Hi! I’m Darren, a product design leader. I started in games and have spent 15+ years designing for commerce, healthcare, education, and finance.
Today I lead a team of 12 at Citizens Bank and help set design standards across a 60+ person UX org. My team designs for business clients, private banking clients, and the fraud agents who protect them. Our work has won 6 industry awards.
Before banking, I led rapid experimentation at edX (MIT/Harvard) that drove $37M+ in revenue. Earlier, I built mobile-first stores for brands like Coach and Warner Music Group.
Projects
Leadership & Strategy
Citizens Bank: Commercial Banking
Built a UX practice from zero and delivered a multi-year platform transformation for 75K+ business clients on Citizens' largest revenue line.
5 industry awards
96% screen scraping risk cut
Weeks → minutes onboarding
Citizens Bank: HELOC FastLine
Took a struggling initiative to #1 market position by resetting the team, the process, and the design vision.
$10.1B in originations (+26.3%)
Mid-80s NPS (+20 pts)
50% faster origination
Creative Direction / Branding
Optaros / MRM Commerce: Translating Iconic Brands
Five years building mobile-first DTC commerce for major consumer brands, translating print-focused brand systems into responsive digital storefronts.
Coach, Warner Music Group, Stella & Dot, Nestlé
Broke Magento platform sales records
125% YoY revenue increase at Stella & Dot
Citizens Bank: 5 Brands, 1 Design System
Pitched and shaped a themeable design system that lets 5 banking sub-brands share infrastructure while each keeps its own identity, palette, and tone of voice.
Retail, Business, Commercial, Wealth, and Private Bank
Themeable via design tokens
Adopted across a 60+ person UX organization
Hands-On Impact
edX (MIT/Harvard): Revenue Optimization
Three-year experimentation arc that helped a mission-driven nonprofit achieve financial sustainability without compromising free, open education.
$37M+ in attributable revenue
200+ research studies
35% conversion lift