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Human layer / Detach with care

Human layer / Detach with care

About

I design complex products that don’t make people feel stupid

Ryszard Szeja

Product Designer

I’ve spent 5+ years working on trading, fintech, job marketplaces, vehicle financing and social products

How I work

I use interviews, product data and prototypes to work out what’s actually going on, then stay close until the final UI

Looking for

A team where designers help decide what gets built and stay close to the details users actually see

What I want to build

Useful products with enough character that people want to come back

Selected outcomes

+38% navigation task success

tastytrade · Tree testing

After card sorting showed where traders expected key screens to be, I reorganised the navigation and validated the new structure through tree testing

≈35% more applications submitted

Stepstone · Application journey

After removing repeated fields, rewriting application copy and reusing saved profile data

≈20% more job listings viewed

Stepstone · Search

After reducing visual noise and making location, work model and salary easier to spot on job cards

≈10% more App Store downloads

Stepstone · App Store

After testing clearer App Store screenshots and product page copy

Recommendations

Patterns people noticed while working with me

Large

“Ryszard helped establish our first-ever user research practices, coached others on different research methodologies, and provided valuable feedback to his peers about how to improve our experiences. I’m grateful to have had the chance to manage, work with, and learn from Ryszard during his time on the tastytrade design team.”

Camille Celone

Product Design Manager @ tastytrade

Large

Camille Celone

Product Design Manager @ tastytrade

Research synthesis

“Ryszard has a great ability to bring together quantitative data, customer interviews, usability research, and platform analytics into insights that are easy to act on.”

Karolina Johnson
Senior Product Designer @ tastytrade

Product direction

“His work went far beyond conducting research. He was often the person identifying opportunities and helping shape the first direction for UX solutions.”

Karolina Johnson
Senior Product Designer @ tastytrade

Range and initiative

“He’ll dive deep into any area that needs attention, whether it’s copywriting, digging into data to identify opportunities for improvement, or prototyping concepts to get in front of users.”

Camille Celone

Product Design Manager @ tastytrade

Challenges assumptions

“He’s not afraid to ask difficult questions or challenge assumptions, always with the goal of making the user experience stronger.”

Kasia Kołodziej
Senior Product Designer @ tastytrade

Turning evidence into products

“He knows how to translate research into thoughtful, practical design solutions that balance customer needs with business goals.”

Karolina Johnson
Senior Product Designer @ tastytrade

Better, not easier

“Ryszard is a collaborative, approachable teammate who’s always focused on finding the best solution rather than the easiest one.”

Kasia Kołodziej
Senior Product Designer @ tastytrade

Selected Case Studies

A few projects that best show how I think, decide and design

After Apply

How I redesigned the post-application journey to support candidates through employer silence and unreliable status data

Native iOS · Recruitment · Journey redesign · Shipped

Trader Benefits

How I shaped the research and designed a reward experience to support high-impact business decisions at scale

Fintech · Reward strategy · Research · Decision framework

Trader Benefits

How I shaped the research and designed a reward experience to support high-impact business decisions at scale

Fintech · Reward strategy · Research · Decision framework

After Apply

How I redesigned the post-application journey to support candidates through employer silence and unreliable status data

Native iOS · Recruitment · Journey redesign · Shipped

Additional Work

A few projects that best show how I think, decide and design

Lmente

How I redesigned the post-application journey to support candidates through employer silence and unreliable status data

Native iOS · Recruitment · Journey redesign · Shipped

After Apply

How I redesigned the post-application journey to support candidates through employer silence and unreliable status data

Native iOS · Recruitment · Journey redesign · Shipped

How I Think

A closer look at how I think and work through difficult product situations

Inspecting:

The solution arrived before the problem

What I check

Who is affected, how often, and how much does the problem matter? What evidence shows it is worth solving — and that this feature is a plausible answer?

Where I start

I write down what we know, what we’re assuming and which unknowns could change the decision. Then I decide what can move forward now and what needs checking first. The original idea may survive, but it stops being the default answer.

Seen in practice

Stepstone and tastytrade · Checking the evidence behind proposed AI assistants, Live Activities and requested filters before moving into UI

Inspecting:

The solution arrived before the problem

What I check

Who is affected, how often, and how much does the problem matter? What evidence shows it is worth solving — and that this feature is a plausible answer?

Where I start

Seen in practice

Stepstone and tastytrade · Checking the evidence behind proposed AI assistants, Live Activities and requested filters before moving into UI