Alex Jansen

AI Product Leader & HCI Researcher

Bridging the gap between $70M ARR strategies and 0-to-1 prototyping.

Email: alex@alexjansen.com · LinkedIn · GitHub · Substack

📄 Download full portfolio data as JSON

About

I believe the most powerful AI isn't just intelligent—it's intuitive. My career is defined by a singular arc: bridging the gap between complex machine learning systems and the real-world needs of the people who rely on them.

Rooted in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research and honed through engineering roles at Google and Nest, my approach is data-first and people-centric. I don't just build features; I champion robust platforms that translate raw data into reliable, scalable tools for billions of users.

Currently, I lead product strategy for high-growth SaaS platforms, driving AI innovation—from Agentic evaluations to semantic search—while navigating complex organizational landscapes.

Selected Work

Brandfolder AI Strategy & Roadmap

Senior Product Manager · Smartsheet (Brandfolder) · 2023–Present

Challenge: Enterprise customers faced "blank page syndrome" when organizing assets, and manual taxonomy creation was a massive bottleneck.

Strategy: As the owner of the $70M ARR product line, drove the comprehensive AI roadmap — launching people tagging, suggested descriptions, and automated AI tagging.

Impact: Dramatically reduced the time required to manually build taxonomies. Authored business cases for AI initiatives representing $1.5M–$5M in new ARR.

Stack: Python, LangChain, Anthropic Claude, Vector Embeddings

Smartsheet AI Evals & Internal Tooling

Senior Product Manager · Smartsheet · 2023–Present

Challenge: Evaluating non-deterministic generative AI features requires entirely new frameworks for defining "success" and launch readiness.

Strategy: Built internal tooling for early signal detection. Cemented a robust, 3-tiered evaluation approach: manual audits, LLM-as-a-judge, and human-in-the-loop reviews.

Impact: Provided executive leadership with clear, quantifiable signals on when AI features were safe and effective enough for rollout.

Stack: Python, Synthetic Data Generation, Custom Eval Harness

Google Workspace UI Transformation

Product Manager · Google · 2022–2023

Challenge: Google Workspace had fragmented UI patterns. Unifying meant navigating massive organizational complexity.

Strategy: Drove a strategic, decade-first UI transformation (Material Design 3 adoption) across the entire suite.

Impact: Shipped to 1B+ users. 80%+ positive CSAT, far exceeding baseline expectations.

Stack: Internal Google Frameworks, A/B Testing Infrastructure, Statistics

Nest x Yale Lock

Product/UX Engineer · Nest (Google) · 2014–2021

Challenge: Smart locks were seen as "gadgets" rather than serious security devices.

Strategy: Focused on "Human-Centric IoT." Engineered a seamless entry experience that established design standards for remote physical security.

Impact: Surpassed launch revenue goals. Created a best-in-class standard for smart home access.

Stack: Java (Android), Objective-C (iOS), Thread/Weave Protocols

Street View App UX Overhaul

Product/UX Engineer · Google (Maps/Street View) · 2014–2021

Impact: Increased Play Store ratings by a full star for 1M+ DAU.

Universal "Flat" Imagery Support

Product/UX Engineer · Google (Maps/Street View) · 2014–2021

Impact: Significantly increased user-generated content uploads and broadened utility for local discovery.

Street View Hardware Lab & Dynamic Routing

Product/UX Engineer · Google (Maps/Street View) · 2014–2021

Impact: Drastically improved driver efficiency and operational uptime for one of the world's most complex data collection fleets.

Labs & Side Projects

Penguin Free (v0.1-alpha) — A 2.5D endless runner. React, Canvas API, Supabase.
South Beach Diet Tracker — AI-powered nutritional tracking. Kotlin, Jetpack Compose, Gemini API.
Pointing Magnifier — Assistive technology from HCI research, deployed to real users.
ContextType — Intelligent keyboard using hand posture to resize keys. Published at ACM CHI.
SurTouch — Personalized input modeling on vision-based touch surfaces. C#, WPF, Computer Vision.
MoodMusic — Mood-based music generation engine. Published at ACM UIST.
Lock Screen Survey App — Micro-survey mechanism embedded in Android lock screen.

Publications

The effects of task dimensionality, endpoint deviation, throughput calculation, and experiment design on pointing measures and models — ACM CHI (Full Paper)
Enhanced area cursors: reducing fine-pointing demands — ACM UIST (Full Paper)
ContextType: using hand posture information to improve mobile touch screen text entry — ACM CHI (Note)
From the lab to the world: lessons from extending a pointing technique for real-world use — CHI Extended Abstracts (Case Study)
Modeling and predicting pointing errors in two dimensions — ACM CHI (Full Paper)
MoodMusic: a method for cooperative, generative music playlist creation — ACM UIST (Poster)

Education

Master of Science, Human-Computer Interaction — University of Washington, 2013
Bachelor of Science, Informatics — University of Washington, 2010

Awards

UW Center for Commercialization Award — "Best Commercial Potential" (Top 2 of 70)
NSF Graduate Fellowship — Honorable Mention (2011)

Skills

Product Strategy, AI/ML Product Management, Agentic AI, LLM Evaluation, RAG & Semantic Search, Python, LangChain, TypeScript, React, Android (Java/Kotlin), C++, System Design, A/B Testing & Statistical Analysis, HCI Research, Accessibility, UX Engineering, Data-Driven Decision Making