FAQs

What kind of design leader are you?

1

I'm a business leader who uses design as competitive advantage. For over 30 years, I've built teams from 0 to 2,000+ people, grown and run businesses from $45M to $1bn, and created products used by 100+ million people across every vertical you could imagine, including financial services, sports, entertainment, travel, hotel and hospitality, consumer electronics, retail, and technology.

I believe great design isn't just beautiful—it's how things work. For example at Visa, I led design for Intelligent Commerce, the first AI agent platform enabling autonomous purchases while maintaining user trust. At NextBank in Brazil, I designed a digital bank from scratch for 22 million underserved millennials. For Wells Fargo, I led UX for products serving 69 million customers.

My philosophy: Create giants that surpass me. I hire for curiosity over credentials, build psychological safety for teams to take risks, and measure success by whether people are growing—not whether they're doing things my way.

I'm equally comfortable presenting to C-suite executives, rolling up my sleeves in design critiques, or negotiating business strategy with product and engineering leaders. I speak both design language and business language fluently.

How do you approach building and scaling design teams?

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I've built design teams at every stage: startup (0 to 29 at Visa) to enterprise/growth (2,000+ at Cognizant). Here's my philosophy:

I hire for SWANS: Smart, Works hard, Ambitious, Nice. I prioritize curiosity over credentials. Some of my best designers came from non-traditional backgrounds—what matters is hunger to learn and ability to collaborate. In addition, the skills we hire for today will change over time; I lead people who evolve their skillsets at the speed of culture and commerce.

Create psychological safety: Great design requires risk-taking. I build cultures where people feel safe sharing work early, welcoming feedback, and admitting when they don't know something. Weekly 1:1s, open critiques, and "disagree and commit" decision-making are core to how I operate.

Build systems, not just teams: At Visa, I didn't just hire designers—I built Advisory Services as a business with clear delivery models, quality frameworks, and scalable processes. At Cognizant, I created training programs, career ladders, and governance structures that allowed 2,000+ people to deliver consistently excellent work.

Measure by growth, not control: I judge my success by whether people on my team are growing. Many designers I've mentored now lead design organizations at Fortune 500 companies. That's the legacy I care about—creating giants that surpass me.

I lead with Miles Davis's philosophy: "It's not the chord you play, it's how you respond to it." Great leaders don't punish mistakes—they create space for people to turn them into breakthroughs.

What industries have you worked in, and how does that cross-industry experience benefit organizations?

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I've designed across music (Island Def Jam), fashion (Donna Karan), retail (Nike, Verizon), consumer electronics (Beats by Dre, Samsung), spirits (Diageo), and financial services (Visa, Wells Fargo, BBVA, NextBank, Scotiabank, Bank of America).

This cross-industry fluency is my competitive advantage.

Most design leaders know one domain deeply. I know patterns that work across domains. I understand how to build brand experiences (music/fashion), create physical-digital ecosystems (retail), design for trust and security (financial services), and scale teams across cultures (global enterprises).

When I joined Visa, I brought retail thinking to payments—designing merchant experiences like Nike designs athlete experiences. When I designed NextBank in Brazil, I applied entertainment industry storytelling to make banking feel approachable for millennials who'd been excluded from traditional finance.

Cross-industry experience means:

  • Fresh perspectives on entrenched problems

  • Pattern recognition from solving similar challenges in different contexts

  • Ability to translate best practices across domains

  • Comfort navigating ambiguity and learning new domains quickly

I don't just know financial services, or just retail, or just technology. I know how people experience brands, spaces, and systems—and that knowledge transfers everywhere.

What sets you apart from other design leaders?

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I live at the intersection of art and commerce—and I'm fluent in both languages.

I can sit in a room with creatives talking about craft, storytelling, and vision, then walk into a boardroom and translate that into business strategy, revenue impact, and competitive advantage. Most leaders lean one way or the other. I bridge both worlds naturally because I believe great design isn't art or business—it's both, inseparable.

I quantify creativity. I quantify business value with metrics, case studies, and ROI models. Creativity isn't a cost center—it is a revenue driver. I can track the performance of creativity to bottom line results, and I use that data to secure resources, build teams, and earn strategic influence.

I'm a storyteller. I take complex, systemic business problems—from product suite, AI trust architectures, cross-border payment flows etc.—and explain them simply. Whether I'm presenting to C-suite executives, inspiring my team, or pitching new business, I make the complex feel clear and the ambitious feel achievable. People don't follow strategies they don't understand. My job is to make the vision so clear that everyone knows their role in making it real.

I'm an advocate—for design, and for my people. I fight for design to have strategic influence, not just execute someone else's roadmap. But more importantly, I advocate for the people on my team. I teach them how to tell their own stories, champion their work, and build their careers. I show them that being creative and curious isn't about personality type—it's a skill you cultivate. Some of my best designers were introverts who learned to present boldly. Some were extroverts who learned to listen deeply. Growth happens when you meet people where they are and help them become who they want to be.

I inspire through optimism and trust. I lead by generating enthusiasm while creating psychological safety. I'm naturally persuasive without being domineering. I bring energy and optimism to ambiguous, high-stakes problems, and I make people believe we can solve them together. I build trust quickly, create collaborative environments, and turn "wrong chords" into breakthroughs. People don't burn out on my teams—they grow.

What sets me apart isn't just 30 years of experience or the scale I've achieved. It's that I understand creativity is a business discipline, storytelling is a leadership skill, and great design happens when curious people feel safe taking risks. I don't just build products—I build teams that surpass me. That's the work I'm most proud of.