Airbnb co-founder taps Peter Arnell as first US chief brand architect

Airbnb co-founder Joe Gebbia announced on Monday that designer Peter Arnell joined the U.S. National Design Studio to serve as its first chief brand architect. The news was shared at The Wall Street Journal's "Future of Everything" conference. The studio forms part of a Trump initiative to improve the government's online presence. Arnell, who has spent four decades branding and marketing for companies including Donna Karan New York, Samsung, Unilever, Pepsi, Reebok, Chrysler and The Home Depot, will work with Silicon Valley design and software engineering talent. The team focuses on reshaping the usability of U.S. government online platforms. Arnell said the goal is to create consistency and a unified look-and-feel so that American citizens build trust in their daily interactions with the government. The team is redesigning 27,000 government websites using design approaches previously applied to consumer apps such as Airbnb. Gebbia noted that the work involves taking complex processes and making them easier, safer and more trustworthy, citing examples such as a streamlined web-based retirement process completable in minutes rather than months and a workflow reduced from 87 clicks to 12 with a target of 10. The initiative also targets issues such as difficult navigation and pages that time out and cause data loss. Gebbia described poor government website experiences as one of the darkest UX patterns and said the perception of difficulty prevents engagement while the team aims to empower users to complete necessary government tasks.