Founder and CEO
2019 - PRESENTFuturePlans- Founded a life and estate planning marketplace.
- Researched market and competition, conducting hundreds of user interviews to understand requirements and define the problem space.
- Led discovery to develop lo-fi and hi-fi prototypes to define prioritized backlog.
- Managed backlog and drove major architectural and feature decisions.
- Launched alpha to test users for further testing and iteration of the initial live data product.
Entrepreneur-in-Residence
2018 - 2018Grand Central Tech- Explored opportunities related to insurtech and fintech.
- Researched various markets and technologies related to financial services and insurance.
- Interviewed SME's to deepen understanding of market landscape.
- Conducted market landscaping, analyzing competitors, products and macro trends.
- Analyzed market needs to determine new product opportunity and market entry strategy.
Founder and CEO
2017 - 2018FuneralPlan- Founded a funeral planning search and discovery platform to provide price transparency.
- Conducted market research, user interviews, and prototypes to inform product roadmap.
- Built team and managed backlog during build.
- Launched product and conducted marketing testing.
- Decided to discontinue due to poor unit economics.
Director, Product Management
2016 - 2017CapitalOne- Led new product development in the NY Labs, overseeing exploration and application of new tech-related to consumer finance.
- Implemented Lean and Agile to improve product process and focus.
- Conducted market research to develop strategy, vision, and roadmap related to the delivery of a new automated savings app.
- Utilized design sprints and design thinking to understand consumer needs and enable rapid iteration of the prototype.
- Managed and mentored a team of junior product managers implementing a performance measurement approach to enable improved career development.
- Devised and delivered product management training for new hires, outlining product management techniques (Agile, Lean, HCD) to enable rapid onboarding and training of new hires.
Product Manager - Consultant
2015 - 2015Fortune 100 Insurer- Hired to build and coach a new Agile pod with cross-functional capabilities to execute against KPIs.
- Coached product owner about best-practice related to product, opportunity identification, backlog prioritization, and scope.
- Derived roadmap, vision, and strategy to socialize with senior leadership and across the organisation.
- Worked with C-level executives to identify market opportunities and transform organization to align with product-thinking approach.
- Implemented best practices related to consumer insight and user testing to improve customer-focus of design and engineering teams.
Product Manager - Consultant
2014 - 2015Fortune 100 Insurer- Led new product initiative to deliver an automated pricing platform to improve underwriting experience.
- Conducted interviews with stakeholders to understand work process flows and document requirements.
- Worked with the UX team to wireframe and conduct user tests of prototypes before build-out.
- Built backlog of prioritized features and managed the cross-functional teams to deliver the v_1.0 of pricing tool.
- Socialized effort with C-level executives to achieve buy-in and ensure continued support for the project.
Founder and CEO
2013 - 2014RevMax- Founded company focused on revenue optimization SMB's in the hospitality space (hotels).
- Built founding team and identified market opportunity based on SME interviews and outreach.
- Conducted market research, and competitor analysis to determine to go-to-market strategy.
- Developed customers for initial proof of concept, negotiated contracts and partnership agreements.
- Gathered requirements from partners and built a roadmap for feature roadmap.
Product Manager
2012 - 2013Zynga- Shipped seven new product features for flagship FarmVille franchise with ~2 million DAU.
- Conceived and executed a puzzle-based game to drive engagement and retain users. The social aspect sourced ~10% of DAU and generated ~$100,000 revenue through the product lifecycle.
- Created and released themed feature-set, with staged release to reduce complexity and risk, resulting in ~5% increase in user engagement and 17bps lift in retention.
- Identified and targeted less engaged user segment with a revenue-focused “promotional” feature, using multi-variate testing to optimize discount and duration, resulting in ~3% daily incremental revenue lift.
- Gathered requirements and worked with cross-functional teams to deliver the product.
Consultant
2010 - 2012Boston Consulting Group- Oversaw the product development - project managed initial rollout of a complex, multimillion-dollar trading platform, building roadmaps for a leading global hedge fund to save $100 million in three years.
- Spearheaded the tech implementation - winner of 12th Annual "Polaris Award" for outstanding client impact when implementing improved operations for a global hedge fund leading to $1 billion NPV in savings.
- Developed the growth strategy - identified a go-to-market strategy for $10 billion consumer goods company, recommending an organic growth strategy yielding $200 million in potential incremental revenues.
Daniel James
Product Manager in New York, NY, United States
Member since November 3, 2019
Daniel has nearly a decade of experience in strategy, operations, product, and technology. His focus is on consumer, eCommerce, fintech, and insurtech with exposure to B2B and SaaS tech. He has worked every phase of the product development life cycle, launched new concepts as an entrepreneur, shipped features to millions in Silicon Valley, and led new product development for Fortune 100 companies. Daniel is an engaging and empowering leader.
Daniel is now available for hire
Project Highlights
- Launched automated pricing platform, rolling out to entire division of over 100 underwriters.
- Led conception, discovery, and execution for a mobile-first automated saving app for a Fortune 100 financial services firm.
- Designed, built, and launched a new product to provide transparency in the funeral planning industry.
Expertise
- Consumer Products
- Customer Discovery
- Customer Research
- Fintech
- Insurance Technology (Insurtech)
- Product Discovery
- Product Management
- UX Design
Education
- Kellogg School of Management
Employment
Project History
- Enterprise-wide Pricing Platform for Fortune 100 InsurerLaunched automated pricing platform, rolling out to entire division of over 100 underwriters.
Led product development process, from discovery to execution and roll out. Conducted user interviews to map the work process flow and gather user requirements. Led user testing to refine prototypes and data visualization before division-wide release.
- Automated Saving App for Mobile BankingLed conception, discovery, and execution for a mobile-first automated saving app for a Fortune 100 financial services firm.
Owned the strategy, roadmap, and vision for new product development focused on solving American's under-saving problem, leading customer research and product development for alpha roll out.
- New Product LaunchDesigned, built, and launched a new product to provide transparency in the funeral planning industry.
Conducted market research, user interviews, and built a team to deliver the product to market. Gathered pricing data and used existing API's to build a comprehensive database of existing businesses to enable consumers to plan while providing transparency.
Education
- Master's degree in Business Administration2008 - 2010Kellogg School of Management - Illinois, USA
- Bachelor's degree in Economics1998 - 2001University of Bristol - Bristol, England
