Experience

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  Trade Me

  • New Zealand
  • Technology, Information and Internet
  • 700 & Above Employee

  • UX and Design Lead

    • Aug 2020 - May 2024

    Accountable for design strategy for the Marketplace business with $1B in sales, and the Consumer business with over 1.2 million monthly active users. In this role I led the product design, communication design, and UX Research teams with up to 6 direct and 10 indirect Mel reports.• Identified that the current design strategy was no longer fit for purpose given commercial challenges in new competition, difficult macro-economic contexts, and changing user expectations. Developing a new strategy required stakeholder buy-in from multiple business units heads with competing interests. Through a structured and engagement process that involved deep needs analysis, synthesis, prioritisation and continuous communication, I achieved alignment to implement the strategy with full endorsement from the executive team. In the execution of the design strategy we created improvements in design systems, defined design practice, introduced UX benchmarks, and built a centre of excellence in UX research that transformed product discovery and execution. This influenced product teams to migrate to a user centred product strategy leading to successful product initiatives like chat, shipping transparency, and accelerating purchases with ‘make an offer’ - all highly valued by customers and increasing revenue through conversion and engagement. • Championed the use of design thinking and design research methodologies to help product teams rapidly iterate towards customer outcomes. One of the early adopter teams went on to improve conversion more than 5% within months – the biggest measured change in conversion ever recorded. • Implemented Research Operations after observing the impact in world leading UX teams in US. This was a new function to the business to grow customer knowledge within product teams. This enabled teams to do better research more often and faster, and was so successful other business units in Trade Me adopted the model.

  • Design Lead

    • Jul 2019 - Aug 2020

    Responsible for defining, prioritising, and executing design for common web and native application products, as well as managing 4-6 direct reports. Deployed our design system, Tangram, across all product teams, and extended it to mobile. This improved consistency of the experience, and lifted engineering velocity by 2x for front end work. Led the team responsible for engineering implementation and design of Tangram, the Trade Me design system.

  • Senior Product Designer

    • Sep 2015 - Oct 2019

    Responsible for concept development, prototyping, usability testing, branding, change management, and customer onboarding of the Ping product launch. Designed the UX and brand for Ping, a digital wallet payment system, as a part of the launch team. This was a technically complex product in a challenging regulatory environment, with low UX maturity in Trade Me at the time. To get this initiative over the line took persistence, patience, and a commitment to the vision of a zero configuration payment system. Ping is now available to all 2 million Trade Me members with billions of dollars payments processed.More than 90% of pro seller listings use Ping, and buyers prefer it by a substantial majority across mobile and desktop.

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  Self Employed

  • Designer

    • Feb 2012 - Dec 2015

    Designer, developer and owner.http://tpie.co.nzhttp://paramedico.com.auhttp://sheshouldhavegonetothemoon.comhttp://showdownfilms.co.ukhttp://benjamingilmour.comhttp://antonyloewenstein.com

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  chalkle°

  • Wellington & Wairarapa, New Zealand

  • Chief Experience Officer

    • Feb 2014 - Apr 2015
    • Wellington & Wairarapa, New Zealand

    Building a team to develop Chalkle.com into a world class platform for community sourced education. We use web and mobile technologies to build a platform to support a community of peer to peer learning. I manage the development team, and lead design efforts.

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  Orange Umbrella

  • Designer and Product Manager

    • 2010 - 2015

    Developing functional requirement for the orange umbrella platform. Overseeing development of that platform. Managing a team of developers.

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  MET Hotel Architectural Design

  • Chengdu, Sichuan, China

  • Interior Architect

    • Mar 2010 - Jun 2010
    • Chengdu, Sichuan, China

    3D concept design of luxury hotels. Used Sketchup, 3d Studio Max and Blender to produce concept boards for pitching new developments and renovations. Responsibilities included: * Concept Design* Presentation of design work to stakeholder panels

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  SW

  • Shenzhen, China

  • Interior Architect

    • Dec 2009 - Mar 2010
    • Shenzhen, China

    Concept and developed design of numerous luxury Hotels being constructed in Southern China.

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  Filmtiki

  • Vienna, Austria

  • Designer

    • 2008 - 2009
    • Vienna, Austria

    Design, and Business Analysis

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  VBC

  • Victoria University, Wellington

  • Polymath

    • 2006 - 2008
    • Victoria University, Wellington

    broadcaster, computer guy, sound booth designer and builder for the recently established Victoria University Broadcasting Club, or the VBC

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  Gedas AG

  • Berlin, Germany

  • Internship – Web development

    • 2003 - 2003
    • Berlin, Germany

    On a team of 3 maintaining the website, and main intranet, and regional intranets.