...inventor, entrepreneur, designer, product manager, musician and athlete.
The high level...
I aim to have fun creating experiences and products, working with creative, intelligent and motivated people! I thrive on having my sleeves rolled up and getting deep into solving big challenges.
Music, art/sculpture, literature and fitness are my passions when I am not creating products.
A little more...
I have been building software since my Computer Science days at university. I am a seasoned designer, product manager, and entrepreneur. I spent almost a decade shipping products at Microsoft, followed by 3 startups in Silicon Valley. Most recently I worked at Xero creating a payments network for businesses and employees.
I have lead user experience and product management teams and I thrive in ambiguous environments that require multi-facetted skill usage and development. I am a highly user focused product manager that have driven the shipment of over 20 internationally recognized products, including SaaS platforms, hardware and software. I has proven skills as a "full stack" designer having performed design functions (IA, UX/UI, research, brand) at multiple companies. I did all the heavy lifting on the music SaaS platform, Tronic.fm.
I have a lot of experience in consumer software and services, shipping multiple versions of Zune, Bing for iOS, leading the OnLive product and design team as well as heading up product at SFX Entertainment. I co-founded and shipped the B2B EMS solution, Tronic.fm, focused on tools for the music industry, raising capitol, building a team of engineers, designing the platform from ground up and finding market fit.
Let's socialize!
Employment
Founder :: JV Consulting 5/2013 - Current
- This the my company I contract my services out from. Services are product strategy and design oriented.
- Client: Buzzz - product strategy for voice first service. Detailed visual and UX design for Chrome app and iOS app.
- Client: Ornish & Healthways - product strategy for Ornish healing program platform.
- Client: Ornish & Healthways - Learning Management System (LMS) strategy and deep integration design with Litmos for Ornish healing platform.
- Client: Firefly - designed (UX/Visual/Interaction) for the iOS and Android app for the Bluetooth portable vaporiser
- Client: Bigid.com - Company focused on protecting personal info. Building out landing page for the companuy. bigid.com
- Client: HashChat - mobile social media app. Help with product strategy and design
- Lecturing a course focused on Product Management for The Product School.
- Plug (plugged.world): creating and developing an app, including driving product vision, user research UX design, front end dev (Flutter), landing page and marketing materials etc.
Senior Product Manager and Designer 5/2015 - Current
Xero
- Worked for the Financial Web team innovating on ways to enable small business pay and get paid.
- Delivered direct deposit payment rails platform (API and UX) for Xero's various feature verticals (payroll, bills, lending) enabling B2B and B2C digital payments in the US.
- Developed and evangelized a process based on lean methodologies to manage and priorities ideas
- Wrote PRDs, defined and analyzed KPIs, wrote email copy, authored help pages.
- Drove quantitative research and qualitative research to understand opportunity hypothesis
- User testing and surveying, as well as design (process flows, screen flows, high fidelity mockups)
- Researched, analyzed and prioritized multiple opportunities for the service.
Co-Founder, CPO/COO 9/2013 - Current
Tronic.fm
- Created SaaS platform for the music industry with a focus on connection, engagement and discovery for the archetypes involved in the music industry. (“LinkedIn for music”)
- Raised $500K from investors.
- Drove product vision, designing, research, brand, product management, customer engagement.
- Wrote PRDs and design workflows
- Conducted user research and A/B tests, wrote email copy, authored help pages
- Managed developed of responsive site (using Twitter Bootstrap, PHP5, Yii Framework, AWS)
- Tronic.fm is a SaaS platform for the music industry with an acute focus on connection, engagement and discovery for the archetypes involved in the music industry (artists, promoters, agencies, venues, management, labels, fans). Think ERP for music. Tronic.fm provides a rich event ecosystem with a guide and ticketing, booking and artist roster management, comprehensive industry pages, integration with key services (YouTube, Vimeo, SoundCloud, Facebook, Twitter) and customizable hosted sites.
Director of Product2/2013 - 8/2013
SFX Entertainment
- Worked with executive members of company to build a cohesive company wide digital strategy.
- Lead the redesign of Beatport.com, taking it from a prosumer to consumer experience.
- Sourced and manage a design agency on all up product strategy, functional & visual redesign.
- Performed deep functional analysis for potential company acquisitions.
- Lead the design of the corporate website and marketing materials.
Lead Product and UX Manager 2010 - 2012
OnLive Inc.
