Team Spotlight: Co-Founder Britt Jensen
After a year of hiding away in our houses and building a company over Zoom, we would like to introduce ourselves!
Meet Britt, co-founder of Peak Response. She is a product designer with a passion for bringing user-centered design to industries that are not traditionally design-focused.
What is your role at Peak Response?
Running a small startup inherently means wearing lots of hats. Some days I’m working on developing our product strategy, other days I’m trying to untangle the government grant application process. I’ve spent a lot of time over the past year talking to users and experts while developing our product strategy and product design. I’m now working more on our business strategy: customer discovery, pricing, marketing, distribution, etc.
In a nutshell, I would say my role is to always be learning from our users and customers, whether I’m working on the design of a product feature or working on a distribution strategy.
What do you enjoy most about your role?
I love working with people. I always feel super energized when I get to talk to advisors, partners, and users. I feel particularly lucky that we’re developing a product in an industry that attracts such passionate and kind people. Everyone we’ve talked to in the public safety world has been incredibly insightful, patient, and friendly. Every conversation leaves me reminded of why we’re working to bring improved technology to the public safety sector.
Tell us a bit about your background before Peak Response.
Before joining forces with Francis to start Peak Response, I was working in product design consulting at Whipsaw, a Bay Area-based design firm. Working in design consulting gave me amazing opportunities to work with companies of all shapes and sizes in a wide variety of industries. I worked with tiny startups and massive global corporations on everything from medical devices to children’s toys. A lot of the human-centered design methods I used in design consulting have been central in informing our product development and business strategy. Francis and I made the decision early-on to be a design and user-focused company and it has been a great challenge to figure out how to use thoughtful design to differentiate our product.
What excites you about working on tools for the EMS community?
I love working on products for highly-skilled audiences who are often overlooked by design. Design isn’t just about making products beautiful, it’s about making them usable. First responders need their tools to be usable when they’re under huge amounts of stress. Just because someone can use a spreadsheet doesn’t mean it’s the right tool for the job. I enjoy finding opportunities to reduce stress and improve outcomes with better-designed tools. Public safety is full of opportunities! It really excites me to bring the type of design we’re all familiar with in consumer products to highly-skilled audiences who often get stuck with sub-optimal tools.
Where do you hope to see Peak Response in a year?
I would love to see our software being used to improve interoperability between agencies that currently operate on different pieces of software. I’m also excited to see how the data collected by our software can help agencies with continuous quality improvement. This is a part of the product we haven’t done much work on yet, but I see the use of data as a huge area for impact!
What do you do when you’re not working on Peak?
When I’m not working I love to be outside biking, hiking, camping, or skiing. And when I’m not outside, I do a lot of ceramics and sculpture and dabble in painting and printmaking. I’m also a volunteer member of the Code for San Francisco brigade where we work on technology to solve civic and social issues. I actually met Francis at Code for San Francisco, so it has a special place in both of our hearts!
