Building the system that builds the product
ServiceNow's AI ambition accelerated rapidly with generative and agentic AI, but design ownership, decision rights, and operating models were fragmented. Without a clear platform design function, teams risked shipping inconsistent, untrusted AI experiences that would stall adoption and erode confidence.
If this failed: AI would scale faster than trust, turning innovation into fragmentation and slowing adoption at the moment it mattered most.
The challenge was not hiring designers or shipping features. It was the absence of a durable system that could translate AI ambition into repeatable, high-quality outcomes across products, teams, and time.
I believed clarity and humanity were competitive advantages. If we could give teams shared direction, strong principles, and psychological safety, we could move faster and ship AI responsibly without slowing innovation.
Founded a centralized AI Platform Design organization with clear mandate and scope. Designed the org around leverage: frameworks, patterns, governance, and enablement. Invested early in leadership roles and cross-functional trust, not just execution capacity. Explicitly deprioritized bespoke design work in favor of scalable systems.
AI Platform Design team gathering — growing from 15 to 62 people
Collaborative workshop session
Team building and collaboration
Oct 2022 – Mar 2025 • 29 months
Built and scaled the AI Platform Design org 4× over two years, with rapid initial scale in the first six months by borrowing five top designers from partner teams to augment a core team of six. Established platform-wide AI experience ownership. Shipped shared AI frameworks, patterns, and governance models that evolved rapidly as the technology changed and we learned in real time.
Supported the fastest-growing product family in company history. Enabled hundreds of millions of user-accepted AI-assisted actions tied to significant annualized business impact.
I would invest earlier in rotating enablement ownership across senior ICs, supported by clearer executive sponsorship and shared visibility, to reduce dependency on a small core team and accelerate leadership development.
This case study shows how I build the system that builds the product—designing organizations, not just experiences.