I design
products.I build teams.I ship things.
Two and a half years at Disney. Over four years building and launching a software company. A decade collaborating with, and leading design and engineering teams and still designing, prototyping, building, and shipping every day.
These days I lead a small team of designers and frontend engineers, and still design — increasingly with AI in the loop, because getting from idea to working software has never been this quick. The interesting part is still deciding what deserves to exist.
- Manager, Product Design/FE Engineering
- Team Lead - Product Design
- Product Design Lead
- Head of Product & Co-Founder
- Full Stack Product Designer/Web Designer
- Business, Marketing & Sales
- MORE INFO
- Check out my LinkedIn
The distance between an idea and a working product is collapsing. That's genuinely exciting, and it isn't the same thing as better.
I’ve spent a decade working across design and engineering, learning that great products come from connected teams, not disconnected handoffs. I collaborate with, and lead designers and frontend engineers to turn ideas into intuitive products faster, using AI to accelerate exploration, prototyping, and delivery. The goal is simple: build the right things, not just build things faster.
HUMAN JUDGMENT
Knowing what’s worth building, and why it matters.
CRAFT & TASTE
Turning what works into something people love.
TRUST & ALIGNMENT
Building the relationships that make great teams work.
Four years building a software company taught me more than ten clean launches would have.
- Led a team of 6 engineers (I was the sole designer)
- Hundreds of conversations with industry professionals
- 100+ companies involved in beta
- 300+ users by launch (March 2020)
2017 · THE IDEA
An event-industry problem I couldn't stop thinking about. Hundreds of conversations with people who lived it every day.
2019 - THE BETA
100+ companies involved. Real workflows, real objections, a product shaped by people who had no reason to be polite.
The company
Outside capital, then a team, then engineers to manage — and a founder (me) learning that design is only part of the job - but the most fun job by far :-).
March 2020 · Launch
300+ users at launch. Three weeks later the in-person meetings & events industry came to a complete stop, due to Covid. It wasn't the ending we wanted but an invaluable learning experience that I will take with me for life.
“
Hugo's positive, collaborative approach broke down silos and brought design, development, and business together as one team, creating a shared sense of ownership and making the product shine.
GABOR PUHALLA - CEO OF PROFIQ (ENGINEERING PARTNER)
TAKEAWAYS
- Obsess over the problem, not the solution. Understand people deeply, and better products will follow.
- Raising money is a design problem too: you’re not selling a product, you’re selling a vision of what’s possible.
- Try. Fail. Learn. Repeat. The biggest failure is never taking the shot in the first place.
ESPN / Disney
Evolving ESPNFantasy Football
Evolving ESPN Fantasy Football
I spent almost 3 years making one of fantasy sports' biggest products smarter and more fun. A product with an enormous, deeply invested audience, a long-standing codebase and hard, immovable deadlines: the season starts whether you're ready or not.
FEATURE REEL // ESPN
- SEASONS
- 2022 — 2025
- Initiatives
- 13
- Role
- Team Lead
- Platforms
- iOS · Android · Web
Rundown
14 INITIATIVES // 3 SEASONS
- IC & MANAGED2024
Modernized draft board
A color-coded position view so managers can read a whole league's roster construction at a glance, mid-draft, under time pressure.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- IC & MANAGED2024
Live Activities
Designed Live Activities and Dynamic Island updates, putting matchup updates at a glance without unlocking your phone. Designed in 2024, launched for the 2025 Football season.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- IC & MANAGED2023
Auto teams
Computer-controlled teams with distinct personalities and adaptive play styles, helping new users get started, commissioners fill leagues, and everyone enjoy a better pre-draft and in-season experience.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- IC2024
Quick / optimized lineup
One-action lineup management. Removing work without removing control.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- COLLABORATED2024
Team name generator
AI-generated team names — small feature, very high joy per pixel.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- IC2024
Lineup autosave
Mobile parity for something desktop managers had taken for granted.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- COLLABORATED2024
Players experience
Clearer free-agent and waiver workflows.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- MANAGED2024
Draft grades + recap
The draft ended. The story didn't. Personalized post-draft grades and analysis turn an abrupt stop into a reason to come back.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- MANAGED2024
Weekly recap
Personalized league storytelling — highs, lows, notable performances, Monday night miracles. Turning fantasy data into entertainment.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- COLLABORATED2024
In-app league manager controls
Commissioner tools brought from desktop into the app, where leagues actually live.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- COLLABORATED2024
Touchdown celebrations
Player-specific animations you can send to the opponent you just beat. Fantasy is entertainment; delight is a feature.
