# Luke Rolka > Building the future through transformative product design, organizational strategy and leadership. | MBA, Design Strategy Location: San Francisco, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/lukerolka When you get close enough to anything, it goes from object to landscape. This is how I view design practice. It’s the opportunity to take long-held beliefs, approaches, or points of view and recast them. I build transformational teams that challenge what we believe works with what people actually want. To get there, I have 10+ years of creative leadership in b2b and b2c tech contexts across product and marketing with close collaboration on UX & CX teams. I'm a recent MBA graduate in design strategy. Visual design is my first love, but shifting mission-oriented organizations towards long term success is my calling. I'm looking for leadership partners to drive us to a preferred future together. ## Work Experience ### Product Design Manager @ LendingTree Jan 2021 – Present I'm the lead product designer for the LendingTree app and senior member of design system team, helping Americans make smart choices during their most important debt and credit decisions. I drive think, make and check cycles through UI/UX pods primarily on authenticated user experiences with special contributions on: -Customer journey / service mapping -Qualitative research analysis -Design system standards for UI and workflow refinement for developer handoff -Marketing funnel consultation and product alignment for CRM strategy and tactics -Team culture and resiliency ### Design Manager @ LendingTree Jan 2021 – Jan 2021 | San Francisco, California, United States I drove high impact creative for digital acquisition through concept and execution at all levels of the marketing funnel in collaboration with the product team to align customer expectations. Under my tenure, LendingTree was able to drive profit at record volume among all top digital display/social advertisers in the US, with many of my design concepts among the best performing the US in 2021. Notable achievements include: - Record-breaking social and display ad performance for core LendingTree products - Senior contributor, LendingTree rebrand and design system - Creative strategy for social advertising and built ongoing consultative relationship with product marketers and channel managers for growth tactics - Head designer and strategist of pilot Facebook email-acquisition product with value-added gated content (from proof of concept to full pilot) - Visualization analysis of key customer journeys to improve and aid roadmap decisions - 2021 new HQ interactive installation to engage employees and build a picture of career "personalities" ### Senior Creative @ LendingTree Jan 2017 – Jan 2021 | San Francisco Bay Area As a data-guided lead creative for both digital marketing and product design at LendingTree, Luke has achieved the following milestones: LendingTree Rebrand ---- Released in 2018, Luke was a core team member developing a new corporate logo, color scheme, image treatments and thematic direction. The rollout was successful, achieving significantly positive consumer ratings, and net gain metrics across all paid advertising. Record-Breaking Paid Advertising Performance ---- Creative oversight on social advertising on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, SnapChat, and Pinterest as well as significant new contributions to Display network advertising resulted in company records with direct response creative performance. Innovating New Creative Marketing Concepts ---- Developed new app MVP to help renters transition to home ownership by assisting with down payment calculations and savings. Utilized b2b experience to test richly designed gated content marketed through social channels. Initial tests exceeded expectations by over 100%, opening the opportunity to scale. Cross-Team Management ---- Manage creative communication alongside Senior Creative Director to ensure digital marketing teams effectively utilize all the creative levers at their disposal, across 10+ campaign managers and analysts. Product Design ---- Developed new visual direction and UI/UX for core LendingTree product, with continued efforts for successfully overcoming both growth and consumer experience challenges as part of a wider effort to develop a design system and consistent approach across products. ### Creative Manager @ Exterro Jan 2015 – Jan 2017 | Beaverton, Oregon Exterro is a leading E-Discovery and legal process software startup, and prides itself on industry best product, in order to change how legal professionals work to reduce costs, manage risk, and eliminate unknowns. As the lead marketing designer, it was Luke's role to reframe and contextualize how Fortune 500 corporations, law firms, and service providers view their industry and their roles within it. In order to achieve this, Luke pursued a combination of routes, through brand awareness (typically via social media ads, PPC banner ads and event design), industry-best content marketing (ebooks, visual guides, infographics, educational microsites), sales tools (product briefs and sales presentations), and honed messaging through traditional marketing vehicles like the corporate website design, HTML emails, and event landing pages, utilizing the latest digital marketing metrics and user testing methodologies. Luke also drove brand development across the organization including UI/UX consulting for product. These cross-functional relationships were key to design success, to ensure for a well rounded strategy fed by multiple points of view. Before moving permanently to the Bay Area, Luke ensured a clean hand-off for the brand to the succeeding designers, setting the company up for a milestone private acquisition the following year, and for rapidly increasing industry leadership. ### Creative Director @ Janrain, Inc. Jan 2011 – Jan 2015 | Portland, Oregon Area Janrain was the industry leading Customer Identity and Access Management platform and pioneer of social login, acquired by Akamai in 2019. Luke joined Janrain in 2011 to build their brand and up-level their content marketing, develop a visual language for sales and marketing presentations, and clarify what Janrain does and how through clear narratives and easy to understand visuals through print, digital, web, and motion graphics. This role cut across many areas in order to achieve its goal, from UI/UX consultations for login user experiences on Fortune 500 corporate websites, to customer journey paths and support UI for Janrain's own website. Luke managed a team of designers while collaborating with outside agencies, the core marketing team, product, sales, and digital strategy in order to produce the deliverables that worked to redefine and mature the market, as well as successfully position Janrain for the future. ### Design for Good Committee Member @ AIGA Portland Jan 2010 – Jan 2013 | Portland, Oregon Area Luke feels passionately about sustainability from professional, personal, humanitarian, and environmental points of view. As a member of the sustainability committee, Luke collaborated with the Portland design community and others to provide relevant resources, events, and tools on sustainability until it matured and was merged into the AIGA Design for Good initiative. ### Portland 48 Hour Film Project @ Perfect Strangers Productions Jan 2011 – Jan 2012 | Portland, Oregon Area Co-Art Director for 2012 PDX 48 Hour Film "Silent Redeption." Co-Art Director and Credits Designer for 2011 48 Hour Film "Pollinating." Film won Best Editing and Best Graphics. ### Lead Marketing Designer @ Eleek Inc. Jan 2008 – Jan 2011 Eleek is a high end cast metal lighting and hardware maker specializing in environmentally preferable manufacturing techniques and supply chain transparency. Luke's role as lead graphic designer was to maintain Eleek's brand and produce visually rich digital catalogs and product photography, while also maintaining their web presence. Luke oversaw the visuals/strategy for several sustainability initiatives at Eleek, and produced/maintained a popular resource to make it easier to make light bulb selections from a energy efficiency point of view. ### Freelance Designer @ Voice for Oregon Innovation & Sustainability Jan 2009 – Jan 2010 Branding development and web design execution for VOIS non-profit organization. ### Colaboratory Graphic Design Intern @ Portland Advertising Federation Jan 2008 – Jan 2008 Six week internship program with CMD, Livengood | Nowack, and Asterix Group, including a professional pitch with intern-formed Kiwi Agency. ### Graphic Design Intern @ Oregon State University Jan 2007 – Jan 2008 Developed and elaborated on unique identity for the 07-08 school year. Produced full range of print promotional materials within the OSU brand and poster series, as well a 2007 Annual Report. ## Education ### Master of Business Administration in Design Strategy - DMBA California College of the Arts ### Bachelor of Fine Arts - BFA in Applied Visual Arts Oregon State University ### Comics Certificate Program in Comics Independent Publishing Resource Center ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/lukerolka - Portfolio: http://twitter.com/lukerolka - Portfolio: https://www.lukerolka.com/ --- Source: https://flows.cv/lukerolka JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/lukerolka/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-13