Hi. I'm Joshua Rudd, a seasoned product design leader taking products, people, and processes from zero to one to scale across B2B SaaS platforms and B2C experiences.
Throughout my career I've often entered as the first designer in the room—building products, teams, and processes from the ground up—and then leading these through what comes next in a rapidly changing world. I have a focus on continuous learning, rapid iteration, challenging assumptions, scaling what works, and preparing for what's around the corner.
Most recently I led the design org at Aiwyn across three business lines and five products serving accounting firms. Before that, nearly a decade at UserVoice building and leading design and product.
I'm not driven by titles or prestige, but rather by zeroing in on the biggest, gnarliest problems in front of us, and doing what it takes to solve them. I'm passionate about building up those around me to do the same.
You can find me on LinkedIn, Dribbble, GitHub, or out and about in Cary, North Carolina. I’ve also started sharing some thoughts and insights on Medium. Feel free to get in touch with me via email.
Selected Work (albeit a bit outdated—reach out for more recent examples)
Led design vision and quality standards across Aiwyn's multi-product platform, building and developing a design team that operates as strategic partners in product trios.
Evolved design system toward agentic patterns for AI-integrated experiences
Championed AI tools and workflows adoption across the design team
Introduced opportunity solution trees and continuous discovery practices
Hands-on leadership through design critiques and coaching
Direct customer and prospect engagement to support sales and inform product direction
Joined as the first designer and built the design function from scratch, establishing team culture and delivering products that drove real business outcomes.
Designed 0-1 products including billing, engagements, and practice management
Introduced user story mapping as a core discovery and alignment practice
Developed and maintained the design system
Built strong customer relationships through on-sites and virtual sessions
Created Notion documentation hub for design team knowledge sharing
Led design for B2B and B2C experiences across desktop and mobile platforms at this product development consultancy.
0-1 product design for diverse industries including fintech payment processing, pest control field workforce management, and data security threat platforms
Facilitated discovery sessions and user story mapping with client stakeholders
Led internal product initiatives and light branding projects
UserVoice is a B2B SaaS platform that simplifies the arduous tasks of gathering user feedback, making sense of it, and making informed product decisions. During my nearly 10 year tenure at UserVoice I played many product and design roles, all with the same goal: solve real problems. As director of UX I helped put in place the tools and processes for teams to do the same.
Created team alignment through our UX philosophy, design principles, and version-controlled design system
Spearheaded company-wide commitment to a course of accessibility compliance and transparency
Lead design for several major feature releases with a focus on expansion and new business, including Contributor Sidebar, Roadmaps, and a fundamental redesign of our feedback infrastructure that enabled UserVoice to become the single repository of product feedback collected by any system
Skills & Responsibilities
Facilitate project kick-offs, customer research, user story mapping sessions, and design critiques — all with an emphasis on problem definition and alignment on desired outcomes
Set up and maintain core usage analytics using FullStory, Heap, Mode, Pendo, and Google Analytics
After five years in UserVoice’s San Francisco office, I transitioned to leading product and moved to Raleigh to help ramp up the east-coast office. During this time we doubled the size of our Raleigh office, began building out a new space, launched a new version of our platform, and realigned our focus from small businesses to mid-market and enterprise.
Launched UserVoice 3.0, an entirely new version of the platform targeted towards mid-market and enterprise customers, helping move UserVoice’s monthly average selling price from $200 to >$1,000
Introduced the company to OKRs, and helped implement them across all departments
Created UserVoice’s first Customer Advisory Board
Skills & Responsibilities
Worked with our CEO to develop UserVoice’s product vision and roadmap, worked across departments to communicate our roadmap, and provide training on upcoming releases
Conducted generative research through regular customer interviews, both on-site and remotely, identified market opportunities, and worked with design and engineering to discover and validate solutions
I got really good at saying, “No,” to help us focus on our key objectives
I joined UserVoice as their first designer, and worked out of the cofounders’ San Francisco apartment alongside seven others. It was quite a change from the design studios I had been at before, to say the least! Over the course of my time we opened a proper office in San Francisco, and then opened a second office in Raleigh, NC. During my time at this role I lead a team of designers across two offices (San Francisco and Raleigh, NC).
