a little about me
Engineering-led companies reach a point where the product needs to feel as clear as it is capable. That’s where I come in.
The common thread in my career: I join engineering-first companies where design has no seat at the table, and I build the team that earns one. Then I use that seat to shape product strategy, not just polish interfaces.
I started in visual design at 22 Feet Tribal Worldwide, producing work for Titan, Kingfisher, and Mahindra. It was a masterclass in visual storytelling under real pressure. At TrulyMadly, I was the sole designer, rebuilding internal processes, running research, and shipping core platform features.
At BrowserStack, I partnered directly with the CEO to design the enterprise admin tools. That work migrated 22,000 scattered users into managed accounts, removed buying blockers for large companies, and added $3.6M in annual revenue within six months.
In 2018, I joined Plivo as its first in-house designer, an engineering-led company with no design culture. I restructured the product, built the design system, and grew a team that went on to ship the contact center, the AI platform, and the brand.
Three promotions later, I became the CEO’s strategic partner on AI product development. I led the merge of three communication products into a single platform with an AI workflow builder. That work now defines Plivo’s direction as a Voice AI company.
Today, as Director of Design & Brand, I own Plivo’s positioning for its AI evolution. I built a hybrid operating model: three humans extended by four purpose-built AI agents. Content production tripled. Research cycles compressed from weeks to days. Zero added headcount.
how I work
I earn trust through rigor, not manifestos.
I don’t pitch “design thinking.” I show up with a spreadsheet of inconsistencies, a documented architecture, and a clear operational plan. Engineers respect that.
I operate in the messy middle.
The space between what the product should be, what engineering can build, and what buyers need to see before they sign. That’s where I do my best work.
I make bets, not just iterations.
Building new products takes conviction. I invest deeply in research to find the real problems competitors miss, then commit to solving them well.
I build teams that outlast me.
A design leader’s real output isn’t pixels. It’s the team that ships what comes next without you. The team I built at Plivo went on to ship the contact center, the AI platform, and the brand long after I scaled out of the IC layer.
what I bring
The things I’ve done repeatedly, across companies, at increasing scale.
- 01
Building design teams from zero in engineering-led companies.
Hiring, structuring, and growing the function inside companies that did not start with a design culture. I built Plivo’s design org from one person to seven, and the operating model still anchors how the team works today.
- 02
AI product strategy, both inside the product and on the team.
Designing the interaction patterns for agent-driven products, and the operating models for the teams that ship them. The hybrid human + AI brand team at Plivo is both the case study and the live prototype.
- 03
0-to-1 product development with conviction.
Going from market research and competitive analysis to a shipped first version. The Plivo Contact Center was a six-month launch from whiteboard to enterprise-ready product, with the integration strategy decided by user research, not assumption.
- 04
Brand strategy through inflection points.
Defining how a company is read in the market when its center of gravity is shifting. Currently leading Plivo’s repositioning from a legacy CPaaS provider to a voice AI platform.
- 05
Design systems that outlast the people who build them.
Component libraries, contribution models, and review rituals that let lean teams ship at scale. Plivo’s first system still anchors every new product surface six years on.
- 06
Earning design a seat at engineering-first tables.
Not through advocacy. Through documented architecture, operational plans, and outcomes engineers and founders can measure. Trust gets built by the work, then by the way the work shows up.
life outside work
I travel to absorb places rather than see them, the kind of trip where you stay long enough to know the local coffee shop. I bake more than I cook because my brain runs on structure, and the current obsession is a barista machine and a good espresso tonic. Reformer pilates is the other addiction. I read more from X than from books, mostly long-form posts by the people shaping the AI wave, and lately I keep thinking about community: as the world tips further into AI, the people part is starting to feel like the real opportunity.
