I began more than a decade ago as a contractor, building software on long projects for large corporations. The brief usually arrived finished, and the job was to build it well. Years of doing that made me curious about what the brief did not ask: how people would understand and use what we built.

Two questions stayed with me. One was how light and sound relate; the gradient behind these words is generated from colors derived from sound. The other was what biomimicry might teach us about how an interface communicates with people. I explored the second question in a biomimetic framework for interfaces. Following both questions changed what I paid attention to when building software.

That curiosity followed me into software engineering and interface development across industries, from consumer goods to real estate. I moved from building as a contractor to leading multiple squads and, later, whole engagements. I wrote about what those years of tech leading taught me. Across different clients, a recurring question was whether the planned interaction matched how people actually used the product. That question shaped decisions about both the interface and the software behind it.

At McKinsey, I worked across several teams on firm-wide initiatives. The work involved deciding what should exist by weighing what people would use against what could be built well.

I now work independently, carrying decisions through implementation. The work calls for judgment about what to build, how it should behave, and when to bring in collaborators. I take on a few projects at a time and stay close to the work, from the first conversations through delivery. The plan is a hypothesis until real usage tests it, and when the signals move I say so. Start a note