Portugal

Product Design

Generalist Product Management

Growth Design

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Master's degree

Vova Safonov

City Ambassador

Head of Design

Product strategy

Problem-solving

Critical-thinking

Empathy

Team player

Organisation skills

Leadership

Zeplin

Adobe Photoshop

Amplitude

ChatGPT

Figma

HTML

Adobe Creative Suite

Adobe After Effects

Sketch

Collaboration

Introduce yourself, define mentoring expectations and goals. Learn and grow together.

General mentorship

Making remote and globally distributed teams work for you and your needs.

Working remotely

Learn essential burnout prevention techniques and replenish physical and emotional energy.

Managing burnout

Talk to people who have learned to manage their imposter syndrome.

Dealing with imposter syndrome

Understanding factors that lead to a motivated team - recognition, communication and more.

Keeping team members motivated

Understand the process of training, motivating and directing your team members.

Managing people

How to create a positive workplace culture that drives collaboration and productivity?

Fostering a good team culture

Steps to building and maintaining a strong, cohesive and effective team.

Building an effective team

Learn the tips to successfully manage a team in a remote environment.

Managing a remote team

Best practices for running productive design critiques.

Running effective design critiques

How to define and execute a successful launch and managing stakeholders expectations. (eg. MVP)

Launching new products or features

Methods of prototyping and solution validation. When to use which kind of prototype (eg. Webflow, Notion, etc)

Prototyping methods and tips

Tips on how to work and collaborate with designers.

Working with designers

How to work with team members with different skill sets but towards a common goal?

Working cross-functionally

Methods and models of exploring, deciding and delivering design.

Building a design process

Navigating the working relationship with PM's and engineers as a designer.

Working with product and engineering

Best practices for documenting projects, epics, and stories

Writing product requirement documents

I leverage my experience in managing and leading design teams to teach young design leaders how to effectively manage and lead their own teams, providing guidance on best practices. By sharing my knowledge and experience, I help bring unconscious knowledge and practice to a conscious level, enabling the development of personal understanding and mastery.

I developed 9 successful lectures with high student praise, contributing to increased enrollment for the course. Topics covered include but not limited to strategy and maturity in design, team organization, people management, designer development, motivation, and soft skills for designers and design managers.
            

    
    

    
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As a Head of Product Design I’m focused on inspiring and empowering my team. I believe that great teams create great products and people need to be managed properly so they can have psychological safety to be creative, reach their full potential and be inspired by the company mission.

Main achievements:
- Effectively assembled and trained a high-performing design team, resulting in a deep understanding of the design process and company goals, and heightened ability to deliver exceptional results.
- Successfully retained, leveled and promoted a highly experienced design manager, contributing to significant cost savings for the company and elevating the quality of projects and initiatives. Provided mentorship to increase her outcome and job satisfaction plus a sense of value as a team member.
            

    
    

    
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As a partner in a design school, I got a unique opportunity to practice my skills as a product leader by developing new products and revenue streams for non-software business while also lecturing courses for designers at different levels of seniority. Working closely with students and other educators, I also honed my managerial skills and developed a strong understanding of building and managing high-performing teams in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.

Main achievements:
- Implemented an iterative improvement approach and feedback system to continuously improve the quality of all courses.
- Grew lecturer team from 4 to over 20 and streamlined integration processes for improved overall quality and reduced individual workload.
- Designed and delivered 3 impactful courses (Design Basics, Mobile Design, and UX Design) that led to the successful graduation of over 100 students.
- Improved processes to drive growth and attract more students to the school.
            

    
    

    
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As a product designer and leader I led the successful redesigns of two major products: Documents and PDF Expert. My main product was Documents, a file manager on iOS with a user base of over 60 million. I also worked on PDF Expert 7, a significant overhaul of the previous version based on user feedback, which involved changing the payment model to a subscription.

For PDF Expert 7, I was responsible for designing the full PDF viewer, establishing the style basis for the product, and creating a new design workflow and integrated a team of designers to continue the work together after. The processes and systems I laid the foundation while working on PDF expert and improved further helped me to start a delightful rework for Documents 7, which resulted in the release of Documents X with significantly improved user engagement and revenue.

Through these experiences, I streamlined the design process and fostered collaboration with cross-functional teams to improve design output and knowledge sharing.

Main achievements:
- Streamlined the design process, resulting in reduced integration costs for new designers and increased collaboration with cross-functional teams, leading to improved design output and knowledge sharing.
- Led a successful usability and design overhaul of PDF Expert, resulting in positive user feedback and increased engagement.
- Helped to boost revenue of Documents by 6X over a period of 2 years through a significant number of design improvements.
- Led a successful design and delightful rework for Documents 7 that resulted in Documents X release with even more praise, user engagement and revenue.
- When I was leaving, I identified and recommended two exceptional designers, who had previously taken my courses, to the team. They have since become valuable members of the team, contributing to the continued success of the Document and the team.
            

    
    

    
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Led design efforts for a marketing automation startup that achieved stable revenue growth through successful client acquisition and retention. Created a well-received, user-friendly design that increased customer engagement and facilitated self-assisted service, resulting in increased revenue.

Main achievements:
• Onboarding flow conversion is about 60%, which we think is high taking into account traffic channels and a case.

I taught courses on Design Basics, Mobile Design, and created a pioneering UX Middle course from scratch. I built a talented team of lecturers and designed a course that was the first of its kind in our city, providing students with a unique and valuable learning experience.

As the sole product designer at a music streaming startup, I led the product design process from ideation to release. The resulting product was a unique music streaming service that incorporated mini-games and a variety of social features, available on iOS, Android, and web platforms.

As a Project Manager on a social crowdfunding platform, I successfully led the creation of 2 web portals and 16 offline social projects, each with a team of dedicated volunteers. Through inspiring and motivating these teams, we were able to make a positive impact in areas such as supporting the blind community, promoting a cleaner city, and fighting poverty. This experience further developed my leadership and management skills, which I continue to utilize in my current work.

I taught Human Resources Management and earned positive feedback from students and colleagues. This experience provided me with a solid theoretical foundation in the field, which I later applied in my roles as a Product Design Manager and Leader. Additionally, I obtained a PhD in economics during this time.

Vova Safonov🇵🇹