Dave is available for hire
Hire DaveDave Ruzius
Verified Expert in Product Management
Product Manager
Location
Prague, Czech Republic
Toptal Member Since
May 11, 2020
Dave is a well-rounded senior product manager, consultant, coach, and product owner in web and mobile development, product strategy, R&D, and innovation management. His work has won numerous awards recognized as outstanding in their respective fields. He has a down-to-earth, pragmatic attitude and business sense. Dave has worked in logistics, HR tech, hospitality, travel, and eCommerce. He is passionate about building teams around product innovation with a focus on product discovery.
Project Highlights
Prace za Rohem (Work Around the Corner)
Managed the product and team, extended the team, launched in two countries, and built the B2B side of the platform.
FIDOPOLI Litter Diary Application
Led the product development and delivery of the FIDOPOLI application.
Smartr.me
Spearheaded the build of a product organization around the innovation product Smartr.me. Built a team continuously top rated according to Agile team health check. Launched numerous new product features, increasing usage and user satisfaction
Expertise
Work Experience
Product Consultant
2019 - PRESENT
Product Tape - Product Consulting and Coaching
- Advised more than five scale-ups on starting the journey to becoming product-led organizations.
- Presented on no-nonsense product management at the largest SaaS conference in the Czech Republic.
- Trained over 20 Czech Technical University students on starting the transition from project manager to product manager.
- Coached and tutored aspiring and experienced product managers on specific product management topics.
Chief Product Officer (CPO)
2023 - 2023
Nelisa
- Reshaped product development processes and built a happy performant team.
- Kickstarted OKRs and adoption company-wide. Communicated these OKRs within the team and built Metabase dashboards.
- Built outcome-based product roadmap based on the company and product strategy of five pillars.
- Launched a long overdue new product—Talent Database.
Senior Product Manager
2021 - 2022
SmartRecruiters
- Helped define product team structure for the new product.
- Set up and managed the best-performing product team within the group according to the Agile team health check.
- Launched SmartRecruiters Insights as a new feature set in the product with an 85% satisfaction rate.
- Owned onboarding, activation, and growth domain and increased activation rate by more than 25%.
- Contributed to raising NPS by 25% through the launch of new features and improving the overall UX.
- Set up a new product support team with defined processes and lowered support issues by 40%, using knowledge base technology.
Product Manager
2020 - 2021
XR Systems, GmbH. - FIDOPOLI
- Led the introduction of a JTBD and ODI approach to product discovery.
- Managed fake door testing and ran online campaigns to drive traffic.
- Oversaw JTBD user interviews, including scriptwriting and synthesis.
- Assembled a development team and led the delivery of FIDOPOLI Litter Diary, an app for dog breeders on Android and iOS, using React Native.
- Defined overall product vision and strategy and managed external parties and providers.
Professor of Product Management
2020 - 2020
SPRYNT.de
- Trained eight students on different aspects of product management, including metrics, estimation and prioritization, writing user stories, user story mapping, and prototyping.
- Attributed to the development and improvement of course material.
- Contributed to improving online education operations.
Onboarding and Growth Product Manager
2019 - 2020
Mews - Hospitality Technology
- Built and managed a product team focused on self-onboarding and online sales.
- Finalized a successful pilot that enabled 15 properties to self-manage the setup of their property management system (PMS) using assisting technology.
- Managed a design workshop bringing together the marketing, sales, and onboarding product teams to design the complete onboarding flow of new properties.
Co-organizer
2017 - 2019
Mind The Product - ProductTank Prague - Product Community
- Co-founded ProductTank Prague, a community of now more than 1,000 members interested in product management.
- Organized the launch event and co-organized over five events attracting hundreds of product enthusiasts.
- Led the #innovation track in ProductTank, focused on product discovery, new product development, and product innovation.
Product Manager
2016 - 2019
LMC - Prace za Rohem - Online Recruitment
- Launched Prace za Rohem, an Android and iOS app for blue-collar job searches in the Czech Republic and Poland, achieving over one million downloads, a 4.5-star rating, and about 50,000 unique users daily.
- Built the B2B side of Prace za Rohem, enabling SMEs to post jobs directly using the mobile application.
- Took over the existing development team and extended it to a team of seven that worked against and achieved their quarterly OKRs.
- Liaised with Direct People, an innovation agency, to define and track OKRs for this product that was defined as an innovation project between LMC and Direct People.
Product Manager Mobile
2011 - 2013
LMC - Jobs.cz and Prace.cz - Online Recruitment
- Launched the mobile initiative in LMC, offering the largest job boards on mobile using jQuery.
