David Sasda, our Designer here at Trusted Health, spearheads everything from product design, marketing, user experience, and branding to our notorious swag, photography, and videography. Wonder what goes on behind the scenes here at Trusted? We got to pick David’s brain and we’re giving you the inside scoop!
Describe your day-to-day at Trusted Health.
My day-to-day involves solving problems and delivering a simple, elegant solution to the antiquated experience for nurses all while listening to soulful tunes to stir the creative juices. Collaborating and bonding with engineers, nurse advocates, founders, Trusted Nurses, and teammates in general all helps feed into the result of my craft.
Have you always been interested in design? How did you get started in the industry?
Mmm….absolutely! I’ve been designing since I was 13 years old when I found a fascination with graphic design and photo manipulation. It felt like magic. I started off designing graphics for my self-identity and wallpapers for people to download, which then grew into web design and web development.
What kicked off my career in this industry was when I was 16 years old, I got a random email from a stranger that wanted to pay me to build his website for a documentary he was releasing on DVD. This entailed traveling from NYC to LA on only $5 a day with nothing but a backpack, a camera, and the kindness of humanity. At 16 getting an offer to be paid for what seemed like a hobby got me excited, but I was still naive as to the possibility of what this would hold for future me.
What does a designer do? Does this deviate at all in your role at Trusted?
Aside from the typical “make stuff look pretty,” design takes into account the various emotional and psychological expectations of the person that will be using the product on a day-to-day basis. If a user is frustrated with how a product works (or doesn’t), it’s a failure on my part but not the end of the world since it’s in our DNA to smooth these kinds of wrinkles out fast. As a designer, I tend to empathize with the end-user, keeping in mind that their success is my success, and their frustrations were, in-part, due to my decisions.
As a designer, I tend to empathize with the end-user, keeping in mind that their success is my success, and their frustrations were in-part due to my decisions.
As mentioned above, I’m responsible for the overall brand, swag that goes into our Trusted Gift Boxes that nurses get on their first day, photography of our nurses, shooting videos that nurses can relate to for Trusted TV, and ultimately the product that nurses use to find their next job. This is all part of the experience that we, as a team, want to deliver and maintain a high bar of.
What’s it like designing for nurses?
Legen…wait-for-it…dary! Most, if not all, nurses I’ve met are extremely friendly, honest, caring, and really really fun to hang out with. Knowing that I’m helping to enrich their lives through design has been an honor, and I look forward to seeing what the future unfolds. Being able to directly communicate with Trusted Nurses through the design process has been unbelievably fruitful—their thoughts and feedback into design has contributed to what you see and experience today in the product.
What do you enjoy most about working for Trusted Health?
Being given the opportunity to change the landscape of traditional staffing in the nursing world with people that care as much as I do about the space is priceless.
I’d like to spend my career tackling one of the 4 major pillars in anyone’s life. Those pillars are family, love, health, and career.
Trusted Health seems to blend all 4 pillars together with a major focus on career. When I joined Trusted, the team was only 5 people. Seeing how we grow and bond day to day has been an incredible journey that also excites me for the future.
What’s your favorite thing to design?
Everything I can get my hands on.
In every field, there are advancements and changes in research and technology that keep us on our toes. What do you do to grow and develop your skills?
I tend to gain inspiration from sites like Dribbble and just observing the real world. Go against the grain and don’t follow trends that most designers seems to jump on the bandwagon for. Yes, it’s new and shiny, but if everyone else is following that trend, you’re just another pixel. Go to the beat of your own drum!
What experiences or people have influenced you along your journey?
My family, long story short. They’ve always believed in me and trusted my decisions in life. LOVE!
What gets you out of bed in the morning and gives you energy?
Work and coffee. Being here with the team at 9ish and taking it day by day towards our future-selves is invigorating. Not to mention living and working in the bustling city of San Francisco, the energy is shared on my commute.
If you were a patient, what would you want in a nurse?
Don’t let me die. Yet.
Where do you dream of traveling to? Why?
It may not be my next destination, but possibly 2nd or 3rd and that’s Iceland. It seems like the kind of magical and surreal that I’d love to photograph. But, in the immediate future, I’d love to go back and explore more of Japan’s countryside. Delicious food, extremely nice residents, and just full of art and mastery.
What’s your favorite color? Color code please!
White, the absence of color #FFFFFF
- My given name is: David Sasda, but I go by: Sasda at work, David IRL
- Hometown: New Milford, CT
- Favorite Food: Rice
- Favorite Destination: Japan
- Secretly really good at: Making a loud clicky noise with my tongue
- Prior to Trusted I was…Soul searching
- I couldn’t be a nurse because: Needles scare me
- If I could be an animal I’d be: a Liger
- Celeb crush: Justin Timberlake
- Favorite condiment: Sriracha
- 3 Fun Facts: Aspiring musician, I was a break dancer in middle school, never broken a bone
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