# Silvia Stephenson 🇺🇦 > Strategy + Product + UX | Early Stage Startup Advisor + Founder + Product Leader Location: San Francisco, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/silviastephenson I’m a Product and Product Design leader working with early-stage startups, established businesses, and entrepreneurs to help them build, scale, and streamline through strong product vision, design excellence, and smart systems thinking. AI is a key part of my work, from uncovering opportunities to improve workflows to implementing practical, effective solutions across product, marketing, design, and operations. I focus on helping teams automate where it counts, speed up execution, and make better decisions through intelligent systems. With a background leading cross-functional teams in both fast-moving startups and complex nonprofits, I bring structure and clarity to ambiguity. I specialize in 0 to 1 product development, design systems, and org design, with a strong focus on team-building and mentoring. I love design. All aspects of it, from architecture to interfaces, hardware to software, civic art to that button on the elevator. Everything we see and interact with evokes an emotion. I love the emotions, the why and the how of All. The. Things. ## Work Experience ### Startup Advisor + Strategist @ Self-employed Jan 2023 – Present | San Francisco Bay Area As a Startup Advisor and Strategist, I partner with early-stage startups to refine their product offerings and achieve market fit. By leveraging comprehensive market research and strategic planning, I guide teams towards user-centric product development, fostering operational excellence and team growth. My focus is always on integrating Product/UX Design into core strategies ensured that startups were well-positioned for success. ### Co-Founder + Product Leader @ PropertyBot Jan 2024 – Jan 2024 | San Rafael, California, United States Led the early-stage development of a real estate automation startup from concept to prototype. Built a network of strategic partners and prospective customers, conducted market and user research, and performed in-depth competitive analysis. Explored funding sources, developed user personas and journey maps, and created detailed use cases to shape the product vision. Developed the product requirements document (PRD), designed a clickable prototype, and collaborated on our MVP roadmap. Additionally, directed the branding and positioning strategy to align with our target market and business goals. We made a strategic decision not to pursue the product to market, the experience sharpened my ability to validate ideas quickly, align product strategy with user needs, and lead early-stage innovation efforts. ### Head of Product + Design @ IMAIGE AI Jan 2020 – Jan 2023 | San Francisco Bay Area Implemented cross-functional Product and UX initiatives, including extensive product design of the Photofetcher Ai demo prototype. Developed and managed the initial design system, establish workflows, team meetings cadence and strategy for both Design and Product. Determined product value and viability to align and achieve business goals, developed operational processes and conceived and wrote initial Imaige AI’s AI ethics framework. ### Sr. Product Design + Design Ops Manager / Product Manager / Engineering Manager @ Burning Man Project Jan 2020 – Jan 2020 | San Francisco Bay Area Responsible for developing, mentoring and managing the Product Design team. Introduced and strategized best practices around product design and user centric design. Managed internal and participant-facing software development, scaled internal teams, and established organizational design vision. With a deep design and product management background I determined a products value, viability, and usability to achieve the business goals all the while keeping in mind the unusual business position that Burning Man is. ### Sr. Product Design + Design Ops Mgr / Product Manager @ Burning Man Project Jan 2018 – Jan 2020 | San Francisco Bay Area ### Sr. Product Design Mgr / Product Manager / Engineering Manager @ Burning Man Project Jan 2011 – Jan 2018 | San Francisco Bay Area ### Sr. Producer / Product Owner @ Burning Man Project Jan 2011 – Jan 2011 | San Francisco Bay Area ### Sr. User Experience Designer @ Move, Inc Jan 2010 – Jan 2011 As a Sr. User Experience Designer for Move.com & Realtor.com my role was to support both the UED and Product Teams to focus on a variety of different research studies, focusing on multivariate user testing that spanned the product development lifecycle. We planned and determined the best methods and design studies, iterated on actionable findings and ongoing executive reports. Additionally I worked as the lead User Experience/Interaction Designer on Move.com’s first release of the Windows Mobile 7 version of their mobile application. Move was one of the first companies asked to produce their app for the Windows Mobile platform and it was still very much in it’s beta release phase. With limited documentation we were able to produce an app that garnered high marks at the official release at Microsoft. ### Senior Studio Manager (Design Ops): Front Doors + Ideation @ Yahoo! Jan 2008 – Jan 2010 | Sunnyvale, CA As the Sr. Studio Manager (Design Ops) of the Front Doors (Yahoo! Home Page, Toolbar, My Yahoo!, etc.) UED team I provided day to day support, production management, fostered team building and cultivated team culture. This included scheduling, resource allocations and tracking production projects, kickoffs, reviews, approvals, and final releases. A key responsibility was driving and building a strong network between Design, Product and Engineering as well as supporting the design team with both personal and professional development. ### Director Of Web Services @ EMC Creative Jan 2004 – Jan 2007 | Danville, CA Responsible for the strategic development and creative direction for web and digital marketing and communication. Coached account executives on new media and trends. Developed processes and integrated best practices with the in-house creative and development team. Responsibilities also included project budgets, timelines and client management. ## Education ### Bachelor of Science - BS in Applied Art & Design California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/silviastephenson --- Source: https://flows.cv/silviastephenson JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/silviastephenson/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-13