About Ryan Schmidt
Leadership
At i4cp, I'm the sole designer, owning the design system, UX standards, PRDs, and roadmap conversations that shape what gets built. There's no one else to hand ambiguity to, so I'm responsible for turning unclear problems into shippable product direction.
At D-Tools, I led twice-weekly design reviews with five designers and six PMs. I sharpened collaboration, learned how to spot edge cases early, and saw how teams actually make decisions. The reviews that made the biggest impact were the ones where disagreements surfaced early enough to change direction.
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End-to-end ownership
Design → PRDs → staging code
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Product direction influence
UX, roadmap, and system strategy
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Built design review system
Drove alignment and faster decisions across complex product work
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Promoted to Senior Product Designer at D-Tools
Recognized for design systems leadership, cross-team alignment, and SaaS platform scale
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Leading UX at i4cp
Owning system direction, standards, and roadmap influence
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AI-augmented build
Cursor + OpenCode: design decisions validated in code, not mockups
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Custom AI assistant
Gemini + Supabase + vector search powering every portfolio answer
Builder
I'm making the shift from designing interfaces to building them. With Cursor and OpenCode, I can take a product idea from concept to staging without waiting on an engineering handoff. My portfolio is the proof.
My foundation in code started nearly a decade ago, building responsive interfaces in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for enterprise tools at TASB and white-label transit apps for municipal agencies at Bytemark. Prototyping in code with modern tools is the natural evolution of that workflow.
AI does not replace the thinking. Every layout and interaction is still a decision about structure, hierarchy, and behavior. The tools just move those decisions closer to production, faster.
Mentorship
Across five years with Designlab, I mentored 50+ emerging designers 1:1 through UX Academy and facilitated over 400 structured group critiques as a Senior Facilitator.
After hundreds of critique sessions, I became much more intentional in how I give feedback: helping designers define the business problem before defending a screen or feature. Working with so many different designers pushed me to constantly evaluate new tools, interaction patterns, and ways of thinking.
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400+Group critique sessions
Helping designers define the problem first
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50+1:1 Designers mentored
Across UX Academy research, systems, and capstones
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Started mentoring at Designlab
Supporting students and early-career designers
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Promoted to Senior Facilitator
Leading structured group critiques
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Concluded group facilitation (400+ sessions)
Transitioned focus to 1:1 mentorship, family, and core product work
Life Lately
I live in Austin with my wife, our toddler, and two cats named Pickles and Pesto. Most of life right now revolves around my son: parks, swimming, bedtime stories, snacks in places snacks absolutely should not be, and getting outside whenever we can.
I organize the team mostly so everyone else can just show up and play. I like the skating and the team dynamic, but let's be honest, mostly the beer after.
A hobby you can never fully master, which is either the appeal or the trap. Unfortunately my favorite guitarists all play the kind of stuff that makes you question your life choices.
Another hobby you can't master in a lifetime, though lately it's more practical than ambitious. We still make room for new recipes, usually stolen from somewhere we've traveled, and I've fallen into wine as its own rabbit hole.
I don't miss scraping ice off my windshield or fishtailing down a hill, but I do miss white Christmases and the bite of real fall air.