I’m a ______________
While I’ve spent much of my career dedicated to the craft of product design, I’ve always resisted the narrow assignment of the role. Instead, I focused on broadening my knowledge through education while actively experimenting with and integrating practices from other fields. This makes for an awkward introduction at parties, but I truly believe versatility is a valuable trait to develop.
Since you’re here and reading this, I’ll try my best to summarise:
Designer
I started in UX design more than decade ago, after working in the design and tech industry as a digital producer and project manager. Since then, I’ve developed a broad set of skills spanning research, service design, innovation, interaction and user interface design.
While recent roles have demanded a more strategic contribution, I make a point of rolling up my sleeves and getting involved in the execution side of the job — whether it’s helping a client scale their design system, moderating face-to-face research and testing or rapidly producing an interactive prototype.
I’m a certified practitioner and facilitator of Human Centred Design with the LUMA institute, and frequently train other designers on HCD practices and techniques.
I’ve also graduated from General Assembly’s Immersive Front-end Development course, but these days I usually leave coding to the experts…
Strategist
Over many years of designing and launching digital products I found that good, user-centred design, while important, had a limited influence on success. The more that design was sensitive to business goals and aligned to organisation strategy, the further the product would go.
So now I spend a significant portion of my time with clients working on product strategy — performing industry, market or category research, conducting market and opportunity sizing, developing competitive approaches, planning releases and rapidly testing value propositions. I have the d.MBA program to thank for sparking my interest initially.
I often play the role of Product Owner/Manager on projects in development and am a certified IC Agile and Scrum.org practitioner.
Leader
I never planned to be a manager but found myself in a Head of Design role about 7 years ago. I quickly realised how rewarding it is to see others grow, and to be a part of their development through training and mentorship.
In my time as a leader I’ve built a diverse, highly skilled team of designers, researchers and product people. I’ve introduced new frameworks for critique and collaboration, created personalised career development maps for each of my team members and nurtured a culture of openness, transparency, equality and innovation.
I firmly believe in servant-leadership as a grounding philosophy. Most of my team members have at least one area where they demonstrate exceptional talent, and I consider it my responsibility to look for opportunities to apply it. Most of my team members also struggle with at least one aspect of the job — so it’s also important, I find, to help maturing designers diversify their skillset.
As a designer I help marginally improve the experience of millions of people I’ll never meet. As a leader I have the opportunity to make a far more significant impact on the experience of a few people I see every weekday. I try to make the most of this.
“I'm forever thankful to have Mark as my Design leader at Palo IT. He has a natural ability to cultivate a fun and transparent environment where I was able to thrive and grow as designer. He is attentive and listens to the teams individual needs and always tries to address them as best as he can.
Mark is very knowledgeable across many different areas and has been such an inspiration. I definitely would work with him again.”
Vivienne Yang
Senior Product Designer, PALO IT (2018 – 2022)
Husband and Father
I invest a great deal of passion and energy in my work, but my family has my heart. Thankfully, they are also a great source of inspiration and motivation for the work I do every day.
I’ve had the opportunity to work on many positive impact projects: from conservation tech with WWF, to mental health apps with the Black Dog Institute and NSW Ambulance, and improving the lives of Australian children with data at RSTO.
But I also believe it’s the true purpose of all technology to make the world better. If I work hard, and if I’m lucky, my kids might get to benefit from it.
Let’s work together
Maybe you’ve seen or read something here that sparks your interest. Maybe you think I can help shape your product. Or perhaps you just want to chat — in any case, please don’t hesitate to reach out.