I’m a principal product designer who builds.
At PayPal I shipped in-store QR payments in five markets, and built the two AI tools the design team adopted. At NBC News I designed the live election results, which drew 140 million page views in 2024.
A working prototype gets a room to a decision faster than a deck, so I make one early, put it in front of people, and see what they actually do with it. I keep my hands in the work, whether it’s starting the design system or building the tools that turn days of work into minutes.
I’ve run three design teams at NBC News: Elections, Breaking & Live, and the first GenAI team, which also made the games. I managed up to four designers at a time and taught three to prototype games themselves.
I’m looking for a hands-on design manager role, or a principal product designer role on interesting work, where I set direction and stay close to the people building it. Remote, hybrid, or on-site all work. Here’s what I bring:
I build AI tools teams keep using, then teach them to build their own. At PayPal, over half the people I paired with built one within a week.
I put working prototypes in front of people early, so they react to the real thing. At PayPal, decisions came about five times faster.
When teams disagree, I bring in what we learned from users, next to business and engineering needs. Sometimes it’s what tips the decision.
I set the direction and give designers real problems to own. At NBC News, a team that had never made a game built six in five months.
My design systems hold up across web and mobile. At NBC News, one sat behind 683 live election results pages and outlived the project.
I design for accessibility from the start and test with real users. At NBC News, that made our election maps easier to read, with zoom and clearer legends.
He pours time, care, and thoughtfulness into the growth and development of his team. I had the privilege of working with him as he led design on the most successful digital election night experience in NBC News’ history.
His work on the 2024 Elections products contributed to record-breaking online traffic. Kriss is an exceptional product designer, and any team would benefit greatly from his experience, creativity, and leadership.
Kriss is a decisive and strategic thinker, a strong collaborator, and a natural leader. He consistently brought clarity and direction to complex projects, and his ability to navigate shifting priorities and team changes was invaluable.
Kriss is an incredible UX Design leader… My role at NBCUniversal was to build an enterprise accessibility program. Kriss was the first person at that table for our News group, and he stayed, and learned, and advocated, and led, and practiced, and shared, and modeled for his organization, and again, led.
For the past seven years at NBC News he has consistently proven himself to be an exceptional UX design lead and a trusted collaborator… His design insight and deep understanding of both user needs and technical constraints have been instrumental.
Kriss is a true team player. He pushed our junior designers to elevate their work, challenging them to explore alternatives and grow their creative thinking.
Kriss is a powerhouse builder… proactive in wielding AI to create detailed and robust products and prototypes that help align stakeholders, from design leadership to PMs to engineers.
Kriss built two internal AI tools on his own initiative… then ran pairing sessions to teach teammates to build their own. That combination, strong craft plus a drive to make the whole team faster, is rare.
I left Belgium at 20, and my first job was at Microsoft, on the Encarta encyclopedia. Making complicated things feel easy turned out to be what I do. I forage mushrooms with the Snohomish Mycology Society and grow my own, make sourdough and pasta, and cook far too much for far too many people. I love automating anything that eats time: for our honeymoon I planned everything with AI and built an app to take the friction out, so there was nothing to look up or decide. The honeymoon went fine too.
Email me at krisschaumont@gmail.com