30+
30+
Awards.
Awards.
32+
32+
Investments.
Investments.
10K
10K
Users.
Users.
Alex Pacheco
Lead Product designer
I operate at the intersection of product, systems, and AI. Helping companies move faster, scale smarter and turn complexity into competitive advantage.
I operate at the intersection of product, systems, and AI. Helping companies move faster, scale smarter and turn complexity into competitive advantage.
I operate at the intersection of product, systems, and AI. Helping companies move faster, scale smarter and turn complexity into competitive advantage.
Drop me a follow
Drop me a follow
Dublin
Dublin
Selected work
2019 - 2025
National Australia Bank
Making money management effortless
Catch
Helping Australians shop with ease
ULO
A playful e-commerce site
CBRE Growth Platform
Two questions that changed how brokers pitch
Alex Pacheco
Lead Product designer
My love for design started with a fascination for the interplay between form and function, with it’s quiet power that shapes the world around us. I've worked in fintech, e-commerce, creative fields, and the built environment trying to simplify complexity while building product’s that are not only usable, but truly valuable. My craft is grounded in human-centered design, with a balance of product intuition and systems thinking. I’ve embraced ambiguity as a superpower that influences thinking, creativity and resilience. It’s the sweet spot where ideas ruminate, stakeholders align, and helps drive design-led thinking in environments where impact matters.
My love for design started with a fascination for the interplay between form and function, with it’s quiet power that shapes the world around us. I've worked in fintech, e-commerce, creative fields, and the built environment trying to simplify complexity while building product’s that are not only usable, but truly valuable. My craft is grounded in human-centered design, with a balance of product intuition and systems thinking. I’ve embraced ambiguity as a superpower that influences thinking, creativity and resilience. It’s the sweet spot where ideas ruminate, stakeholders align, and helps drive design-led thinking in environments where impact matters.
My love for design started with a fascination for the interplay between form and function, with it’s quiet power that shapes the world around us. I've worked in fintech, e-commerce, creative fields, and the built environment trying to simplify complexity while building product’s that are not only usable, but truly valuable. My craft is grounded in human-centered design, with a balance of product intuition and systems thinking. I’ve embraced ambiguity as a superpower that influences thinking, creativity and resilience. It’s the sweet spot where ideas ruminate, stakeholders align, and helps drive design-led thinking in environments where impact matters.
Strategic Design
Bridging the gap between high-level business objectives and granular user needs. I build roadmaps that design teams can actually execute.
AI & Future Tech
Integrating LLMs and generative AI into product workflows. Moving beyond chatbots to proactive, agentic interfaces.
Design Systems
Architecting scalable systems that serve as the single source of truth for both designers and developers. Focus on tokens and automation.
What my colleagues say
Driving clarity through design and collaboration
Alex brings clarity and momentum by aligning strategy, product, and design, turning complexity into cohesive, customer-focused outcomes. His leadership in data visualisation and component design exemplifies end-to-end ownership, cross-functional collaboration, and a genuine commitment to elevating others and the craft of design.
Jen Heazlewood
Head of Design
Creating alignment and purpose through design
Alex is a collaborative design leader who brings focus and direction to complex initiatives. His strategic contributions to the Financial Wellbeing Hub, grounded in research, simplicity, and customer insight, have shaped the vision and strengthened alignment across teams. Even with challenging stakeholders, he consistently champions better experiences and a shared, design-led approach.
Shruti Thakor
Product Designer
Championing simplicity and customer impact
Alex designed the new Savings experience from the ground up using real customer insight, resulting in a simple, intuitive feature embraced by over 80,000 customers in its first month. He consistently champions the customer voice, balancing clarity of vision with technical depth through initiatives like onboarding D3.js for richer data visualisation. A true advocate for simplicity and collaboration, Alex leads by example and elevates those around him.
Leanne Haire
Product Manager
Recent experience
Feb 2026 - Present
Lead Product Designer
Ripple Treasury
6 months
At Ripple Treasury I lead product design for Payments, Netting and Digital Assets, building the design system and tooling that keep a fast-moving payments platform consistent as it scales. I’ve embedded AI agents into the practice itself — an automated critique loop that reviews work against our design system standards, and drift-detection tooling that catches token, accessibility, and component inconsistencies in CI before they ship — backing a 79-component library I’m architecting as a living, self-correcting system. I also used AI-assisted workflows to drive insights and decisions that influenced the design of the Transaction Center’s filter bar, replacing a legacy pattern with a composable, chip-based one now adopted as the team’s default.
