A. Litsa

2023 – Present // Crowdbotics

The Crowdbotics platform uses AI to drastically reduce the time and cost of planning IT modernization

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Director of Product

• Served a team of Product Managers, Product Designers, and one Technical Writer
• Supported PED through two major launches: the GitHub Copilot Extension and Code to Spec
• Drove alignment across the organization by facilitating executive roadmap prioritization and expectation setting on a quarterly basis
• Maintained focused execution by establishing semi-weekly product status and KPI reporting
• Enabled data-informed, customer-centric Product Discovery by setting up a program of frequent customer interviews and periodic surveys
• Set up weekly usability testing to greatly improve the designs submitted to engineering

Product Manager

• Helped Crowdbotics pivot from an application development service to an enterprise software platform
• Led migration off of legacy tools, owning both project management and change management
• Delivered CLI, code module catalog, Code Ops dashboard, Jira integration, and other features
• Executed a "product led growth" campaign in collaboration with Marketing
• Led Crowdbotics' first design sprint, followed by its first product concept deck

2019 – Present // Dear Diary LLC

Dear Diary Coffee is a mission driven neighborhood coffee shop that helps artists build their creative businesses. The shop provides space for collaboration, art markets, and retail.

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Business Owner

• Grew annual revenue from $0 to $500k during the pandemic, without COVID relief (new businesses did not qualify for government programs)
• Developed new food products such as powered oat milk and vegan honey alternative

Community Partner

• Built network of 200+ Austin-area artists
• Established an artist residency program which generated income for 25-30 artists every year
• Developed partnerships and collaborations with many local brands
• Provided incubation environment for brands like Golden Ratio, Backyard, and Trashless
• Sponsored or raised money for local athletics clubs, wildlife rescues, and others

Employer

• Maintained living wages and benefits for all employees
• Implemented fair and transparent system for raises and bonuses
• Engaged staff in quarterly financial review and retrospective
• Helped baristas gain real-world businessand design skills by offering special projects they could do at will, without obligation
• Created an emotionally safe, productive, and happy work environment

2017 – 2020 // WP Engine

WP Engine is a managed web host and digital platform for WordPress users. WP Engine's product suite includes tools for both web developers and digital marketers.

Head of Product Research and Design

• Built Product Design & Research at WP Engine from the ground up
• Designed and delivered product management training
• Oversaw the redesign and usability overhaul of WP Engine’s customer portal
• Introduced design system and accessiblity standards

2007 – 2017 // Bazaarvoice

Bazaarvoice products aggregate user generated content to be displayed on brand websites. They also offer brands a number of tools for analysing UGC and assessing brand sentiment.

Product Designer

• Architected front end development patterns for internal teams
• Served many, many scrum teams in a Product Design capacity
• Built internal tools for fellow designers

2004 – 2007 // Miscellaneous

Amalia began her career as an animator and illustrator, but followed freelance opportunities into the world of tech. She taught herself HTML, CSS, JS, and PHP during this time, as well as (mostly Adobe) design applications.

Nadia Barbot

Senior Product Manager at Sysco LabsSenior Product Manager at Sysco Labs

Litsa was the first person I've worked with that talked about user interaction design in every one of our projects. She spurred me to do more research via blogs and speakers to learn more about the field. Litsa truly puts herself in the user's shoes and every decision she makes is with that user in mind. In our company, with a lot of established processes and features, she is constantly challenging the norm and thinking up creative solutions to problems that we had used a "band aid" for long ago. Litsa advocates for quick iterations and finding ways of getting data to measure our assumptions & expectations, and she models the behavior that every product person should - she isn't tied to her ideas and when data uncovers that we are on the wrong path, she quickly switches to the right one. I would absolutely work with her again and I hope to in the future!

Austin Hernandez

Sr. Product Designer

Litsa was instrumental to my career in UX providing me with several opportunities for growth and mentorship. I had the pleasure of working with Litsa in different capacities for seven years and she is one of the most talented people I've ever met. She has a unique skill set of being both a creative innovator and results-driven researcher. Litsa really is the whole package and I would not think twice to recommend her work and character.

