# Bhushan Balagar > Designer learning to build — from the full user journey down to the last pixel Location: San Francisco Bay Area, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/bhushanbalagar Currently: → Straia — Designing agentic chat interfaces for higher education, translating product design directly into frontend code. (https://www.straia.io/) → VibeCode Arena — Helping shape a playground for AI-assisted coding, where people can experiment with how LLMs write code and learn from each other. Designing and building the frontend as I dig deeper into AI and design. (https://vibecodearena.ai/) If you're thinking about the role of design in AI products or blending design with engineering — I'd love to chat! Reach me at bhushanbalagar@gmail.com, or send me a message :) ## Work Experience ### Product Designer @ Straia Jan 2025 – Present | San Francisco, CA Shaping the design foundation for an AI-powered intelligence platform for higher education. Work spans branding, design systems, and product design — with a growing focus on frontend implementation as I bridge into design engineering. ### Product Designer @ OddsJam Jan 2024 – Jan 2025 ### Product Designer @ eSUB Construction Software Jan 2022 – Jan 2024 Construction management software (eSUB Cloud 2.0) used by subcontractors to streamline project management, documentation, and communication. - Worked closely with PMs to translate product requirements and user feedback into new features and product iterations, facilitating user migration to Cloud 2.0 - Collaborated with engineers to discuss technical concerns and ensure alignment between the design intent and implementation, with detailed specs in Zeplin - Conducted regular stakeholder meetings to gather user feedback and validate design hypotheses, which informed design iterations during each sprint - Led the creation of a mobile design system to establish consistent visual language and UI components, resulting in improved development time - Updated the web design library based on engineering feedback and new feature requirements, creating new components and documentation as needed ### Product Design Intern @ EcoCart Jan 2021 – Jan 2021 | San Francisco Bay Area Designed onboarding screens for the chrome extension, and used After Effects to animate a video to promote EcoCart at a conference ### Product Design Consultant @ Berkeley Innovation Jan 2018 – Jan 2021 BI is a human-centered design consultancy that works with companies to solve design problems. My projects included working on a mobile app's onboarding, web platform redesign, and an urban research study: 1. SkyAlert (Fall 2018): Early warning alert app for earthquakes widely used in Mexico and 3 western US states —— Used 5,000+ survey responses and client feedback to understand user demographics and gauge user exposure to premium features —— Designed benefits-oriented onboarding flow with 3-person team to educate users about earthquake alerts and clarify differences between premium plans 2. Market Games (Spring 2019) Business web simulation program used by 700 UC Berkeley undergraduates each semester —— Participated as UX designer on a 4-person team to redesign web interface including dashboard page, site navigation, and onboarding —— Conducted X user surveys determining pain points such as complex site navigation and game instruction overload that influenced product design —— Led 2-week ideation sprint, including ideation sessions and communication with client, while designing prototypes for each simulation component 3. SITELAB Urban Studios (Fall 2019) Urban design firm creating large and small scale city spaces — Organized a generative research study to identify public space opportunities across 3 SF districts that foster community social interaction — Utilized guerilla interviews, surveys, and contextual inquiries to evaluate public space usage metrics and interactive behavior among locals — Developed 3 public space concepts that enabled various communities and members of the public to congregate ### Video Contractor @ Brex Jan 2019 – Jan 2020 | San Francisco Bay Area Continued responsibilities of previous role in a remote position focused on editing and creating product-focused videos ### Sales Content Intern @ Brex Jan 2019 – Jan 2019 | San Francisco Bay Area Designed marketing and sales collateral to support sales funnel; edited videos for prospective and current customers on product usage and integration guidelines ## Education ### Bachelor of Arts - BA in Cognitive Science and Economics University of California, Berkeley ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/bbalagar - Website: https://bhushan.design --- Source: https://flows.cv/bhushanbalagar JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/bhushanbalagar/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-08