Roots

Andrew Abogado is the Design Lead at Saleswhale, a Singapore-based Y-Combinator startup. It’s a B2B SaaS product that deploys an AI sales assistant, helping engage and qualify leads at scale. Previously, he was a Frontend Engineer at Viki (exited, Series B) which was acquired by Rakuten. Andrew is drawn to venture-backed tech startups where he can solve big problems as well as bring big impact during the company’s early stage. Outside of work, Andrew likes cycling and travels with his wife in different countries. In this episode, we talk about Andrew’s roots in open source, his journey from Davao to Singapore, doing design and development at Viki and Saleswhale, and so much more.

Cedric Lee is the UX Lead at Cambridge University Press, a leading global publishing business that aims to advance education and research worldwide. Before leading the user experience team, he previously held graphic design, UI, and UX roles from the same organization. Currently he’s taking up his Masters in Communication in De La Salle University. As a student at LPU, he championed transparency reforms and constitution revision as President of the student council, and was an active debater for the debate society. In this episode, we talked about how student-activism and debate helped him lead design, contributing to the academic research of UX, transitioning from graphic design to UX, and so much more.

Jian Adornado is a Product Designer at Netflix designing data and financial tools to shape the company’s content portfolio. He previously designed data intelligence tools for Uber and tools to control, simulate and remote operate self-driving cars for Uber’s Advanced Technologies Division. He also worked at Dropbox and Amazon. Jian is specialized in helping users monitor performance, report insights and explore data in historical, real-time and predictive timeframes. In this episode, we talk about getting used to Silicon Valley’s hustle, finding inspiration from observations, Jian’s passion for data and design, and so much more.

Jordan Deja is an Assistant Professor in De La Salle University teaching courses like Human-Computer Interaction, Design Patterns, and Software Engineering. He is also a Community Lead of UX Philippines, the country’s largest network of UX professionals, students and enthusiasts. He helps people bridge technology and design towards better interfaces and experiences. He is also the Vice-Chair of Manila ACM-SIGCHI Chapter and the Advisor of User Experience Society - DLSU. In this episode we talk about how he found his calling in UX, leading the UXPH roadshow, finding opportunities to study abroad, and so much more.

Oliver Bayani is a Senior UX Designer, managing user research and UX writing for digital products used by 4 million Filipinos at Home Credit Philippines. Previously, he was the Co-founder and Vice President of Product & Design of SnippetMedia, a news app boasting 2 million users. He was also a journalist for 8 years, writing about the most creative people in advertising for Marketing Magazine Philippines and Adobo Magazine. He now uses his skills to serve his user’s needs, instead of just readers. In this episode, we’ll talk about lessons from middle-class suburbia, the people that shaped how Oliver designs, why it’s a good idea to get more sleep, and so much more.

Riel Reyes is an Associate Product Designer at Kalibrr. His design work includes the 40th Metro Manila Film Festival Souvenir Programme and Truelogic's brand redesign, where he previously worked as a Graphic and UI designer. He enjoyed tinkering with electronics and joining poster making contests as a kid, which he believes are the roots for his fondness in design. Riel is also passionate about his side project Intersections, a monthly documentary series on people with multiple passions in life. In this episode we talk about Riel’s origins as a poster maker, transitioning from marketing to product design, how and why he joined Kalibrr, and so much more.

Janelle Hitz is a Senior Visual Designer working on the Disney+ platform. Previously, she designed for gaming companies that include Electronic Arts and Blizzard Entertainment — working on things like Origin, Hearthstone, StarCraft II, and Heroes of the Storm. She enjoys executing the entire breadth of a design process. Janelle believes that building relationships across teams and disciplines is the key to successful products. When she's not designing, you can find her surfing, snowboarding, or playing video games. In this episode, we talk about the being a first time design manager, doing product design for games and gaming websites, launching Disney+, and so much more.

Camille Zapata is the Lead UX/UI Designer at Tailors Mark, where she is part of a team that designs innovative solutions in the world of custom clothing — namely bespoke suits. She is a team player who enjoys moving fast to validate ideas through creative experiments, design tests, and prototypes. Previously, she designed for the growing marketplace at Carousell. She also worked with a range of brands and companies from beauty to finance, like SK-II and Credit Suisse, while at the design agency Huge. In this episode, we talk about Camille’s decision to live independently abroad, working in tight constraints as a designer, applying for companies around the world, finding work-life balance, and so much more.

Andrei Gonzales is a Service and Interaction Design Associate Manager at Fjord Canberra, Australia, focusing on designing and delivering innovation for Government, Health, and Public Services. Previously, he was a Senior UX Designer at BCG Digital Ventures in Sydney, where he helped build ventures that put the customer first. Before moving to Australia, Andrei was co-founder of Hugo Manila, a Philippine design consultancy, and a designer at InVision, a very popular prototyping tool, during what he describes as the “really early days”. In this episode, we talk about designing for InVision, Andrei’s evolution in his design craft, what it means to design for a whole country, and so much more.

Jill Tiutan is a product designer who currently studies Cognitive Science at UCLA. She has been designing professionally for the last 5 years and was most recently a product design intern at Factual, a big data company focused on location. Prior to that, Jill has also interned at Fjord (Accenture Interactive) in LA, and at GoGuardian, where she built Enterprise tools for schools. Apart from being an avid designer, she also co-founded Applica.me, which became a part of Stanford’s StartX student program in 2017. In this episode we talk about building Applica as a student design co-founder, getting internships in LA, finding a home in a fraternity, interning in the US, and so much more.