Joshua Adrian

Co-Owner at Dear Diary CoffeehouseCo-Owner at Dear Diary Coffeehouse

Litsa has great attention to detail and the motivation to see projects all the way through. Also a great communicator and easy to collaborate with, would highly recommend to anyone looking to fill a UX/Designer position.

Greg Brown

Chief Revenue Officer at Storable

I had the pleasure of working alongside Litsa for a number of years while leading sales at Bazaarvoice. Litsa is an amazing Lead User Experience Designer, and a natural team leader: always positive; collaborative; and inspires teammates to go above and beyond. Specifically, Litsa excelled in her role by conducting rigorous user research and applying her learnings to UI/IX design and prototyping. I learned a lot from her and the impact of her work on our customers through internal presentations and speaking engagements outside the organization. On top of that, she is always looking to innovate in her role, with the business and customer in mind.

In addition to excelling at discovery and optimization, Litsa is simply one of those employees that brings out the best in others, and is a tremendous contributor to the culture of the organization. She will be a great member of your organization and valuable addition to your team.

Joe McCann

Founder, CEO, CIO

Litsa is one of the most passionate, articulate and empathetic experience designers I've had the pleasure of working with. She has a rare "can-do" attitude to nearly anything whether it involves design research, prototyping to even writing end-to-end style guides (this was a requirement from me to her for our mobile platform at Bazaarvoice). Her positive attitude is infectious on the team and clearly shows in her work. One would be foolish not to take the opportunity to work with her!

Tiff Ting

Product innovator revolutionizing health care | Software industry veteran of many hats

Litsa is the entire package: product discovery, definition, design, and delivery are all in her wheelhouse. She is constantly seeking ways to make truly valuable products for the target audience while being able to balance users' needs with business goals and technical limitations. She also collaborates well with everyone no matter his/her role. For instance, she gives regular updates to the Curations development team on where she is with her product vision and asks for feedback. She also reviews the analytics results of the Curations client-facing interface weekly to see what we can learn from them and how we can improve the site. I love working with Litsa and highly recommend the experience to anyone if you get the opportunity!

Andrew Chen

Vice President, Product

I've had the good fortune of working with a handful of truly great people in my career. The best of the best always operate across multiple dimensions. Litsa is among the elite in my book for several reasons:

Measured and methodical. Her UX and design thinking is iterative, exploratory, and data-driven.

Boundless creativity. Her wealth of knowledge of design patterns from years of experience give her the mindset necessary to choose when to break glass.

A servant leader. Everyone wants to be a part of whatever Litsa is working on. She leads by doing, inspiring the people around her, and marshaling supporters to a cause.

A quirky sense of humor -- her best trait. Her electric personality, positive attitude, and sheer brilliance are a big reason why Bazaaarvoice was able to succeed and leapfrog competition early in the company's history. I'm lucky to know and have worked with Litsa.

Crystal Hansen

Product Leader - Digital Experiences

Litsa is one of the brightest, most thorough and talented design minds I have ever had the pleasure of working with. She has an innate gift for user research and can apply that user empathy to break difficult problems down into simple and elegant solutions. Any team who works with Litsa can count on her to ensure that their product is designed in a delightful and design-oriented manner. She is also an inspiration to those who work around her, with a curiosity and passion for her work that is infectious.

Alex Medearis

Product Manager At Google

Litsa is, hands down, one of the best UX designers I have ever worked with. Her intuition and attention to detail is second to none. I recall one discussion in which, in contrast to some of our previous experiments, she suggested a greatly simplified design approach for one of our pilot clients. Never one to accept a theory at face value, we spent several days collecting data on the new designs. The experiment ultimately resulted in a remarkable 140%+ boost in conversion rates and quite a bit of buzz in the industry as she documented her findings. She brings a unique energy and creativity to the workplace and is an exceptional teammate.

Ashley Moreno

Digital Marketing and Communications

Litsa is one of the very best artists and designers I know. Her technical and analytics expertise, coupled with her artistic gifts, makes her a fantastic UX designer. She has a real talent for putting herself in the user's shoes, and then seeing a design the way the customer does. Driven to continue to optimize her designs over time based on business objectives, user feedback, and user-based analytics data, Litsa produces and manages sites and apps that continue to improve over time. I always seek her advice on all things UX- and design-related, but particularly when it comes to mobile.