Jehad Affoneh is Chief Design Officer at Toast, where he leads design across product, platform, and culture. Previously, he held design leadership roles at VMware and other complex B2B companies. Starting his career as an engineer, Jehad brings a unique perspective to design, viewing it fundamentally as problem solving. On today's show we chat about the transition from engineering to design, the value of being multilingual across disciplines, organisational design, and how AI is transforming the way teams build products.

Timestamps:

• 00:00 – Intro
• 02:08 – Jehad's journey from engineering to design leadership
• 05:32 – Being multilingual across disciplines and bridging gaps
• 09:48 – Organisational design and how teams should be structured
• 20:16 – The role of design systems and platforms at scale
• 31:44 – Leading design in complex B2B environments
• 42:22 – How AI is changing product building and design tools
• 52:18 – The future of AI agents and conversational interfaces
• 58:02 – End of show questions

Connect with Jehad
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