MAKING THE SEASON MORE FUN
- COLLABORATED2023
Fantasy chat
Expanded league activity with richer transaction and message experiences.
Building the foundation
- COLLABORATED2023
League customization
More flexibility in how leagues and playoffs are run.
Building the foundation
- MANAGED2023
IBM waiver grades
AI-assisted evaluation of waiver decisions.
Building the foundation
The screens were only part of the job.
Product, engineering, design, content, data, research and stakeholders — across three platforms, a legacy system and a deadline set by the sports schedules. Design leadership was mostly connecting those pieces and keeping the team's attention on the things that mattered most.
Hugo is a technical leader with a relentless commitment to building a collaborative culture and serving our users. He involves his peers and stakeholders in his process and gets the best out of them. A true team player. He is a natural leader, with strong values and deep work ethics.
ANDRÉ BERNARDI · MANAGER, PRODUCT DESIGNTAKEAWAYS
- Design the system, not the screen. Every decision should strengthen the entire experience, not just one moment.
- Alignment is part of the craft. The best products happen when design, product, engineering and data move together.
- Utility gets the job done. Personality, storytelling and delight are what make people want to come back.
Leading product transformation from design to code.
- 01
Product Transformation
Rethinking and modernizing a complex ecosystem of internal and customer-facing software products.
- 02
Design at Scale
Design system, patterns, components, tokens and workflows that let multiple products and teams feel like one ecosystem.
- 03
Design + Engineering
Deep partnership with frontend engineering (Vue/Vuetify) — closing the gap between what gets designed and what actually ships.
- 04
Complexity → Clarity
Scheduling, kiosk management, advertising, authentication, dispatch app, production status — messy systems made understandable.
- 05
Faster Product Development
AI-assisted design, rapid prototyping and tighter design-to-code workflows — from idea to working product, faster.
TAKEAWAYS
- Operational complexity is a design problem. The closer design sits to operational workflows, the simpler the whole system becomes.
- A design system only scales when engineering owns it too. Shared tokens and components turn handoff into a conversation.
- AI is most useful when it shortens the distance between idea and working product, not when it replaces the designer's or engineer's judgment.
Where curiosity gets shipped, and ideas run wild.
A planning tool in the spirit of Jira, without the weight of it. Boards, issues and timelines for people who want to see the work clearly and get back to doing it — designed and built end to end.
View liveLeadership isn’t a level. It’s helping everyone play their best game.
I’ve collaborated with, and led teams and products from startups to global sports platforms, and coached sports teams for many years. I’ve learned that leadership works best when you give some of it away. Set direction, know your people, build confidence and trust, then give them the space to challenge ideas, own decisions, and lead.
Set the field
Create a clear direction, define what good looks like, and make the constraints visible.
Share the context
Bring design, product, engineering, content, and research into the work early.
Create space
Match people with opportunities that stretch their strengths, then trust them to own the result.
Back the team
Stay close enough to unblock and coach, but far enough away for other leaders to emerge.
Celebrate progress
Notice the shipped work, the better decision, the brave question, and the teammate who grew.
“It's better to be interested, than interesting”
MARK SCHARENBROICH
This is one of my favorite quotes and it's a good reflection of what a leader should be all about. Take the time to truly be interested and curious in learning more about your team members and people around you in general. Make them the star of the show instead of trying to be interesting and bragging about your own accomplishments. Outside work I regularly mentor new designers and it's so inspiring to see their passion and be able to share stories with them.
“Hugo excelled at being the design leader. At a startup, that meant getting deep into the work, collaborating closely with engineers, and serving as a partner to product to ensure we had the right priorities.”
ALEX JANSEN · PRODUCT MANAGER, NEAT“Hugo is a natural leader within our ESPN team and he always provides great feedback and fresh perspectives.”
GABRIELLE WEST · CONTENT DESIGNER II, DISNEY/ESPN