Columbus, Ohio
Designer. Product strategist. Founder. I took two businesses from napkin to revenue-generating in under 6 months—simultaneously. Whatever the challenge, I ship solutions that users love and businesses need.
Featured Work
Not side projects. Not proof-of-concept. Two actual businesses—concept to production-operational, generating mid-5-figures in combined revenue, while executing consulting work.
This demonstrates execution velocity, multi-threaded thinking, end-to-end ownership, and the ability to move from problem to validated, revenue-generating solution in weeks—not quarters.
Founder & Product Lead · Live, recurring revenue
Problem: No dedicated D2C brand for child-safe costume capes—a fragmented market dominated by generic Amazon listings with no brand story or repeat purchase loop.
Built: Custom storefront built from scratch with Stripe integration, subscription dashboard, customer retention UX, and a conversion-optimized checkout flow. Conducted customer interviews to shape sizing and online customer surveys to learn about pricing and experience.
Now: Live e-commerce platform with a recurring revenue model. Full-stack ownership—brand strategy, UX, ops, fulfillment—from day one.
Founder & Operator · Live, recurring customer base
Problem: Local field service providers offered inconsistent delivery with no digital booking, poor communication, and zero customer retention infrastructure.
Built: End-to-end customer experience—discovery to post-service follow-up—plus operations workflows, scheduling systems, and service delivery checklists grounded in customer research. Also serving as the proof-of-concept for Janous, a franchise management software platform in development.
Now: Operational with a recurring customer base. Demonstrates that UX thinking applies equally to service businesses—and that operational systems are a design problem too.
Corporate Case Studies
End-to-end narratives: problem → strategy → design → measurable business outcome.
A major U.S. bank's mobile banker tablet app was receiving poor feedback from the field—bankers found it slow, inconsistent, and friction-heavy. The tools that were supposed to accelerate customer conversations were slowing them down. This wasn't just a usability problem; it was a revenue problem.
I led the end-to-end redesign as Sr. UX Designer, transitioning into a Sr. Product Owner role mid-engagement to own the roadmap and delivery. I conducted field research with bankers across multiple branches, ran usability studies on the existing app, and facilitated cross-functional workshops to align design, engineering, and business stakeholders.
Rather than redesigning features in isolation, I reframed the problem around the banker's actual workflow and bank processes. We mapped task flows, identified the critical path, and stripped out everything that didn't serve that moment. The redesign was mobile-first, interaction-focused, and validated with real bankers before a single pixel went to engineering.
The final design was released back to the market, and we saw huge success!
A consumer-facing healthcare platform had strong traffic but weak engagement. Users were completing their primary task but not creating accounts, not returning, and not adopting features that would drive long-term platform value. The UX and product teams were misaligned on priorities, and research velocity was too slow to keep up with competitive pressure.
As Sr. UX Manager and lead product researcher and designer, I led the product team through a series of workshops and customer surveys to determine where we provided the most value to the customer and delivered a design that exceeded our leader's expectations.
For the account adoption problem, I led a cross-functional team workshop to determine where our users see our value. We narrowed in on our "Success" page. By analyzing our data we found that 1% of users create an account when they reach our website, but 10% of users sign up for an account when they reach our success page. It's at this point where the user can see a way to a better price using our discount card at the pharmacy to buy their medication.
For a new account adoption feature, I led rapid discovery, validated the design in under two weeks, and shipped an MVP that immediately outperformed expectations.
A global private aviation operator's operations team was running a critical 50-year-old process entirely on paper and manual coordination—a process where errors had direct operational and safety consequences. Field staff needed a mobile-first tool that could match the speed and reliability demands of private aviation.
I led UX design for the mobile-first operations platform, working directly with operations staff, engineers, and leadership. I also built the foundation for a company-wide design system to bring consistency across fragmented internal tools.
We embedded with operations staff to understand the actual workflow—not the idealized version, the messy real one. Research surfaced the precise moments where paper processes created delay and error risk. The design prioritized speed, error prevention, and offline reliability. We validated every major flow in the field before engineering handoff.
The design system work ran in parallel: establishing tokens, component patterns, and interaction guidelines that gave future teams a stable platform to build on rather than starting from scratch each time.
How I Work
Repeatable process. Adaptable to context. Grounded in evidence.
Every project starts with the user, not the solution. I conduct structured interviews, usability studies, and continuous discovery sessions to build an evidence base before any design decision gets made. AI-accelerated research synthesis keeps velocity high without sacrificing rigor.
I prototype at the fidelity that answers the question—no more, no less. Production-level prototypes built with AI-augmented design and technical workflows compress the gap between concept and testable artifact from weeks to days.
I build shared understanding across design, engineering, product, and business stakeholders before a line of code is written. The result is faster builds, fewer revisions, and outcomes that hold up after launch—measured against real metrics, not completion criteria.
About
I'm James Weaver—designer, product strategist, and founder based in Columbus, Ohio. I've led UX across fintech, healthcare, and private aviation—at some of the most recognized companies in each sector—and currently run two founder-led businesses alongside a Product and UX consulting practice.
My background spans the full product lifecycle: research and synthesis, interaction and visual design, product roadmapping, cross-functional team leadership, and business execution. I hold an MS in Human-Computer Interaction and a Certified Usability Analyst (CUA) credential.
I use AI as a force multiplier—to accelerate research, prototype faster, and scale delivery without scaling headcount. It's how I work, not what I am.