- Initiated a dedicated app for students to find temporary jobs on three platforms.
- Won the Application of the Year award with Brigady do Kapsy, a student job search app.
Senior Product Marketing Manager
2009 - 2011
Zoom International - Contact Center Quality Management
- Redesigned and relaunched the Zoom International website.
- Won the Cisco Partner Marketing award during the Cisco Partner event in Barcelona.
- Delivered over ten case studies and other sales collateral to support the Zoom sales team.
Founder
2007 - 2010
Bringsome - Startup P2P Goods Delivery
- Developed and launched a solitary MVP for Bringsome.com, a startup focused on P2P goods delivery.
- Entered, rebuilt the team, and pitched on IP048, a hacker event in Prague.
- Listed with Bringsome.com on Springwise.com, which gained interest from the investor community.
Team and Tech Lead R&D, Product Manager
2006 - 2008
Monster.com - Monster Labs - Online Recruitment
- Built a Monster.com Labs "pod" with developers and a product designer.
- Won the Monster Innovation Award with the concept "Monster in the Window."
- Designed, presented, and developed the MVP of Monster Mobile, which was taken to the Monster core product team.
- Managed the development and launch of Monster Mobile in four countries.
Product Manager and Technical Consultant
2004 - 2006
DHL - Deutsche Post - Logistics
- Participated and contributed to a global initiative with McKinsey on the adoption of service-oriented architecture (SOA).
- Aligned global business and technology stakeholders in selecting a global solution for the enterprise service bus (ESB).
- Consulted the enterprise architecture team on adopting SOA in three countries.
Software Developer and Technical Consultant
1991 - 2004
Selected Clients
- Developed the foundation for the HP service desk as their Oracle developer using Oracle Forms and Oracle 5.
- Managed a high-availability cluster of databases for the largest book warehouse in the Netherlands.
- Conceived and delivered a new product, Oracle Database Scan, that was sold to over 50 customers.
- Trained and mentored internal staff in Oracle products and SQL at Caesar Oreade.
- Developed and executed training for Oracle system integration products at Whitehorses.
- Designed and built an Oracle, Java, and XML-based solution that became part of the Heathrow Terminal 5 luggage handling system.
Project History
Prace za Rohem (Work Around the Corner)
https://www.pracezarohem.cz/Managed the product and team, extended the team, launched in two countries, and built the B2B side of the platform.
Work Around the Corner is a B2C and B2B mobile application for a local mobile blue-collar job search application launched in the Czech Republic and Poland. As the product manager, I managed the team, roadmap, product discovery, delivery, and product strategy.
Prace.cz Online Recruitment
http://www.prace.czOversaw the largest online recruitment website in the Czech Republic and transformed it from a service in sustain mode into a completely redesigned and re-positioned successful service with over 20,000 unique daily users.
I have taken on this service's business owner and product manager role. It was outdated. I managed a complete redesign and repositioning of this website, serving a new market segment. I built the team, set OKRs, and delivered successfully against them.
Intercars eCommerce Optimization
http://intercars.comLed implementation of eCommerce and online marketing measurements with the aim to continuously improve conversion.
Intercars is one of the largest online B2B and B2C car parts providers in the Czech Republic, Poland, and is now launching in Portugal. I consulted on and led the implementation of Google Enhanced eCommerce, custom events, and tracking.
Monster in the Window
http://monster.comWon the Monster.com Innovation award for the concept Monster in the Window.
"Monster in the Window" would bring the offline world of Monster offline, allowing SMEs, especially retail, to print their job posting and present it in their shop windows using QR codes to enable candidates to apply.
FIDOPOLI Litter Diary Application
http://fidopoli.comLed the product development and delivery of the FIDOPOLI application.
FIDOPOLI is a mobile app on iOS and Android that enables responsible dog breeders to capture data and pictures of their growing litter with the goal of fostering capturing irrefutable data and transparency.
Smartr.me
http://smartr.meSpearheaded the build of a product organization around the innovation product Smartr.me. Built a team continuously top rated according to Agile team health check. Launched numerous new product features, increasing usage and user satisfaction
Smartr.me is the innovation product by SmartRecruiters focused on the job candidate experience and aims to help any job seeker land the job that they deserve. I have spearheaded the creation of three product teams, the creation of processes for usual track agile product development, and standards for product discovery and product analytics.
Education
1993 - 1995
Coursework in Artificial Intelligence
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam - Amsterdam, Netherlands
Certifications
JUNE 2020 - PRESENT
Agile Methodologies Assessment
JANUARY 2006 - PRESENT
Prince II Practitioner
PearceMayField
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