![Mitch Daniels](https://res.cloudinary.com/read-cv/image/upload/c_fill,h_92,w_92/dpr_1.0/v1/1/profilePhotos/62fV1kgGEWMWATIvgDrdv2usRQx2/8e02aac9-ae5d-4590-ab7a-824f5a47bbbf.jpg?_a=DATAdtfiZAA0)
About
Principal product designer in Durham, NC with over 10 years experience crafting vision, rallying stakeholders, and charting a course from chaos to clarity. I've worked at agencies, startups, and in B2B SaaS enterprises and am proud to have:
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Improved complex B2B tools in spaces such as insurance and sports ops
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Launched 0 → 1 products in fast-moving, high-stakes environments
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Built team-wide trust and alignment with clear, thoughtful communication
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Continuously leveled up my craft in both visual design and code
I thrive when tackling hard problems with passionate, curious teammates. I explore widely, prototype early, iterate obsessively and balance long-term strategic vision with tactical execution.
I’ve found fulfilment as both individual contributor and manager and am open to Lead+ IC roles that allow me to coach more junior team members.
Let's chat!
Projects
Charting the course from decades-old legacy systems to a single, unified insurance hub that empowers carriers, agents, and customers
Designed industry-leading compliance tool for student-athletes and athletic departments to coincide with the launch of the NIL era in college sport. Used across 200+ athletic departments and 100K+ active student-athletes.
Real-time digital status boards for display in athletic offices and locker rooms.
Work Experience
Lead the design of Umbrella, Pg's bespoke CRM. Established shared vision, fostered alignment across functional teams and business lines, and shipped numerous business-critical features.
Hired and managed a growing design team. Embedded with newly acquired company, INFLCR, to establish design system and go-to-market features for industry-leading NIL exchange serving 70K+ athletes.
Led design through refactor of enterprise SaaS platform. Partnered with PMs and engineers across six squads to concept, iterate, and launch dozens of product updates. Coached junior PMs to streamline process and improve outcomes under tight constraints.
Designed robust dashboards, reporting interfaces, and operation hubs for financial analysts, non-profits, and real-estate firms. Organized four company hackathons, launching eight successful projects.
Leveraged qual and quant data to inform design and maximize business outcomes for brands such as Puma, ESPN, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Valspar Paint, and Wildlife Conservation Society.
Analyzed the cost drivers and impact of the Department of Defense's $20B+ annual corrosion-related maintenance spend.
Side Projects
Twilight Imperium is *the ultimate* board game experience, typically lasting 8 - 12 hours. Using Svelte, I put together a lightweight turn indicator to help my group stay on track whenever we play.
When COVID-19 hit, my buddies and I were forced to move our weekly Dungeons & Dragons game online. Existing digital tabletops were over-complicated and clunky, so I tried hacking one together.
I didn't get it quite functional enough for us to use, but it served as a great introduction to websockets, Firebase, and working with the canvas.
A tongue-in-cheek hackathon homage to a galaxy, far, far away. I pitched the idea and wrote content.
Network graph visualizations of my favorite card game, showing how often specific cards were used together. Built with R, Python, and Gephi.
Used a barcode scanner, Raspberry Pi, and the Google Analytics Real-Time Reporting API to track soda consumption in the office.
Education
Speaking
An overview of D&D, including its history, rules, problematic elements, and recent resurgence in pop culture.
Digital analytics strategy for higher education and libraries
An overview of the game of Go and a preview of the groundbreaking match between AI and a top-ranked player. (Spoiler alert: AI won)
An annual overview of the state of the web. Delivered at every annual retreat from 2012 through 2018.
Data visualization best practices for UX designers