# Bernardo Garcia > Product Design Expert, Blend of Director/IC and Player-Coach, 2 Acquisition Exits, Building 0-to-1 Solutions in the AI Era Location: San Francisco Bay Area, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/bernardo Two acquisitions. Four industries. Experience turning early-stage products into platforms that drive real business outcomes. I've led design through successful exits at Casetext (acquired by Thomson Reuters) and Humble Bundle (acquired by IGN). I've built teams from the ground up, shipped award-winning AI tools, and partnered with founders and engineering leaders to take products from zero to one. At Gridspace, I designed an AI-powered platform that reduced call center handle time and cut agent attrition. At Casetext, I helped build CARA, which accelerated legal research productivity and reduced brief drafting time. At Humble Bundle, my features increased average order value and grew charitable contributions. At Zillow's Hotpads, I led a full product redesign that lifted repeat visits. I'm a Director-level player-coach. I set vision and strategy, but I also roll up my sleeves and do the work: conducting user research, rapid prototyping, designing systems, and executing cross-platform solutions. I've done it at scale, and with high craftsmanship. What I'm looking for: a leadership role at a company that utilizes design as a competitive advantage, not just a service function. A mission-driven team building something ambitious where I can have real ownership and impact. ## Work Experience ### Product Design Mentor @ Designlab Jan 2024 – Present I mentor students and professionals on how to break into the industry and navigate career changes. I offer interview coaching, portfolio reviews, and support students through DesignLab programs. ### Principal Product Designer @ Stealth AI Startup Jan 2025 – Jan 2026 Sold clients on the vision that got leadership and engineering aligned to execute. Worked directly with General Councils from the world’s biggest companies to understand how to apply AI to their internal legal teams. Led design asynchronously, collaborating with a globally distributed team. ### Principal Product Designer @ Guava Jan 2019 – Jan 2024 | San Francisco, CA Conducted on-site user research of call center workflows, observing agents handling calls, and interviewing leadership to develop user personas to inform design decisions. Partnered with cross-functional engineering teams to transform early prototypes into an operational platform, equipping call-center leaders with performance visibility and workflow control—contributing to initiatives yielding a reduction in average handle time and decrease in annualized attrition on key sites. Designed a first-of-its-kind product that enables the creation of cloud-based call centers using domain-specific AI agents within 10 minutes. ### First Director of Product Design @ Humble Bundle Jan 2017 – Jan 2019 | San Francisco, CA Pitched and shipped features that showcased individual games and multi-content bundles, leading to an increase in average order value and an increase in charitable contributions year over year. To date, Humble Bundle has raised over $274 million for charities – and counting. Designed a system of content-driven templates managed by a CMS that improved user engagement by allowing concurrent marketing promotions and content experiments, enabling an increase in the number of simultaneous tests per quarter and an increase in engagement with featured bundles. Changed the design culture to be solutions-driven by training my team in user research, UI/UX tools, and product design best practices. ### Director of Product Design @ Casetext Jan 2013 – Jan 2017 | Palo Alto, CA Designed an integrated platform for attorneys that paired the latest AI technologies in research with professional commentary from the legal community, which improved thought leadership in the industry and avoided costly mistakes for their clients, accelerating legal research productivity, shortening key document access from 14+ minutes to 4:40 minutes on average. Developed innovative legal AI tools leading to the award-winning product 'CARA', enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of writing legal briefs for attorneys and helping reduce brief drafting time by 19.1% while cutting revision cycles by 16.1%. Worked directly with the CEO and engineering team to craft products through user interviews, rapid prototyping, and iterative design. ### Lead Designer @ Zillow Jan 2012 – Jan 2014 | San Francisco, CA Led the UI/UX redesign of the product, which included the transition from Adobe Flash to Google Maps, enabling the reliability and improved performance of a critical feature across all modern platforms. Created content that explained key product features and reintroduced the brand, successfully supporting product relaunch and enhancing user engagement, contributing to a 17.3% increase in repeat visits and a 12.6% increase in users who saved homes or rentals after the relaunch. Developed a design system spanning web, mobile web, iOS, and Android—delivering visual consistency while decreasing feature design time and cutting cross-platform QA discrepancies. ### Designer @ VSA Partners Jan 2010 – Jan 2012 | New York, NY Designed digital projects for luxury and hospitality brands—Rolex, Fontainebleau, Hilton—at a top-tier NYC boutique agency, directing creative vision and execution from concept through launch. ## Education ### BS in Innovation in Design and Technology, Minor in Philosophy University of Miami Jan 2006 – Jan 2010 ### The real world across industries. Professional Product Designer Jan 2010 – Jan 2026 ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/bernardodesigns - Portfolio: https://www.bernardodesigns.com --- Source: https://flows.cv/bernardo JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/bernardo/resume.json Last updated: 2026-03-25