James Reilly

I am an AI product designer with 26 years of experience working in print, digital, and now AI. I merge all three to cope with the pace 2026 has forced on product teams.

The process is not magic. Always start with the problem. Why are you delivering this work? What value does it bring to the business and the user? Ask questions. Speak to users. Build relationships with the people building it. Communication is still the skill that decides whether a product ships or dies in a deck.

I've run my own companies and built startups for others from 0 to 1. Fifteen years freelancing across studios and banks. I now work as an IC at J.P. Morgan, embedded as an internal consultant on product design for the senior leadership team — moving between design, AI, and research.

At the bank I sit on the Claude Code forum as the only designer with a license, running experiments daily on how AI changes the design process and where it actually creates leverage rather than noise. Outside of that I'm building Aced-It — interview prep for designers who need to walk into high-stakes hiring fully prepared.