akanoodles

Agency of one.By design.

Product, experience and AI transformation that keeps working after I've gone.

The Barclays Design Operation Playbook, the artefact the repair produced

Client roster

  • CNN
  • Jio Financial Services x BlackRock
  • Samsung
  • Disney
  • Barclays UK
  • NTT
  • NatWest
  • British Gas
  • Johnson Matthey
  • Legal & General
  • Rolls-Royce
  • Asahi
  • BSI
  • Bupa
  • Cigna
  • eBay
  • H&M
  • Kantar
  • Lloyds
  • Mitsubishi Motors Corporation
  • National Gallery
  • Novo Nordisk
  • Opus
  • The Telegraph
  • The Times
  • Tourism Ireland
  • Virgin Media O2
  • Charles Taylor
  • Bacardi
  • Smith & Nephew

I help product, design and technology leaders fix the part of the business nobody owns: the handoff from strategy to design-to-code. I find where it's costing you, give it an owner, and leave your team able to run it.

Services

What I do

Twenty-five years leading product, experience and AI transformation in media, technology and financial services. These are the seven places I usually start.

My work

What it's been worth to clients

Six engagements, and what each one changed for the client.

EY: designed the study that tested Copilot before a wider rollout

The firm had committed to a large Copilot purchase with no evidence from its own people. I designed the evaluation study that gave leadership a validated return before the wider rollout.

Professional servicesRead the case

JioBlackRock: designed a wealth app that cuts investing to three steps

BlackRock wanted to launch a wealth management app in the Indian market. I helped launch it, designing an app that makes wealth management accessible to Indian investors in three steps.

Financial servicesRead the case

CNN Style: launched a luxury vertical built to protect CNN’s authority

CNN wanted a luxury style vertical without weakening its news authority. I built the identity and the ad formats, and CNN Style launched within a year and won a Drum award.

Media and publishingRead the case

Barclays: wrote the design operations playbook for a division mid-restructure

Barclays' design division needed a common way of working through a restructure. I delivered a design operations playbook, an operations blueprint and a maturity model.

Financial servicesRead the case

Mitsubishi Motors: designed one platform for HQ and its markets

Mitsubishi Motors needed one digital platform for its global HQ and its regional markets. I led the UX team, and delivered a page structure and a KPI framework that gave both a place.

AutomotiveRead the case

VMO2 Business: built one design system for O2, Virgin Media and both

The merger left VMO2 Business with two brands to run on one set of products. I built one design system that switches between O2, Virgin Media and a hybrid, and the team shipped from it in its first week.

TelecomsRead the case
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My process

How I work

It's built on the OODA loop: observe, orient, decide, act.

Observe

I watch the work as it actually runs, not as the process map says it does, and note where decisions stall and who is left waiting.

Orient

Every finding is tied to one of seven risks, each with an owner, a route to escalate it and a measure your board already reads.

Decide

The costliest risk goes first, not the loudest one in the room, and every decision leaves with a named owner and a date.

Act

I make the fix with your team, then check it held. You keep everything that was built, and I am judged on how far rework falls.

What I've been writing

Why is thematic parity not evidence?

Synthetic research platforms sell a number. Feed one an audience description, run simulated interviews, and it reports how closely its themes match a real study.

Read article

Why does product infrastructure decide how fast you can scale?

Product infrastructure decides how fast a business can scale its output. Treat the design system, the component library and the governance around them as a cost centre, and growth stays capped. That cap holds whether anyone admits making the decision or not.

Read article

Why is authenticity the moat when AI makes content free?

When generative tools make competent content free, the only scarce asset left is proof that a real person made it.

Read article

Tell me about the handoff nobody owns