- Delivered the first cloud gaming platform to the world. Lead the effort on all consumer-facing aspects of the service. Worked closely with executive staff, engineering and marketing to derive requirements, design functionality and drive execution. 2 Patents earned.
- Provide thought leadership, creative direction and product road map definition for the OnLive Game Service.
- Lead and managed the user experience team (2 artists, 1 IA designer), storyboarding, framework definition, wireframing, detailed user experience definitions, and hi fidelity manifestations.
- Built up product management team and lead evangelization of the product management and user experience skill set at the company.
- Represent OnLive at industry events and with company partners.
Senior Program Manager 2009 - 2010
Bing, Microsoft
- In 3 months lead the effort to deliver a native Bing application to the iPhone, the first official MS app on the iPhone.
- Within 4 weeks of release over 1 million installs.
- Drove definition of functionality, including pushing for key product delighter features
Program Manager2006 - 2009
Zune, Microsoft
- Zune PC Software: In 10 months, built the PC software technology to service the needs of the Zune hardware device, as well as the needs of the Zune Music service for Zune v1.
- Smart DJ: Created, designed and managed the development of Zune Smart DJ service, a music recommendation engine and user experience (ships in Zune v4). 3 Patents earned for work done on this project.
- Podcasting Solution: Lead design and creation of Zune podcasting service (Microsoft’s podcasting solution). This included ideation, designing the end-to-end service experience, driving cross group collaboration effort to deliver the solution.
- Globalization: Lead effort to globalize Zune technologies. Drove solution design and managed a virtual team.
- Media Metadata Solutions:Defined media collection management and metadata management, including music editing tools and online metadata services. Earned one patent for this work.
- Video Experience: Lead the creation of the video experience on the Zune PC software.
- Applications / Games Experience: Lead team to design and deliver and application store for the Zune software and device.
- Software Setup & Servicing: Drove the end-to-end software and hardware servicing and setup servicing experience for Zune.
Program Manager2005 - 2006
Windows Media Player, Microsoft
- Podcasting Solution: Designed and managed the development of an end to end podcasting service for Windows Media Player. 1 patent earned .
- Security and Privacy: Responsible for driving the security and privacy functionality.
Technical Program Manager2001 - 2005
Windows Update, Microsoft
- Windows Update Agent API’s: Lead feature design and development of functionality in the Windows update client software. These public APIs are leveraged by a wide variety of Microsoft solutions as well as 3rd Party vendors today for scanning, downloading and installing software and drivers. 2 Patents earned .
- System Management Server (SMS) integration: Lead integration efforts between Windows Update (WU) technologies and SMS.
- Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA): Lead integration between WU and MBSA.
- 64-Bit Architecture Developed: Lead plan for supporting Windows x64 by the WU technologies and shipped these technologies for the Windows x64 release.
- Release Management: Managed the Windows Server 2003 SP1 release effort across the WU.
- WU Driver Pipeline: Lead effort to design and deliver driver scanning and update for Windows.
Education
Bachelor of Science (Honours) in Computer Science 2000 - 2001
Rhodes University, South Africa
I got an Honors degree in Computer Science with Cum Laude
Bachelor of Science 1996 - 2000
Rhodes University, South Africa
I got and Bachelor Degree in Computer Science with Cum Laude
Other
- Teacher at The Product School, 2018
- Guest speaker at The Product School, 2018
- Landmark Forum, and Landmark Forum Advanced Courses, 2016
- Cooper U Design Courses, USA, 11/2011
- Microsoft Mini MBA, Kellogg School of Business, USA, 9/2008
- Project Manager Professional certification (PMP), USA, 2/2008
- Dale Carnegie Leadership Course, USA, 5/2005
- Audio Production Certification, University of Washington, USA, 5/2005
Products Shipped
Xero Payment ServicesBuzzz Chrome Extension
FireFly iOS App
Tronic.fm (MVP Alpha Beta)
OnLive Game Service
Bing for iOS 1.0
Zune (4.0 3.0 2.0 1.0)
Windows Media Player 11
Windows Vista
Windows x64 Editions,
Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer 1.0
Microsoft Update 1.0
Windows Server Update Services (2.0 1.0)
Windows XP Service Pack 2
Windows Server 2003
Windows Update Site
Product Management
Competitive Analysis & Research
Qualitative & Quantitative User Research
Design Thinking
Lean Methodologies
Project Management
Leadership & Commmunication
Design Skills
Design Collaboration
Interaction Design
Responsive / Web Design
Framework Definition
Information Architecture
Visual Design
Persona Development
Usability Research
Mobile
Tools
Sketch
InvisionApp
Photoshop
OmniGraffle
Illustrator
HTML & CSS
Audio Production (Cubase, Logic, Protools)
Remote Working Tools
Nice things people have said
OnLive was a great place to work largely because of teammates like Josh. He was an outstanding Product Manager at OnLive and a key force in getting the product to market. He was the perfect cure to analysis paralysis - facilitating decisions and making things happen. Rapid turnaround on iterations, well-considered decisions, clear direction/communication with engineering, and a positive attitude made it easy for all my teams to get stuff done. I look forward to the day we can work together again!
