Product designer

Designing clarity in complex systems.

10+ years across product, interaction, and UX design.
Enterprise depth with Amazon, Microsoft, and Nuance.
Designed AI and ML-supported experiences across fraud prevention, enterprise operations, and appraisal tooling.

Proof over polish.

A decade designing operational, trust, and AI-assisted systems across Amazon, Microsoft, startups, and SaaS — focused on measurable outcomes over visual noise.

Purchase impact +
Amazon Transparency — led customer touchpoints project that increased purchase rate by 2% and reduced returns by 6% for enrolled products.
Fraud + ML workflows +
Designed self-service and guided investigation workflows that reduced frozen-account resolution time from days to ~5 minutes, while lowering false positives by 2% and false negatives by 5%. This is also one of the strongest places to talk about how you worked with machine learning in production.
Onboarding speed +
Built internal guided workflows that cut new customer service representative onboarding from 8 weeks to 2 weeks.
Case study

Amazon Transparency

Increased purchase rates 2% and reduced returns 6% through improved trust UX.*

*For brands and products enrolled in the Transparency program.

Amazon Transparency visual
Progress Tracker
Designed customer touchpoints that made product authenticity and order visibility easier to understand.
Trust + purchase UX
Search and Detail Pages
Integrated Transparency into high-traffic shopping surfaces to improve trust and enrollment visibility.
Commerce surfaces
Amazon Lens
Extended Transparency into scan-based verification moments so customers could confirm authenticity in context.
Mobile verification
Case study

Aloft Appraisal

Modernized appraisal workflows with AI-assisted tooling.

Aloft appraisal workflow visualization
AI-assisted appraisal workflows
Redesigned appraisal tooling around AI-supported field population, auto-calculations, and workflow guidance to reduce repetitive manual entry.
AI-assisted workflows
Decision-support interfaces
Introduced visual comparison systems, color coding, and contextual data layouts to help appraisers make faster, more accurate decisions.
Data visualization
Operational efficiency
Helped compress appraisal processing time from 2–4 hours to roughly 45–60 minutes while improving workflow consistency and usability.
Workflow automation
Case study

IDEO Method Cards

A redesign focused on navigation, hierarchy, and clarity.

IDEO mobile visual
Research + landscape analysis
Surveyed existing educational and design-method systems to understand where the original experience created friction, ambiguity, and cognitive overload.
Design process
Information architecture
Reorganized navigation patterns, categorization systems, and card relationships to improve discoverability and reduce interaction complexity.
Systems thinking
Interactive prototyping
Built iterative interface concepts and prototype flows exploring hierarchy, visual organization, and touch-first interactions for method exploration.
UX prototyping
Tools, systems, platforms

From interface craft to AI workflows.

Technology fluency by category
Technology Designer-perspective description Level
Applied AI work

Applied AI work

AI-assisted news aggregation and summarization.

Built Tabum.org, a news platform that pulls from diverse sources, generates concise summaries, and highlights patterns across coverage.

Summarization workflows
Prompt and JSON pipelines for consistent summaries.
OpenAI
Aggregation system
Source ingestion, normalization, and scheduled processing.
Apify + Cron
Utility layer
Weather and lightweight personalization.
OpenWeather
Visit Tabum.org

Shape of AI flashcards.

Integrating AI into UX: a pattern-based approach for designers exploring how AI changes product behavior, interaction models, and interface decision-making.

AI UX pattern system
Organized emerging AI interaction patterns into a fast, scannable flashcard format.
AI interaction patterns
Designer-focused learning tool
Framed AI concepts through practical UX behaviors, tradeoffs, and product examples.
UX education
Rapid AI prototyping workflow
Used AI-assisted design and lightweight deployment to move quickly from concept to product.
Figma + v0 + Claude
Visit Shape of AI

Product experiments

Recent GitHub activity

Still building and shipping on GitHub.

GitHub contribution activity chart for Jay Hilwig
Workflow prototype

Docuformer

A document automation prototype exploring how AI can help parse, clean, transform, and reuse PDF-based content across structured workflows.

VS Code OpenAI Claude Supabase PDF workflows
Browser utility

Hide AI Chatbots

A Chrome extension prototype that detects and hides floating AI/chatbot widgets across websites, reducing interface clutter and restoring focus.

Chrome extension JavaScript DOM detection CSS injection UX utility
Mobile prototype

Dissolvr

A cross-platform iOS/Android messaging prototype using Expo and OpenAI to explore ephemeral communication, privacy controls, and a custom emoji-based language.

VS Code Expo iOS / Android OpenAI Emoji language Privacy UX Messaging
Workflow prototype

Applia

A job application assistant that finds relevant roles, tailors application materials, and shows transparent evidence of what was submitted.

VS Code Next.js Supabase OpenAI Apify Playwright Job workflows
Chrome extension prototype

Search for GPT

A browser extension concept for searching, organizing, and resurfacing past ChatGPT conversations more easily from inside the browser.

VS Code Chrome extension JavaScript Dexie IndexedDB ChatGPT workflows Search UX
CV

Career and credentials

Experience across enterprise platforms, startups, education, and patented product work.

Enterprise
Amazon
Enterprise product design across commerce, trust, and operational systems.
Enterprise
2014–2023, 2025
Nuance
Worked on product and UX design in speech, mobile, and intelligent interface environments.
Enterprise
2010–2013
Microsoft
Early-career product design work, including patented interface contributions.
Enterprise
2003–2006
Startup
Aloft Appraisal Acquired
Led AI-assisted workflow redesign for modern appraisal operations.
Startup
2023–2024
Centri Tech
Startup product design focused on applied product and interaction challenges.
Startup
2013–2014
Pyng.me
Contributed to startup product direction and user experience design over multiple years.
Startup
2013–2017
SNAPin Acquired
Startup experience in mobile and product design prior to acquisition.
Startup
2006–2010
Education
Undergraduate foundation in visual thinking, making, and design practice.
Education
Undergraduate degree
Patents
Patent contributions tied to large-scale product and system innovation (CS Guided Workflows).
Patent disclosure author
Graphical excellence is that which gives to the viewer the greatest number of ideas in the shortest time with the least ink in the smallest space.

Edward Tufte