journalism

  • Treasure: The Big Reveal Boston Magazine · Mar 2018

    A profile on shop owner Lana Barakat and the stories behind two mysterious artworks.

  • The Voice of Julian Edelman Boston Magazine · Jan 2018

    How marketing strategist Assaf Swissa turned the Patriots' wide receiver into a bigger social media star than Tom Brady.

  • Childish Gambino's Funky, Flawed "Awaken, My Love!" Boston University News Service · Dec 2016

    A review of Donald Glover's genre-shifting departure from rap, and what it says about fatherhood and vulnerability.

  • The College Era Lyrics and Ego of Kanye West The Artifice · Jul 2017

    How Kanye's College Era lyrics and persona set the stage for one of hip-hop's most debated trajectories.

Academic Research

  • The Tom Wolfe Papers at The New York Public Library American Journalism (Taylor & Francis) · 2021

    UX audit of the NYPL's online Tom Wolfe exhibit.

  • Literary Journalism & UX Strategy AEJMC Conference, IALJS Panel · 2020

    How UX principles can help long-form journalists design more immersive reader experiences.

  • A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood American Journalism (Taylor & Francis) · 2020

    Fred Rogers' interviewing ethic as a model for empathetic journalism.

  • Joseph Pulitzer: Voice of the People American Journalism (Taylor & Francis) · 2019

    Pulitzer's legacy through the lens of modern accountability journalism.

  • A Student's View of How Digital Media and Higher Education Collided AEJMC: Media Ethics Division Newsletter · 2019

    From the master's thesis: digital media's impact on campus culture, PR crises, and classroom discourse, 2015-2017.

  • Bill Simmons and the New Journalism Tradition AJHA Convention · 2018

    How Bill Simmons pioneered digital-native narrative in sports journalism.

15 years with the American Classical League

American Classical League

Hamilton, Ohio, May 2011 to present

🏛
Maxima Cum Laude Chaperone Award

Recognized for 15 years of sustained service and leadership.

Founding Lead, Agon (Greek Certamen)

Co-founded the Agon competition, building the curriculum from scratch and managing it through sustained national growth.

Content Architecture

Developed history syllabus and wrote history questions for the National Certamen Committee.

Assessment Design

Developed the National Roman & Hellenic Civilization Exams, distributed to thousands of students each year.

Mentorship & Coaching

Coached state-level teams and authored history notes for educators and students nationwide.

Want the full picture?

Full work history, education, and skills.

Download Full Resume (PDF)