Role & Scope
• Reported to the VP of IT Merchandising; led a 25+ person end-to-end product organization spanning Product Design, Research, Engineering (front-end/back-end), Data Science/Analytics, and Product Management.
• Owned the strategy, design, and delivery of the Merchandising UX portfolio, including governance, design systems, AI/ML experiences, and experimentation.
• Acted as primary bridge between Merchandising leadership, Technology, and Finance to align roadmaps, funding, and OKRs.
Governance & Scale
Unified Design System
• Established an enterprise-wide, AI-assisted design-to-code system that automated the flow from Figma tokens and components into production code, enabling consistent experiences across web and internal tools.
• Standardized patterns and accessibility baselines across Merchandising products, reducing one-off design debt and re-work while improving design and engineering velocity.
• Partnered with Architecture, Security, and Compliance to embed governance into the design process (review boards, contribution model, and operating guardrails).
• Formalized an experimentation and rollout model for new components and patterns, ensuring safe evolution without breaking mission-critical workflows.
Innovation Lab
one-sixth the budget, enterprise standard
• Built a lean Innovation Lab that could take ideas from concept to production-grade MVP in weeks, dramatically faster than legacy project cycles.
• Prioritized a portfolio of “high-signal” pilots tightly aligned to Merchandising economics (margin optimization, cost control, vendor collaboration, store execution).
• Developed a repeatable pattern: frame the problem with the business, design rapidly in Figma, co-create with engineers and data scientists, then graduate validated pilots into the main product roadmap.
• Turned the Lab into a “front door” for the C-suite and business leaders to explore AI/ML use cases safely and measurably.
AI Platforms
Coding assistants, and AI governance
• Led strategy for generative and agentic AI tools supporting designers, engineers, and analysts—focusing on real productivity, not just demos.
• Drove adoption of AI coding assistants and design-to-code tooling within UX and engineering, while partnering with InfoSec and Legal on policies, guardrails, and data-handling standards.
• Created a practical governance model: use-case intake, risk tiers, red-lines, and measurement of impact (velocity, quality, and incidents), informing future AI investment decisions.
• Used the Design System as the control layer for AI-driven UI assembly, ensuring generated experiences still met accessibility, brand, and compliance requirements.
Supplier Onboarding
Transformation of the Merchant & Supplier Portal
• Re-designed the supplier onboarding portal and operating model—from fragmented email and spreadsheet workflows to a guided, SLA-driven digital experience.
• Introduced clear roles, task visibility, and escalation paths for internal teams and suppliers, reducing noise into Merchandising and support functions.
• Simplified contracts, forms, and data collection into a sequenced journey that decreased errors and back-and-forth cycles.
• Provided leadership with meaningful telemetry on onboarding time, bottlenecks, and quality so they could refine policy—not just chase exceptions.
Note: I’m actively updating this section with a full case study for this position, including before/after states, outcomes, and team context.