With fifteen years of experience, I specialize in leading impactful design organizations that bring value to market. I have founded, led, and scaled dozens of teams at Stripe, Shopify, Instacart, Jobber, TD, and Loblaw Digital.
Balancing hands-on IC work and design leadership, I have made significant contributions to products used by millions and worked with companies at all stages of maturity. I have shipped Consumer, B2B, and B2B2C products across multiple industries.
A few career highlights-to-date include:
- Co-founded and launched Campas, the all-in-one platform for kids’ extracurricular activities (this-for-that: OpenTable/Resy for camps and classes)
- Concepted and landed a new multi-product portfolio strategy at Jobber, and launched the Growth Tools suite of products
- Launched the new modular Stripe Dashboard product, along with the Stripe App Marketplace
- Concepted and landed the evolution of Instacart's Enterprise product suite, including self-serve tooling for SMBs and advanced configuration tools for Fortune 50 retailers
- Founded and scaled the Ads Tooling team at Instacart
- Optimized the consumer shopping journey in the Instacart app, with a special focus on Activations
- Launched the Frenzy geo-fenced flash-sale app, the Arrive package-tracking app (which evolved into the Shop App), early immersive commerce experiments (AR & VR merchandizing), and numerous other experimental products at Shopify as UX Lead for the Garage team
- Founded the Growth UX team at Shopify, optimizing top of funnel conversion
- Launched and optimized the Loblaws Click and Collect online grocery platform across multiple brands
- Launched the PC Optimum loyalty program merger to 16MM members
- Launched the redesigned TD WebBroker product to 7MM active users
- As employee #1, drove Product for a 0-1 startup called Meta (née Sciencescape) through a 20M Series A round
Proven Leadership
I excel in defining the right team structure tailored to a company's current stage of growth, attracting top talent, and fostering a creative, supportive environment that maximizes their potential. My leadership is characterized by setting a strong design direction through effective coaching, mentoring, and pace-setting. Moreover, I have a track record of successfully bringing new 0-1 initiatives to market and iterating on them to drive the incremental optimization of key business metrics.
Hard-earned Strengths
- Developing and executing against a clear product strategy based on comprehensive market and user insights
- Identifying unmet customer needs, crafting detailed user scenarios, and validating proposed solutions through experience prototypes
- Synthesizing quantitative and qualitative evidence to shape robust objectives, initiatives, and project roadmaps
- Championing a high craft bar for the design team and driving operational excellence
- Defining and aligning on clear goals for each project, setting explicit expectations for all partners, and communicating transparently to build a high-trust environment
- Optimizing key business metrics through a rigorous experimental mindset
- Collaborating closely with senior leadership and cross-functional partners to drive the right work forward
Don't Just Take My Word For It
Over the past few decades, I've had the opportunity to collaborate with and learn from a wide range of fantastic people.
"Design has been a strategic partner more so than at any other time in Instacart’s history. Across each of Will’s teams design has been firing on all cylinders.“
Group PM, Instacart
"Will has the rare combination of great taste in design and a deep understanding of product strategy and KPI's. His robust knowledge of how design can truly have an impact on the business is reinforced by his extensive experience working with senior leaders in multiple industries."
Sr UX Manager, Shopify
“Will was super fun to work with! As my design lead I felt he struck the right balance of structure while enabling a ton of creative freedom. Great guy. A great eye. Great product intuition. No bs. Very hard to come by these days.“
Sr Designer, Shopify
“Will was our first UX hire, and he built and led our design practice. He quickly established a high craft bar and foundational design practices for the team. He tackled difficult challenges head-on, and worked closely with product and engineering leadership to design and build great products. His keen business and product sense allowed him to effectively balance customer needs with measurable impact.“
SVP, Loblaw Digital
“As an entrepreneur and scientist, I have had the fortune of collaborating with many exceptional people during the past half-decade of my career, and I can say without qualification that Will stands out as a rare talent among that group. Far beyond his skills as a designer and product thinker, his ability to innovate and lead will yield tremendous value to any team he is a part of.“
CEO, Meta (née Sciencescape)
"Will's strategic product and design leadership was instrumental in building a solid North Star vision for our product, ensuring a clear and compelling direction for the entire team. His focus on streamlining the UX with simple yet impactful designs transformed the product and delivered outstanding results. He put Jobber design on the map."
Sr PD Manager, Jobber
“Will lead with a clear vision and enabled our team to efficiently ship work by ensuring a team culture of close collaboration with our cross functional partners. Further, by sharing his experience and expertise, Will raised the level that our whole design team operated at.“
Product Designer, Stripe
"Will’s leadership is marked by his clear vision and focus on user needs, consistently driving the team to move fast and with a high bar for quality. As we approached different user problems, Will leaned on the strengths of his team and worked to foster individuals by providing clear and directional impact. His efforts in fostering cross-functional collaboration have been pivotal in aligning diverse teams towards common goals. "
Sr Designer, Jobber
“Will is one of the few design leaders I've worked with who I consider a true champion of research. I always enjoy collaborating with him because he has an eye for finding opportunities to bring research into the design process, and he's great at aligning his team to actually take action on what we learned.“
UX Researcher, Shopify
“Will offered invaluable advice that set me on a path towards becoming a leader myself, helping me understand the nuances of effective leadership. His unapologetic commitment to driving the team towards our goals, combined with his rare ability to maintain focus and momentum, ensured we stayed on track."
Sr Designer, Jobber
"Will’s leadership is marked by clear vision and user-centric focus. His ability to communicate transparently and manage operations effectively was instrumental in our success. Will's expertise in systems thinking and his pragmatic approach consistently delivered impactful results across our projects."
Sr PM, Stripe
"Will is a kind and eager listener, fostering an environment of trust and open communication.”
Sr Designer, Jobber
“Will acts as the glue between research and design, which ultimately makes us all a stronger, more effective team.“
UX Researcher, Instacart
"You’ll never find Will waiting for direction or getting stuck in a loop of questions — he listens, distills, and expects action. We made so much progress from his ability and desire to build upon momentum while steering design forward."
Principal Designer, Jobber
“Will asks important questions at the right time to help focus my thinking but also gives direct feedback when needed.“
Sr Designer, Instacart
My Design Leadership Hypothesis
High craft is a product of iterative processes and a supportive, inclusive culture of feedback
Over my career, I have developed a flexible sprint archetype. This is an elastic framework, and the activities in each phase vary depending on the initiative's stage and level of risk. A discovery sprint will differ significantly from a shaping or optimization sprint, but most successful design projects follow a consistent diverge ⇒ converge pattern.
My Foundational Leadership Tenet
I often say: 'Don't tell me you're funny, make me laugh'. I'm a big believer in showing, not telling. The shortest path to truth is to try it.
Don't get stuck asking open questions - document your assumptions, define your hypothesis, make it real, let people use it, and then refine based on evidence.
Let's be in touch
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