I am a South African-born, Lisbon-based design leader with over 25 years of experience across fintech, enterprise platforms, and digital products. I have worked across Africa and Europe, inside banks, insurance companies, media agencies, and early-stage startups.

I have been the only designer in the room and the person responsible for building the entire design function from scratch.
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That last part is what defines most of what I do now.

When I joined OM Bank in 2023, there was no design team, no design principles, no ways-of-working, and a product that was already being built. Within two years, we had a full UX function, a design system, governance and review practices, and a product that had reached 200,000 users in 3 months.
I did not have a playbook for that. I built one as I went, under real pressure, inside a regulated environment, while simultaneously managing agency relationships, mentoring a growing team, and supporting delivery across multiple agile squads.
Many of the designers I developed during that time went on to become Seniors or Heads of Design at other companies. That is the thing I am immensely proud of.

I'll be honest, I have ADHD. So I built my design operating systems not because it seemed like good practice, but because I needed them to function. That origin makes my frameworks different from theoretical ones: they are simpler, more human, and built to be followed by people who are under pressure and do not have time to read a 60-page methodology document.
I believe the best design leadership is not about having all the answers. It is about knowing which questions to ask, building the systems that help your team find the answers themselves, and creating an environment where good work becomes the default rather than the exception.