Louis Bester
Verified Expert in Product Management
Product Manager
Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa
Toptal member since October 14, 2022
Louis is a results-obsessed PM, experienced in building products for customers from the ground up. He is a strategic leader yet still finds joy in hands-on user research, prototyping, and building. With a solid technical background and a proven track record of delivery, Louis can fast-track your product development by working with cross-functional teams to hone what matters to your customers and ensuring the delivery of the results that matter most to you.
Project Highlights
Expertise
- Agile Product Management
- Agile Project Management
- B2B Product Management
- Digital Product Management
- Product Management
- Product Roadmaps
- SaaS Product Management
- Technical Product Management
Work Experience
Chief Technology Officer and Head of Delivery
Urbian
- Defined the product roadmap and owned the product backlog. Led user research, user interface design, Agile product development, and quality assurance across all projects and clients.
- Set up from scratch and managed the product, design, and engineering teams. Worked on all client projects across the business.
- Worked closely with the engineering and design team to break down business requirements into tasks. Estimated and tracked their implementation and signed-off continual architectural and infrastructural decisions.
- Led the delivery and MVP of a fully underwritten online life insurance journey for Standard Bank and Liberty. Led the team to write the API, back-end logic, and front-end that is currently being used.
- Helped position the firm as a thought leader in the digital product studio space. Built a model to create more revenue share agreements over time-based contracts.
- Formulated software feature requirements, designed wireframes, and created user flow diagrams for clients.
- Led all product management, including the oversight of UX, product roadmap, market research, usability testing, and data analytics.
- Assembled and managed a distributed team of full-time and contract employees, both domestic and international.
- Set KPI targets and implemented OKRs for full-time staff to align the team with company goals.
- Negotiated and helped lead the build for multiple ventures and startups.
Senior Product Manager
Saltracker
- Ran the cross-functional team that built a teacher and learner attendance mobile App. Used Odoo for the back end for the Swaziland Ministry of Education.
- Managed wireframes through to low-fidelity UX flows as well as the user stories and acceptance criteria. Led the sprint rituals and team development.
- Built out all onboarding documentation. Ran the pilot and workshops while engaging with the Ministry of Education of Swaziland.
- Designed and implemented the system using GPS and time code encryption. Ensured fraudulent free daily monitoring of individual teachers and learners across the Swaziland education system.
- Removed ghost teachers and absent teachers so well that the teachers union in Swaziland took the government to court and got an order to halt the rollout past the initial 60 pilot schools.
Project History
Online Insurance Sales Digital Transformation
https://buylifeinsurance.standardbank.co.za/buy-online/life-cover/welcome/Led a team that cleared a nine-year product backlog for the Standard Banks insurance API. I built a fully underwritten online life insurance program that keeps a 30% conversation rate. This is six times better than any other internal sales channel.
Under my guidance, the team wrote the API, back-end logic, and front end currently being used.
Each subsequent channel was delivered a fraction of the time using a design system.
Re-imagining Customer Acquisition for Sanlam Private Wealth
https://sanlamprivatewealth.sanlam.com/Led a team that designed and built the responsive website, design system, and internal handbook for Sanlam Private Wealth. This led to them acquiring under management $11 million in assets within the first 90 days.
Within 90 days of launch, we acquired AUM for $11 million. We also built and published a design system in the group, the first of its kind.
The Social Tech Startup Accelerator
Designed and facilitated a tech startup and incubator program for the Diageo Empowerment Trust in South Africa. We ran 2,450 entrepreneurs through the program and ended up launching five startups.
We used an online platform to manage the program. This tool allowed us to review and select the best online submissions quickly. It ensured that all the successful participants knew exactly what was required of them throughout the different stages of the program.
Once we narrowed down the field for the 12 months, we built the top five startups and allowed them to pitch at an event for access to the prize money.
The program ran as follows:
Open call to action for South Africa social tech startups and ideas:
2250 submissions
Top 30 selected:
Each entrepreneur completed user research, business model canvas, wireframes, and revenue forecasts with our help.
Top 15 selected:
Each of the top 15 entrepreneurs had their business' prototyped by a few teams I was leading.
Top five selected:
Each top five entrepreneurs had their startups built by a team I led.
Launch Event:
R five million awarded to the top five startups
Smart School System - Teacher and Learner Attendance Tracker
The application was so successful in removing ghost teachers/absent teachers that the teachers union of Swaziland took the government to court and got an order to halt the rollout past the initial 60 pilot schools.
I led the teams that designed and implemented this application using GPS and time code encryption to ensure fraudulent free daily monitoring of individual teachers and learners across the Swaziland education system.
Convenient Personal Health Coach
Led the design and development of a personal health coach mobile application and online platform.
Skills
Paradigms
Agile, Agile Software Development, Agile Product Management, Kanban, Scrum, Agile Project Management, B2C, API Architecture, B2B2C, Business to Business to Consumer (B2B2C)
Other
Product Management, Technical Product Management, SaaS Product Management, Agile Delivery, Digital Product Management, Product Owner, AWS Lambda, Team Leadership, Minimum Viable Product (MVP), Prototyping, Product Roadmaps, B2B, Startups, Mobile, Two-sided Marketplaces, Release Management, Feature Prioritization, Early-stage Startups, User Experience (UX), Software as a Service (SaaS), Business to Business (B2B), Product Frameworks, SaaS, B2B Product Management, Android, ERP Implementation, Web Development, Strategy, Product Growth, Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), Amazon Web Services (AWS), Design Systems, Leadership, Cross-functional Team Leadership, Product Strategy, Feature Backlog Prioritization, Product Launch, Complex Problem Solving, Feature Roadmaps, Mobile Apps, Governance, Govtech, Mobile Applications, Mobile App Development, Monetization Models, Digital Advertising, Website Redesign, Roadmaps, Corporate Strategy, Stakeholder Management, Customer Insights
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