2023 - 2025
Principal Product Designer
National Australia Bank (NAB)
2 Years and 9 months
At NAB I drove design quality across a digital money-management ecosystem used by millions of customers — shaping vision and strategy, turning research into decisions, and shipping simple, connected tools. I led and mentored designers, set standards for NAB’s design system, and partnered with product, engineering, research, and marketing from the first problem framing through to launch. Beyond delivery, I invested in the wider practice: raising craft, building scalable systems, and growing the team’s confidence.
2021 - 2023
Senior Product Designer
Catch.com.au
2 Years and 5 months
At Catch I led design for my squad, shaping how millions of customers shop across web and native apps. I drove the redesign of product filters — replacing a static, single-page interface with guided journeys — making product discovery faster and more accurate, and resolving pain points customers had raised for years. I also rebuilt how design worked across the business, cutting average initiative timelines from months to weeks by bringing the right people in earlier.
2017 - 2021
Senior UX Designer
CBRE
4 Years
At CBRE I designed products for clients and the teams who serve them — including a concierge app for tenants and a business development tool that changed how brokers pitch value. The pitch tool cut proposal turnaround times and made presentations consistent across teams. Working end to end from research and prototyping through delivery, I helped implement CBRE’s new design system, ran workshops aligning product and business goals, and mentored junior designers — embedding practices that lifted collaboration across the organisation.
2015 - 2017
Senior Digital Designer
Australian Institute of Architects
2 Years and 7 months
At the Institute I led creative direction across digital and communications — designing landing pages, micro-sites, and event campaigns that turned complex architectural content into clear, engaging stories for members. I built the brand guidelines and campaign systems that gave the organisation one consistent, recognisable voice across digital and print. It’s where I learned to connect strategy to execution: every artefact had to carry the Institute’s purpose, not just look good.
2011 - 2020
Senior UX Designer
Freelance contract work
9 Years
Alongside full-time roles, I ran an independent practice for clients across property, e-commerce, recruitment, and the not-for-profit sector — including ULO Australia, Yorkshire Property, and the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation. Working directly with founders, I defined strategy, built brand systems, and designed interfaces that had to earn their keep commercially. Independent work taught me to own the whole problem and ship without a safety net — habits I still rely on.
2010 - 2013
Co-founder
Damn Fine Print Dublin
3 Years
I co-founded Damn Fine Print, a screen-printing and design studio in Dublin — writing the business plan, securing government grants, and building the studio up from an empty room. We collaborated with local artists and community groups on limited-edition prints, apparel, and event work; I trained staff and ran public printing workshops. It was my first lesson in building something people care about: craft, community, and the discipline of making things by hand.
Feb 2026 - Present
Lead Product Designer
Ripple Treasury
6 months
At Ripple Treasury I lead product design for Payments, Netting and Digital Assets, building the design system and tooling that keep a fast-moving payments platform consistent as it scales. I’ve embedded AI agents into the practice itself — an automated critique loop that reviews work against our design system standards, and drift-detection tooling that catches token, accessibility, and component inconsistencies in CI before they ship — backing a 79-component library I’m architecting as a living, self-correcting system. I also used AI-assisted workflows to drive insights and decisions that influenced the design of the Transaction Center’s filter bar, replacing a legacy pattern with a composable, chip-based one now adopted as the team’s default.
2023 - 2025
Principal Product Designer
National Australia Bank (NAB)
2 Years and 9 months
At NAB I drove design quality across a digital money-management ecosystem used by millions of customers — shaping vision and strategy, turning research into decisions, and shipping simple, connected tools. I led and mentored designers, set standards for NAB’s design system, and partnered with product, engineering, research, and marketing from the first problem framing through to launch. Beyond delivery, I invested in the wider practice: raising craft, building scalable systems, and growing the team’s confidence.
2021 - 2023
Senior Product Designer
Catch
2 Years and 5 months
At Catch I led design for my squad, shaping how millions of customers shop across web and native apps. I drove the redesign of product filters — replacing a static, single-page interface with guided journeys — making product discovery faster and more accurate, and resolving pain points customers had raised for years. I also rebuilt how design worked across the business, cutting average initiative timelines from months to weeks by bringing the right people in earlier.
2017 - 2021
Senior UX Designer
CBRE
4 Years
At CBRE I designed products for clients and the teams who serve them — including a concierge app for tenants and a business development tool that changed how brokers pitch value. The pitch tool cut proposal turnaround times and made presentations consistent across teams. Working end to end from research and prototyping through delivery, I helped implement CBRE’s new design system, ran workshops aligning product and business goals, and mentored junior designers — embedding practices that lifted collaboration across the organisation.