Lead design of new widget system, allowing companies to collect feedback, provide support, solicit ratings, and rank ideas directly in their apps and websites
Created frictionless sign-up & sign-in system, resulting in an exponential increase of user signups
Designed and launched an entirely new product: UserVoice Helpdesk, the first helpdesk solution to automate support requests with instant answers, saving small support teams hundreds of hours a month
Founded by the same team I worked with at Pentagram, Brick is a multi-disciplinary design studio that creates comprehensive brand experiences. Working at Brick afforded me the opportunity to hone in on my interaction design and information architectural skills, while also being able to craft the building blocks of how we delivered websites and applications.
Designed intuitive new UI and physical input interface for Memorex digital picture frames
Created and maintained large-scale information architecture maps
Helped run comprehensive usability studies both before and after website redesigns
Designed and co-authored an open-source CMS, PHP library, and MVC framework
Project management, estimation, and client relations
Interaction design and information architecture
HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP, and MySQL, with an emphasis on web standards through semantic markup, Microformats, and accessibility
Clients included AIGA, Beats by Dre, Cannon Design, City of Hope, Evolution Fresh, Explore.org, Fuego, Memorex, Microsoft, National University, and more.
Founded in 1972, Pentagram is the world’s largest independently-owned design studio. I joined Pentagram initially for a short-term project as a front-end developer for a major redesign of Stanford Law School’s website, and was soon offered a full time position as Senior Interaction Designer. Pentagram was one of the design studios I idolized during my studies and early career, and working there was an amazing experience.
Created and maintained large-scale information architecture maps for multiple university websites
Designed a large, multi-display exhibit for the grand opening of Cal Academy of Sciences’ Golden Gate Park location
Skills & Responsibilities
Interaction design and information architecture
Front-end development
Clients included California Academy of Sciences, Cannon Design, Stanford Law School, Sonance, Symantec, University of California, Riverside, and more.
Co-founder & Designer
rearviewWindow
Feb 2004 – Apr 2007 (3 yrs 3 mos)
Dallas, Texas
rearviewWindow was a boutique design and photography business serving both local businesses and international non-profit organizations.
Designed and implemented the UI and install process for the initial version of SWIM (Smart Web Information Management), a CMS built with flexible taxonomies in mind
Created the design language, navigation, and base templates for Brink’s internal intranet redesign
Open Source Project
SWIM - Smart Web Information Management
Skills & Responsibilities
Website and product design
Project management
HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP
Clients included Brink’s Inc., Integration Research, Baptist General Convention of Texas, The Damaris Project, Freedom Clothing, Smart Commons, Secured Path, Fleur de Vie, Gachet Coffee Lounge, Urban Dance Movement, and more.
Cultural Strategist
CityReach Austin
Jan 2003 – Feb 2005 (2 yrs 2 mos)
Dallas, Texas
CityReach was a consultancy that specialized in helping organizations identify and understand subcultures and their influences in target areas. While at CityReach, I helped perform city assessments throughout Texas, as well as catalyzing a series of community-building initiatives in Dallas’ urban neighborhoods.
Graphic Designer
Self Employed
Sep 1995 – Feb 2004 (8 yrs 6 mos)
Dallas, Texas
I started my career with a focus on graphic and print design, learning a lot about the print process by trial and error. Through building relationships with local printers, I quickly gained the experience necessary to ensure the print work I did with clients could be reproduced at the highest quality. I learned that how something is made is just as important, if not more important, to how it looked on your screen.
Just as having a deep knowledge of the printing process helped me design print collateral, I also focussed on learning how to write my own HTML and CSS to bring web designs to life. Cross-browser compatibility was a huge challenge during this time, so I focussed on learning and implementing web standards, all the while working in as many browsers as I could.
Print design – including brochures, handbills, posters, and CD jackets
Website design and development
Identity and branding
Clients included Starbucks, Rhythm & Brass, Koch Entertainment, Emerging Church Network, and more.
Graphic Designer (Contract)
Nokia
Jun 1997 – Mar 1999 (1 yr 10 mos)
Irvine, Texas
At Nokia I worked with the marketing director and copy editors to produce collateral for American and Latin-American markets.
Produced corporate brochures, technical information packets, and posters
Conceptualized and designed marketing materials
Oversaw press and color checks
Designed trade show displays for Nokia’s Latin-American market
