Bettina Kast
About Candidate
I’m a creative, independent, human-centered German-Bosnian designer, strategist, mentor, researcher, inventor, innovator, and IxDA Local Leader based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
I’m on a mission to make the world more human, engaging, and understandable. My work brings clarity, simplicity, change, new perspectives, audience growth and satisfaction.
Personal characteristics
curious, creative, collaborative, analytical, pro-active, self-motivated, authentic, empathetic, thoughtful, perseverant, resolute, methodical, open, honest, trustworthy
Experience
- 20+ years strategic design and communication (B2B, B2B2C)
- 11+ years leading enterprise design in R&D for SaaS, low-code platforms, with foci on enterprise AI, data products collaborating across multiple time zones in agile/scrum environments (remote and onsite) and across the organization
- 11+ working in corporate range in size from 800+ to 6K+ employees supporting up to 5K+ customers (SMEs + Fortune 500s) and up to 200+ million users
- 10+ years branding, corporate design, interactive media and entertainment
- 10+ experience working in start-up environments, with entrepreneurs, with/within distributed, agile, multicultural teams range in size from 2-60+ members
- 1+ year experience as interim product owner
- 1+ year experience management experience (5 direct reports)
Accomplishments
- Completed 200+ projects range in budgets from USD 1K+ to USD 2+ million
- Delivered designs used by 5000+ customers (of which most of the Fortune 500s) and with up to 200 million users ranging from consumer audiences, over business, technical, and power users
- won patent award and was awarded a patent
- shipped a video game
- graduated with degree in design
Expertise
- human-centered design
- cross-functional collaboration
- design leadership
- data products (dashboards, visualization, etc.)
- strategy
- research
- mentoring
Domains
- design, research, strategy, design management
- product-, service-, system-, process-, digital-, business model innovation
- UX, customer experience (CX), customer engagement
Knowledge
- Design processes and methodologies
- Design principles
- Design systems, web design, software interfaces, interface design
- HTML
- CSS
- Data literacy
- Color theory and application across all media
- SaaS, Low-code enterprise platforms
- Big data, ETL, Event streams, data modeling, interaction history, data warehousing
- Developer experience, Call Centers, KYC, Marketing automation, enterprise decision management
- WCAG 2.1, EAA, ADA, UK Equality Act
- GDPR, CCPA, HIPPA
- Responsible AI, EU AI Act
- ML, descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive analytics (predictive scores, self-learning models) NLP, Sentiment analysis, voice AI, Co-Pilot, Process Mining, BI, workforce Intelligence, RPA, generative AI
Skills
Hard skills
- Research (qualitative, primary, secondary, generative, evaluative)
- Translating insights into designs
- Defining scope and vision
- Conceiving and developing concepts
- UI
- UX
- Information Architecture (iA)
- Interaction Design (IxD)
- Wireframes (low, mid, and high fidelity)
- Rapid prototyping (mixed media, digital, interactive, installations)
- Validating designs, MVPs
- Corporate design, Branding
- Typography, Layout, Information Design, visual design, data visualization
- Prompt engineering
Soft skills
- Providing and receiving design critique
- Communication (visual, written, verbal)
- Listening and observational skills
- Collaboration, Co-creation
- Product Innovation
- Leading design initiatives, planning
- Persuasion, and influencing
- Coaching, motivating, and mentoring designers
- Building and delivering presentations
- Managing stakeholders
- Identifying synergies
Technology skills
- Adobe CC
- Apple Keynote, QuickTime, iMovie
- Figma, Sketch, Axure RP Pro, Balsamiq
- Mac OS
- MS Office
- Mural, Miro, FigJam
- Whiteboard, sticky notes, and markers
- Generative AI tools (chatGPT, Firefly, Claude)
Languages
- Egnlish (Fluent)
- German (Fluent)
- Dutch (Level B1+)
Interested in
hybrid, in-office, collaboration, design maturity, innovation, strategy, research, analytics, data-driven customer-centricity, quality, growth, technology, aerospace, fintech, science
Location
Location
Education
Graduated with degree in design
Work & Experience
Pegasystems Inc. is an American technology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. Pegasystems develops enterprise software for Fortune 500 companies. Its product portfolio contains a low-code platform with AI-powered decisioning, customer service, 1:1 customer engagement.
Provide research, insight, and data communication skills to help improve Pega's data visualisation and business intelligence capabilities
Act as product owner + in an unofficial managerial role: Mentoring, + overseeing the work of one designer, + one scrum team
Worked with various customers, including Coca-Cola, Sprite, MusiGames, Rocket Ninja, Virtual Toys, and Streamline Media Group, to deliver immersively, and interactive experiences for consumer audiences
Streamline Studios is a leading international studio delivering interactive entertainment productions.
Corporate, web, print, + interaction design
Corporate design, web design, + interaction design for interactive entertainment products
Corporate design, design + development of interactive flash websites
