Joe Velez

Senior Product Designer • Design Systems & AI Prototyping

joe@joevelez.design • (248) 464‑2910 • Waterford, MI • joevelez.design

Senior Product Designer specializing in design systems, component libraries, and AI-assisted prototyping for complex enterprise products. 10+ years building scalable UX foundations across SaaS, automotive, utility, and workforce platforms using Figma variables, design tokens, documentation, governance, and design-to-code workflows. Currently focused on tool-agnostic libraries and React-based prototyping foundations that help teams and AI tools use design systems more consistently.

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Experience

Product Designer, Design Systems • Ford Motor Company

Sep 2025 – Present · Dearborn, MI

  • Contribute to a variable-driven, multi-brand design system spanning Ford and Lincoln in-vehicle infotainment, driver information displays, and connected mobile experiences, using Figma variables, design tokens, and reusable component patterns to support cross-platform consistency.
  • Participate in an internal AI prototyping cohort exploring a tool-agnostic React component library that can support Ford's internal prototyping tools as well as broader coding agents and AI-assisted product design workflows.
  • Partner with designers and engineers to strengthen component documentation, usage guidance, and design system governance, helping teams apply patterns consistently and maintain stronger design-to-code alignment.

Senior UX Designer • Copper Hill Inc.

Mar 2024 – Sep 2025 · Livonia, MI (Remote)

  • Built a 0-to-1 product design function as the company shifted from consulting to an AI-assisted trade compliance platform, establishing Figma tooling, design reviews, product design process, and cross-functional collaboration from the ground up.
  • Built and maintained a design system for complex global trade workflows, creating reusable components and interaction patterns across platform modules including classification, free trade agreements, pre-entry, business intelligence, reconciliation, and entry review.
  • Designed experiences for automation-driven compliance capabilities, including AI-assisted workflows, anomaly detection, document-to-data transformation, dashboards, audit trails, and exception-based review tools.

Senior Experience Designer • PPL Electric (Contract)

May 2023 – Mar 2024 · Allentown, PA

  • Owned UX design for key registration, sign-up, and onboarding flows within a regulated customer migration, helping acquired RIE customers transition to the PPL platform without legacy account data.
  • Collaborated with UX research, product leadership, and stakeholders to identify user needs, define requirements, and translate findings into journey flows, wireframes, prototypes, and detailed Figma/Miro deliverables.
  • Developed executive-facing presentations that communicated customer impact, design rationale, and tradeoffs, helping leadership align around CX decisions in a regulated utility environment.

Senior UX Designer • Shibumi.com

Sep 2022 – Sep 2023 · Norwalk, CT (Contract + Freelance)

  • Established the company's first full-time design practice, creating a collaborative operating model with the CPO, product managers, and VP of Engineering for enterprise SaaS feature delivery.
  • Adapted Material UI / MUI React components into a tailored Figma design system, extending base components into reusable product-specific patterns for a low-code/no-code platform.
  • Improved platform workflows and enterprise customer experiences through feature design, UX audits, and client consultation across configurable customer instances.

UI Designer → UX Designer II → Senior UI/UX Designer • Workforce Software

Feb 2019 – Sep 2022 · Livonia, MI

  • Co-led a design system for an enterprise workforce management suite spanning six product modules and three engineering teams, helping unify acquisition-grown products into a cohesive user experience.
  • Improved design operations and delivery workflows by refining how UX work was scoped, documented, tracked in Jira, and aligned with product and engineering partners.
  • Conducted user interviews, baseline testing, and usability studies for the Workforce Suite redesign, with a focus on time and attendance workflows and mobile support for frontline workers.

Product Manager / Designer • Tiremetrix, LLC

Feb 2015 – Feb 2019 · Brighton, MI

  • Led 0-to-1 product design across the organization, redesigning the TPMS parts catalog and creating a digital tire registration platform that replaced paper-based workflows and integrated with POS systems.
  • Partnered with company leadership to define product strategy, prioritize the roadmap, and introduce right-sized agile processes in collaboration with the engineering team.
  • Supported business development through pitch decks, conceptual prototypes, and product vision materials that helped communicate the platform to customers, strategic partners, and investors.

Skills & Tools

Design Systems

Figma Libraries, Figma Variables, Design Tokens, Component Libraries, Pattern Libraries, Documentation, Governance, Accessibility/WCAG AA, Design-to-Code Workflows

AI & Prototyping

AI-Assisted Prototyping, Agentic Design Systems, MCP Workflows, Figma Make, React-Based Prototyping

Product Design

UX Design, Interaction Design, Information Architecture, User Research, Usability Testing, Enterprise SaaS, Complex Workflows

Tools & Technical

Figma, FigJam, Miro, Jira, Azure DevOps, Confluence, Storybook, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, React, Tailwind CSS, Material UI

Education

Wayne State University

Bachelor of Arts — Dec 2009 • Detroit, MI