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I'm Caitlin Rantala, a creative strategist and graphic design lead with 16+ years of experience, including 5+ in healthcare and research communications. I collaborate with cross-functional teams to shape art direction and design across digital and print, delivering measurable results. I specialize in accessible design systems, content strategy, and brand storytelling, helping teams engage audiences, improve usability, and drive growth through data-informed campaigns and scalable design processes.…I'm Caitlin Rantala, a creative strategist and graphic design lead with 16+ years of experience, including 5+ in healthcare and research communications. I collaborate with cross-functional teams to shape art direction and design across digital and print, delivering measurable results. I specialize in accessible design systems, content strategy, and brand storytelling, helping teams engage audiences, improve usability, and drive growth through data-informed campaigns and scalable design processes.

Caitlin Rantala

Graphic Designer, Designer, Art Director, +2

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I'm Caitlin Rantala, a creative strategist and graphic design lead with 16+ years of experience, including 5+ in healthcare and research communications. I collaborate with cross-functional teams to shape art direction and design across digital and print, delivering measurable results. I specialize in accessible design systems, content strategy, and brand storytelling, helping teams engage audiences, improve usability, and drive growth through data-informed campaigns and scalable design processes.…I'm Caitlin Rantala, a creative strategist and graphic design lead with 16+ years of experience, including 5+ in healthcare and research communications. I collaborate with cross-functional teams to shape art direction and design across digital and print, delivering measurable results. I specialize in accessible design systems, content strategy, and brand storytelling, helping teams engage audiences, improve usability, and drive growth through data-informed campaigns and scalable design processes.

Available to hire

I’m Caitlin Rantala, a creative strategist and graphic design lead with 16+ years of experience, including 5+ in healthcare and research communications. I collaborate with cross-functional teams to shape art direction and design across digital and print, delivering measurable results.

I specialize in accessible design systems, content strategy, and brand storytelling, helping teams engage audiences, improve usability, and drive growth through data-informed campaigns and scalable design processes.

Skills

Experience Level

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Expert

Editorial Illustration

Intermediate

Language

English

Fluent

Work Experience

Sr. Communications Specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center

March 1, 2020 - January 31, 2026

Collaborated with NIH and All of Us awardees to create and implement engagement strategies for researcher communities; managed communications for data/product releases reaching over 12,000 researchers via emails, newsletters, and trainings; oversaw content updates for public and researcher websites focusing on onboarding, data comprehension, compute cost navigation, and training access; migrated a SaaS product to a new cloud platform, coordinating a phased rollout for 12,000+ users.

Program Manager, Design Lead at Vanderbilt University Medical Center

March 1, 2020 - January 31, 2026

Directed creative strategy for 12 research campaigns (participant- and clinical-facing); advised and assisted cross-functional teams of 5-7 to design websites and revise content aligned with organizational goals; gathered UX/UI data through community engagement studios with 15+ community leaders, delivering user-first, WCAG-compliant designs; mentored 1:1 sessions bi-weekly, improving design quality of 50+ assets; drove 10,000+ organic leads through A/B testing social media ads; developed internal accessible design systems and a scalable design template library; revamped internal SOPs accelerating project delivery timelines by 40% and reducing revision requests by 15%; co-authored journal content for PubMed-indexed publications.

Design Lead, Marketing Consultant at Freelance — Nashville, TN

April 1, 2015 - Present

Piloted and executed brand development strategies for 15+ clients across industries; devised end-to-end execution of 10+ sales decks and 50+ digital campaigns, focusing on branding and typography; created marketing collateral including pitch decks and RFPs, resulting in projects won; launched digital campaigns that boosted social engagement by 300% and email open rates by 21%; designed and developed 400+ branded assets (logos, ads, email templates, social posts, landing pages), increasing click-through rates by 20% and conversions by 10%.

Graphic Designer, Lead Photographer at Empower Local

August 1, 2015 - October 31, 2019

Created 300+ digital assets and web graphics, boosting campaign engagement by 15% and sales leads by 10%; standardized visual language across stakeholder materials, establishing a cohesive brand identity reaching 500,000+ end users; led weekly digital ad campaigns with 1M+ impressions, surpassing projections by 700%; redesigned hospitality client interfaces to improve usability.

Marketing & Design Coordinator at Security Awareness Company

February 1, 2014 - April 30, 2015

Prepared interactive e-learning modules with a 95% completion rate; produced 20+ print and digitally interactive infographics for cybersecurity campaigns; authored 40+ blog posts and press releases to amplify web presence; translated technical information into animated training videos (2 per week); assembled monthly newsletters for 20+ organizations ensuring brand consistency; increased social media engagement by 200% through targeted content strategies, generating new leads weekly.

Production Manager at MusicRow Magazine

September 1, 2011 - February 28, 2014

Fulfilled de facto Creative Director duties, leading visual direction and layout for magazine issues; managed end-to-end production and distribution of 15 print publications; collaborated with major entertainment clients for branded content and features; conceived campaigns generating over 1M impressions and a 15% engagement increase; partnered with Sony Nashville and Warner Bros. to ensure brand-consistent creative; resolved a 15-year layout bottleneck, saving 10+ hours per issue.

Admin and Marketing Assistant at Skanska

September 1, 2010 - September 30, 2011

Created slide decks for internal training events (40-100 attendees); managed and updated content and design for internal websites accessible by teams nationwide.