Ronn Brashear, VP Product Development, Oracle
Josh is multi-talented. He can manage complex engineering projects, he can work with a creative team on ideation and design, and he understands business relationships well enough to foster new partnerships with external companies. But Josh's most important talent is his ability to always push for something better - a more usable design, a more innovative offering, or a technology that no one else has figured out how to do right yet.
Ian Todd, Group Program Manager, Zune, Microsoft.
Josh is an extremely motivated, disciplined and experienced Product Manager who drove many projects while at OnLive. Josh designed our social media features, most of our UX interactions and was key to our successful launch in 2010. Josh writes detailed specification documents, produce flow diagrams and wireframes, and knows how to work with artists to product high fidelity comps when needed. With Josh, it wasn't enough to just write the specs... Josh would also sit down with the engineers directly and walk through the logic with them, listen to their comments and then update with new ideas. On top of everything else, Josh was one of the few people who could handle doing meetings directly with the executive team. He'd do presentations they could understand, take detailed notes, and also keep them informed on the status of their requests.
John Speck, VP of Engineering, OnLive.
Josh is the first guy I think of when I want something to look great - anything. He was an excellent addition to the Xero payments team. He rounded us out with his design skills, clear thinking and ability to execute. He has a great balance of ux design, product strategy and technical knowledge. He doesn't get shaky under pressure and tight deadlines. Its been fun working with him on Xero as well as consulting with him on other projects.
Jack Couch, CEO & Founder, Deep Intel.
Josh is not only a great interaction designer but his deep understanding of product development adds a whole other level to his work. He was great to work with and had an immediate understanding of everything we were trying to do. Our app definitely had some tricky bits to it but he created a great unified design that was super crisp and worked seamlessly on both iOS and Android. He was proactive in all his communications and had great teamwork with the developers. Plus he has a devilishly charming accent!
Sasha Robinson, CTO & Co-founder, Firefly.
Josh is a highly dedicated and committed team player. My team had to work through many complex product issues with legal implications in the privacy area and IP areas with Josh. He was thoughtful, easy to work with, and always willing to explain more, on the one hand, and listen carefully, on the other hand. I found Josh to be excellent at working with all levels of the company from our CEO and other C-levels on down. He is a solid and professional team player. I would welcome the opportunity to work with Josh again.
Eve Saltman, Vice President, Legal/Corporate Secretary, OnLive.
Josh is a tremendous collaborator and an expert at cross-team interaction between engineering, product management and marketing. In our time working together, Josh managed the integration of SmartDJ, a key feature for our Zune product. From dealing with deep engineering complexity, to light front on development and product messaging, Josh has an all round ability to mobilize and harness teams. And he's a cool guy. Although he does like dodgy drun and bass music.
Chris Stephenson, GM of Marketing, Zune, Microsoft.
Josh was *the* UX guy at OnLive ultimately responsible for the entire entertainment experience for our app, whether it be on a phone, tablet, TV, PC or Mac. Josh's ability to establish trust among the engineering teams and executive team is only surpassed in his ability to quickly adapt to schedule changes, priority shifts, and new product needs. Combined with his can-do attitude, an attention to detail, and consistently clear product requirement documentation, I look forward to see the next set of products that evolve under Josh's leadership.
Andre Srinivasan, Senior Product Management, OnLive.
Josh is a great Porgam Manager - well able to balance the conflicting requirements of feature set versus available resources. Josh is very easy to work with and able to effectively communicate his requirments to both development and test resources, enabling a cohesive product team.
Mike Rorke, Senior Developer, Zune, Microsoft.
I worked with Josh for several years in the Windows Update, where he was a program manager and I was the architect. Josh impressed me from the start as a smart, creative program manager. Josh found ways to make interesting things happen in a group where the #1 priority is always to ship, ship, ship. He struck a good balance of contributing his own ideas in technical areas while still listening to the rest of the team. I would be happy to work with Josh again someday.