2015 - 2017
Senior Digital Designer
Australian Institute of Architects
2 Years and 7 months
At the Institute I led creative direction across digital and communications — designing landing pages, micro-sites, and event campaigns that turned complex architectural content into clear, engaging stories for members. I built the brand guidelines and campaign systems that gave the organisation one consistent, recognisable voice across digital and print. It’s where I learned to connect strategy to execution: every artefact had to carry the Institute’s purpose, not just look good.
2011 - 2020
Senior UX Designer
Freelance contract work
9 Years
Alongside full-time roles, I ran an independent practice for clients across property, e-commerce, recruitment, and the not-for-profit sector — including ULO Australia, Yorkshire Property, and the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation. Working directly with founders, I defined strategy, built brand systems, and designed interfaces that had to earn their keep commercially. Independent work taught me to own the whole problem and ship without a safety net — habits I still rely on.
2010 - 2013
Co-founder
Damn Fine Print Dublin
3 Years
I co-founded Damn Fine Print, a screen-printing and design studio in Dublin — writing the business plan, securing government grants, and building the studio up from an empty room. We collaborated with local artists and community groups on limited-edition prints, apparel, and event work; I trained staff and ran public printing workshops. It was my first lesson in building something people care about: craft, community, and the discipline of making things by hand.
Feb 2026 - Present
Lead Product Designer
Ripple Treasury
6 months
At Ripple Treasury I lead product design for Payments, Netting and Digital Assets, building the design system and tooling that keep a fast-moving payments platform consistent as it scales. I’ve embedded AI agents into the practice itself — an automated critique loop that reviews work against our design system standards, and drift-detection tooling that catches token, accessibility, and component inconsistencies in CI before they ship — backing a 79-component library I’m architecting as a living, self-correcting system. I also used AI-assisted workflows to drive insights and decisions that influenced the design of the Transaction Center’s filter bar, replacing a legacy pattern with a composable, chip-based one now adopted as the team’s default.
2023 - 2025
Principal Product Designer
National Australia Bank (NAB)
2 Years and 9 months
At NAB I drove design quality across a digital money-management ecosystem used by millions of customers — shaping vision and strategy, turning research into decisions, and shipping simple, connected tools. I led and mentored designers, set standards for NAB’s design system, and partnered with product, engineering, research, and marketing from the first problem framing through to launch. Beyond delivery, I invested in the wider practice: raising craft, building scalable systems, and growing the team’s confidence.
2021 - 2023
Senior Product Designer
Catch
2 Years and 5 months
At Catch I led design for my squad, shaping how millions of customers shop across web and native apps. I drove the redesign of product filters — replacing a static, single-page interface with guided journeys — making product discovery faster and more accurate, and resolving pain points customers had raised for years. I also rebuilt how design worked across the business, cutting average initiative timelines from months to weeks by bringing the right people in earlier.
2017 - 2021
Senior UX Designer
CBRE
4 Years
At CBRE I designed products for clients and the teams who serve them — including a concierge app for tenants and a business development tool that changed how brokers pitch value. The pitch tool cut proposal turnaround times and made presentations consistent across teams. Working end to end from research and prototyping through delivery, I helped implement CBRE’s new design system, ran workshops aligning product and business goals, and mentored junior designers — embedding practices that lifted collaboration across the organisation.
2015 - 2017
Senior Digital Designer
Australian Institute of Architects
2 Years and 7 months
At the Institute I led creative direction across digital and communications — designing landing pages, micro-sites, and event campaigns that turned complex architectural content into clear, engaging stories for members. I built the brand guidelines and campaign systems that gave the organisation one consistent, recognisable voice across digital and print. It’s where I learned to connect strategy to execution: every artefact had to carry the Institute’s purpose, not just look good.
2011 - 2020
Senior UX Designer
Freelance contract work
9 Years
Alongside full-time roles, I ran an independent practice for clients across property, e-commerce, recruitment, and the not-for-profit sector — including ULO Australia, Yorkshire Property, and the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation. Working directly with founders, I defined strategy, built brand systems, and designed interfaces that had to earn their keep commercially. Independent work taught me to own the whole problem and ship without a safety net — habits I still rely on.
2010 - 2013
Co-founder
Damn Fine Print Dublin
3 Years
I co-founded Damn Fine Print, a screen-printing and design studio in Dublin — writing the business plan, securing government grants, and building the studio up from an empty room. We collaborated with local artists and community groups on limited-edition prints, apparel, and event work; I trained staff and ran public printing workshops. It was my first lesson in building something people care about: craft, community, and the discipline of making things by hand.
15 days
Distance to customer
2760+
People interviewed
1st
Best Digital Banking Initiative 2025
Recent articles
I write about the future of design and the life of a product designer.
