About me
I have extensive experience working in various roles and companies, over 15 years in product and UX design, including 6 years in product design leadership and product management.
I’ve worked in-house at the world’s biggest tech firms — notably Meta, Uber, Google, and Microsoft — and have headed design and product for pre-IPO startups.
I am a builder and entrepreneur at heart, and have deep knowledge of the product lifecycle, from user acquisition and onboarding to growth and retention. I have both qualitative and quantitative expertise, ensuring teams build, test and iterate towards products users love.
Learn more on LinkedIn →
My values
My career has progressed along three chapters — the first, learning the ropes of UX as a designer and researcher in both large org setting and software/hardware agencies. The second, an entrepreneurial period in which I founded my own product-building and consulting agency, and headed design and product at two early stage startups. Most recently, I have led teams at larger orgs responsible for evolving mature products and launching 0-1 products.
Three characteristics have formed my design identity based on my journey in these different companies and environments:
I am a storyteller, bringing heart to raw data and user insight, focusing teams on “who” and “why”
I am a pragmatic visionary, outlining the future with a lean startup mentality and technical prowess
I have a systems mindset, designing products and frameworks for scale, future-proofing, and efficiency
Design Manager
REALITY LABS, NEW WEARABLES
Scaled a patent-producing design team building a multi-generation wearable hardware product. Improved processes for collaboration and product quality at the leadership level across multiple teams.
Led a multi-disciplinary design team (product design, research, content) responsible for the operating system and design system for a new hardware product.
Shipped an OS comprised of over 80+ features supporting dozens of product teams including hundreds of engineers.
Key contributor to standing up Quality and collaboration processes to measure and validate launch readiness and raise the design bar across the Reality Labs org.
Worked across the Reality Labs and Meta portfolio of products (AR glasses, Instagram, WhatsApp) to create a shared vision of a platform for connection across products and devices.
Though my work at Meta is confidential, here are some ways my reports and collaborators have described our time together.
Design Manager / Lead
GOOGLE LOCAL SEARCH | CORE UX
Launched the biggest changes to Google's Local Search in over 5 years, resulting in double-digit growth (particularly with Gen Z and international audiences) and new strategic opportunities to promote businesses using user-generated content
Responsible for helping billions of daily users to seek out local destinations such as restaurants, shopping, services and attractions for Google's Local Search.
Key launches: Visual Search, Categorical Search impacting 100+ local verticals, including Dining, Shopping, Services, Leisure, Commodities.
42m daily users have better interactions in Local Search, and 70%+ of users engage in the new Visual Search experience, increasing Local Search traction internationally (notably in APAC).
Strengthened design team and collaborative model across Search, Maps, Ads organizations.
Design Lead
UBER EATS | COURIER
Our team was instrumental in helping Uber Eats scale from an experiment 22 cities, to $3B revenue in 120+ cities. We were able to keep up with consumer demand by building a courier network that was efficient to launch, maintain and scale in each new city.
Increased courier supply by thousands/week (+12%)
Shortened time to first delivery by 9.5 days
Positive courier NPS and increased retention
Launched innovative internal research program, in which employees do deliveries to identify gaps and opportunities
Pitched/launched a global philanthropic food donation program delivering thousands of pounds of food to those in need
Founder & Director
STUDIO AKKO
I founded a full service digital agency with a full time team, that partnered with over two dozen startups and Fortune 500’s on early stage product ideation and MVP launch. Notable clients included American Express, Motorola, Bloomberg, Dolby, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Clinique, and Uber.
We launched several award winning design concepts and highly rated apps in the iOS App Store.
Through Akko, I launched Artifacts, a creative salon attended by 1,000+ designers and makers. Speakers came from the likes of Warby Parker and The New York Times and was sponsored by Mailchimp.
If you’re hiring, looking for an advisor, or just saying hi...