Benjamin van Gelder
Verified Expert in Design
Designer
Barcelona, Spain
Toptal member since December 2, 2019
Benjamin is a seasoned lead product and service designer with 9 years of experience in crafting design experiences. His journey has led him to work in multiple cities, enabling him to wear multiple hats in the design field, from research and service design to product design. Benjamin's mission is to craft digital products and services that resonate with people and businesses, backed by user research and a deep understanding of the client's business objectives and challenges.
Experience
- User Experience (UX) - 9 years
- Product Design - 9 years
- Wireframing - 9 years
- Personas - 9 years
- Service Design - 8 years
- Google Design Sprints - 7 years
- User Research - 7 years
- User Interface (UI) - 4 years
Portfolio
HEMA — eCommerce Website
Work Experience
Lead Product & Service Designer
Nortal
- Led the design and development of digital services for NEOM's governmental initiatives, ensuring alignment with business goals, user expectations, and product requirements.
- Collaborated with cross-functional teams to discover, conceptualize, and implement design.
- Conducted extensive user research to drive design decisions, ensuring products meet the diverse needs of the target audience.
- Facilitated design sprints and workshops to ideate and iterate product concepts, fostering a collaborative environment that propelled innovative outcomes.
- Implemented design thinking methodologies to streamline service delivery processes, significantly enhancing user interaction and engagement.
Designer Screening
Toptal
- Led design screening interviews, technical interviews, test project presentation interviews, and portfolio reviews for multiple roles (product designers, UX designers, UI designers, UX researchers, and Interaction designers).
- Conducted hundreds of screening calls and provided real-time feedback with actionable improvements and recommendations for applicants.
- Collaborated on the screening process improvement and optimization with the designer screening lead.
- Created new test project briefs for product designers, service designers, and UX researchers.
- Communicated daily with design applicants about portfolios, cases, or additional information required.
Senior User Researcher
Zurich Insurance
- Worked on One Zurich, the employee app, redefining the most critical features, prioritizing them, and improving user experience.
- Constantly tested new concepts, screens, and flow with customers.
- Facilitated multiple workshops and knowledge sessions with C-level.
Lead Product Designer
Invygo Tech FZ
- Designed the next iteration of the mobile app, which included new features, branding, and a design system.
- Designed the back office, used by car subscription companies and customers.
- Ran multiple user interviews and gathered quantitative data about the flows and screens of the app.
Lead Product Designer
Worthy Financial
- Designed the company website, including defining the branding guidelines, UX, and UI.
- Created the mobile app for B2C customers, from user flows and wireframes to final UIX design.
- Showed design leadership toward product and development.
UX Researcher | Designer
Banco Santander
- Researched and improved physical and digital user experience in the bank's new concept branches.
- Designed the new product offer, including early sketches and wireframes.
- Performed a heuristic analysis of the app and design improvements.
- Researched and elaborated a new content architecture proposal for the corporate website.
- Led the interviews, focus group, and other group research activities.
- Researched and improved the digital and physical employee experience.
Service and UX Designer
Veryday | McKinsey Design
- Designed a new service for a transportation company, including research, ideation, and conceptualization.
- Designed a new product for an airline company from research and customer journey mapping to ideation.
- Performed UX research on the future role of energy companies.
- Worked on a UX and innovation session for an NGO.
- Conducted research for an health company and helped them improve their physical and digital user experience.
- Led design sprints and co-creation sessions with an automotive client.
UX Designer | Service Designer
BNP Paribas Fortis
- Designed a new notification system for web and mobile from system functioning, prototyping to design.
- Designed new product pages for clients for web and mobile from research, design to testing and decision making.
- Designed various updated after-sales emails from the customer experience to the content strategy.
- Took part in the strategy definition around open banking.
- Interviewed and tested various solutions with customers.
- Coached corporate startups from the bank innovation program to consolidate their proposals and validate their ideas.
Co-founder | UX Designer
Cooks in Town
- Performed qualitative and qualitative research to validate the initial idea.
- Led several design sprints to solve problems and test new solutions.
