Director at eBay, Berkeley MBA 08
San Francisco Bay Area
- Current
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- Director, Design at eBay
- Past
- Education
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- University of California, Berkeley - Walter A. Haas School of Business
- California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo
- Recommended
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Preston Smalley’s Summary
Product guy with track record creating successful user experiences online. I bring a unique blend of strategy, design, and technical capabilities while specializing in managing product teams with expertise in the consumer web space.
Interested in advisory or board roles at consumer startups.
Preston Smalley’s Experience
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Director, Design
eBay
(Public Company; eBay; Internet industry)
September 2007 — Present (2 years 4 months)
LEADING TRADING DESIGN (Oct 2009 – Present)
Leads design globally for eBay Marketplace websites for all aspects of how buyers and sellers trade goods (e.g. purchase, checkout, listing, sales mgmt, customer support). Reporting to VP of overall Product Management and Development and part of the product leadership team.
Established a visiontyping function in Oct 2009 which blends design and ui engineering talents to prototype and explore what directions eBay should take the user experience.
Developing a team of 40 designers, content strategists, user researchers, and ui engineers all with a renewed focus on the evolving set of front-end web technologies and grounded in customer insights. Managed budget for the team
LED BUYER EXPERIENCE DESIGN (Oct 2008 – Oct 2009)
Scaled and developed a multi-disciplinary design team to 25 people (designers & content strategists) by establishing relationships with key design programs and professional trade groups (e.g. IxDA, SxSW, DMI).
Led the 2008 acquisition of a small design/dev company (VuVox) adding Adobe Flash Catalyst talent and capabilities to eBay. Managed the former CEO and directed the delivery of eBay’s iPhone App ($400M in revenue, 4M downloads) and the Oct 2009 launch of one of our first vertical experiences (diamonds.ebay.com).
Built a new resolution center online (launching in Nov 2009) which greatly improves how eBay CS handles our single greatest reason for customer churn: buyers never receiving their item or it arriving different than it was described.
LED INTERACTION DESIGN (Sept 2007 – Oct 2008)
Established the interaction design function by evolving the existing UI Design team and elevating the role it played in shaping behavior and design on the site. -
Manager, UI Design
eBay
(Public Company; eBay; Internet industry)
January 2005 — September 2007 (2 years 9 months)
Managed team of 5 UI Designers focused on eBay's search engine, multifaceted browsing, homepage, landing pages, internet marketing and SEO. Shaped the strategic direction of the business in those areas of focus—determining the investment portfolio.
Coached teams on working effectively toward a common goal. Ensured teams consistently achieved stakeholders' goals and delivered excellent results. Worked with partners around the globe including Europe and AsiaPac (relocated to Shanghai office for 2 months)
Reviewed UI designs for improvements to search products. This included task analysis, wireframes, high-fidelity mockups, information architecture diagrams, and coordinates development of interactive prototypes. -
Senior UI Designer
eBay
(Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; ebay; Internet industry)
January 2003 — January 2005 (2 years 1 month)
Led the effort to improve the finding experience for our worldwide community (eBay users conduct over 400 million searches per day – July 2006). Worked with executives to prioritize “finding” improvements as part of a global product strategy in that space. Contributed to the shipping strategy and conceptualized the UI for partnerships with UPS and the US Postal Service.
Created and reviewed UI designs for improvements to the finding product. This included task analysis, wireframes, high-fidelity mockups, information architecture diagrams, and coordinates development of interactive prototypes.
Created a knowledge management system for collecting and sharing best practices. -
Program Manager (PM)
Microsoft
(Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; MSFT; Computer Software industry)
2000 — 2001 (1 year )
Facilitated the planning process and product management for improvements to the next MacOS versions of IE and MSN Messenger. Designed the UI (thru storyboards, wireframes, rapid prototypes), gained feedback on designs, and iterated based upon feedback solicited.
Communicated with marketing, developers, and upper management in order to gather team feedback and ideas. Defined business focused product objectives based on the latest industry news and market research.
Preston Smalley’s Education
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University of California, Berkeley - Walter A. Haas School of Business
MBA , General Management , 2005 — 2008
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California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo
BS , Computer Engineering, HCI
Focus on Human-Computer Interaction, Software Development & Project Management