- Designed the application from sketches to wireframes to final high-fidelity designs.
- Worked on the art direction and branding.
- Designed the website and created it on Squarespace.
- Performed UX testing of the application.
Strategic Designer
Bundl
- Created a corporate venture startup from scratch.
- Organized a series of design sprints to help the clients to define and prioritize.
- Prototyped UX and design solutions for different ideas.
- Tested the concepts with users and reported results.
- Designed the user experience for the final solution.
- Pitched selected ideas to the management board.
- Managed the project from start to end, including preparing activities, creating content, managing client relationships, and producing solutions.
UX Designer
ING
- Designed the daily banking dashboard, including news, payments, and adding/managing beneficiaries.
- Designed a new onboarding flow for companies registration.
- Helped to implement contactless and QR code payment in the early stage of these technologies, including researching, prototyping, testing, and designing.
- Arranged a series of group and one-to-one interviews to create a solid user knowledge base for the bank.
- Organized and led a series of Google design sprints with management leaders.
- Took part in the new design system redefinition and design.
eCommerce and UX Expert
HEMA
- Analyzed and designed a new content architecture for an updated website.
- Created UX content guidelines including tone of voice, product presentation, FAQ function, and feedback system.
- Took part in the new website design proposal, from early ideas to validating assumptions and help design the final proposal.
- Led a series of design thinking and creativity sessions around the topics of promotional content, new offering, and brand to user tone of voice.
Design Strategist
Nomads Agency
- Designed a fan sponsorship program for a key sports brand, including performing field and desktop research, creating customer journeys and personas and designing the sponsorship program.
- Organized design thinking workshops for a jewelry company, helping them to understand the industry they are in, their customers' needs, and how to redefine their sales proposal.
- Created customer journeys for a national beverage company.
- Developed new ideas and a sales pitch for a baby food company including insights, potential solutions, and early ideas sketches.
- Created online content calendar for major brands.
Education
Post Master's Degree in Design and Innovation (Strategic Design)
IED | Istituto Europeo di Design - Madrid, Spain
Master's Degree in Marketing and Advertising
IHECS | Institut des Hautes Études des Communications Sociales - Brussels, Belgium
Bachelor's Degree in Communication
IHECS | Institut des Hautes Études des Communications Sociales - Brussels, Belgium
Certifications
Improving Education Through Design Thinking (TEDx Speaker)
TED
Ethical Advertising
JEP Belgium
Skills
Tools
Sketch, InVision, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Apple Keynote, Miro, Balsamiq
Platforms
iOS, Web, Android, UserZoom, Figma
Industry Expertise
Food, Banking & Finance, Sports
Other
User Experience (UX), User Research, Wireframing, User Journey Maps, Design Strategy, Mobile UX, UX Testing, Personas, UX Strategy, Design Thinking, Google Design Sprints, User Flows, Ideation Workshops, Service Design, Product Design, Fintech, Mobile Design, UX Audits, Branding, Lean UX, User Interface (UI), Web App UX, Heuristic Review, UX Design, UI Design, Research, Lean Startups, Content Strategy, Web Design, User Testing, Human-centered Design (HCD), Usability Testing, FMCG, Digital Transformation, A/B Testing, eCommerce, Responsive Design, Web App Design, Web UX Design, Strategic Design, Value Proposition Design, UX Research, Project Management, Design Sprints, User-centered Design (UCD), App UX, Concept Testing, Startups, Value Proposition, Lifestyle, Recipes & Cooking, App UI, User Interviews, Conceptual Design, Workshop Facilitation, Ideation, Finance, Notification Center, Stakeholder Interviews, Mockups, Web Notifications, Prototyping, Concepting, Augmented Reality (AR), Soccer, Near-field Communication (NFC), Mobile Payments, Qualitative Research, Quantitative Research, UX Branding, Sportswear, Sport Branding, Analytics, Design, Customer Research, B2C, Customer Insights, Recruiting, Talent Management, Design Leadership, Team Management, Public Speaking, Advertising Design, Web Marketing, Communication Design, Online Marketing
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