# Pietro Dipalma — Design Leader & Product Builder

> Pietro Dipalma is a design leader and hands-on product builder, currently Head of Design at Sport Alliance, with 10+ years of experience across B2B, SaaS, and B2C. He identifies bottlenecks holding organizations back and transforms design into a high-impact engine for success. Based in Germany, originally from Italy.

## About

Pietro operates at the intersection of two disciplines:

- **Design Leader & Strategist**: Builds design organizations that move as one, with clear direction and shared standards. Creates and evolves design systems into engines that support both consistency and rapid iteration. Sets up collaboration models that reduce friction between product, design, and engineering. Defines what success looks like and translates it into plans teams can execute.

- **Builder**: Works hands-on to take ideas from concept to production in a compressed cycle. Uses functional prototypes to test with real users early. Expert vibe-coder who builds high-fidelity, production-ready prototypes using modern tools and AI. Operates end-to-end: research, design, prototype, validate, and ship.

## Contact

- Website: https://pietrodipalma.com
- LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/pietrodipalma

## Featured Projects

### Design System Version Control — Auto Generated Backlog of Changes per Component
- **Role**: Solo creator/designer
- **What**: Figma plugin that brings version-control workflow to design system components
- **Problem**: Design evolves in Figma but code falls behind; no "git" for Figma components; designers can't commit versions or hand developers precise specs of changes
- **Key work**: Baseline commits capture full component state as version 1.0.0; drift detection scans tracked components without committing; changelog generation with breaking changes, added/removed variants & properties, visual/layout diffs with before → after values, token changes; AI prompt generation for coding agents
- **Captures**: Metadata, layout & auto-layout, visual style, typography, component/variant data, design tokens (styles + bound variables), full nested structure
- **Plugin**: https://bit.ly/4pIUrGI

### Sennder — Leading Design Strategy & Operations for Europe's Logistics Leader
- **Role**: Design Lead & IC, 4 years, reporting to VP of Product / CPO
- **What**: Europe's leading digital freight forwarder — B2B shipper platform, B2C carrier platform, internal operations tool (600 operators), 20+ markets, 50,000+ loads/month
- **Problem**: Emerging design culture, no coherent design practice or unified system, teams operated as consultants not partners
- **Key work**: Scaled design team from 2 to 6 designers; established DesignOps; unified Design System across all platforms; redesigned document checking workflow (minutes to seconds per doc); pioneered AI-driven prototyping initiative; built user research repository
- **Impact**: Elevated design maturity from reactive execution to strategic product partnership; Design System accelerated design and engineering delivery; contributed to product KPIs across B2B, B2C, and internal operations

### GT Alarm — Designing for Real-Time Security & User Trust
- **Role**: Sole designer, partnered with CEO/CTO/PO, 6-month MVP
- **What**: Satellite anti-theft tracking app for 40,000+ vehicle owners in Italy
- **Problem**: App rated 2.4 stars, too many actions for basic tasks, misleading data, heavy customer care load
- **Key work**: Overhauled information architecture around single high-utility dashboard; redesigned maintenance into actionable system enabling revenue partnerships; designed dual-purpose geofencing (safety + security); introduced pull-to-refresh and pending status patterns; delivered scalable Design System
- **Impact**: +70% maintenance registrations (2 months), -40% customer care calls, +10% new clients (3 months), App Store rating 2.4 → 4.0 stars
- **App Store**: https://apps.apple.com/de/app/gt-alarm/id1482901623

### GT Fleet — Scaling Enterprise Logistics through Intuitive Design
- **Role**: Lead designer → hired team of 2 designers + 1 researcher, 1.5-year redesign
- **What**: Fleet management platform for logistics companies to manage truck fleets, optimize operations, reduce costs
- **Problem**: Outdated platform with technical debt, critical workflows buried under raw data tables, misaligned with how fleet operators actually worked
- **Key work**: Segmented users by fleet size (small/medium/enterprise); replaced raw data tables with interactive map for speed fine verification; built journey planner from SMS behavior analysis (38% of messages were next-stop missions); designed fully responsive Design System (desktop/tablet/mobile)
- **Impact**: Business grew from 20K to 50K clients over 5 years; platform's ease of use became key differentiator; platform still live and on market; scaled team from 1 to 4

### Sennder Design System — Design at Velocity
- **Role**: Design System architect
- **What**: Unified 3 competing design systems into 1 cohesive system serving all sennder platforms
- **Key work**: Established scalable foundation evolving with quarterly growth; tracked KPIs (Time to Design, Time to Develop); spearheaded AI integration for rapid high-fidelity prototyping with proprietary components

### GT Design System — A Unified Design Language
- **Role**: Design System architect
- **What**: Fully responsive, platform-agnostic design framework for fleet management products
- **Key work**: Built with Atomic Design methodology; optimized for Vue.js (web) and Flutter (mobile); Figma-to-code parity; seamless cross-device experience

### Strauss Group — ERP Refactoring for a Global Workwear Leader
- **What**: Leading German workwear and safety equipment company (formerly Engelbert Strauss). €1.4B+ revenue, ~1,700 employees. Major brand sponsor (German national football team, UEFA Europa League, FC Liverpool, MLB).
- **Role**: Senior Product Designer (via CID GmbH), 1 year. Partnered with Head of Design and 5 designers. Owned features end-to-end — user testing, operator interviews, production-ready design. Built a design system for the Strauss micro-application ecosystem.
- **Note**: This project is protected under NDA.

### Archiproducts — Building a Global Platform for Design
- **Role**: Design Lead
- **What**: Global e-commerce platform for architecture and design — millions of monthly users, 1M+ products
- **Key work**: Created first unified design language; built Design System for 3 audiences (professionals seeking BIM/CAD data, consumers in luxury e-commerce, brands managing digital presence); accelerated development with atomic components as single source of truth

### My Yoga Classes — From Vibe Coding to Production-Ready iOS App in 72 Hours
- **Role**: Solo builder (no Figma, built entirely with Cursor + AI)
- **What**: Native iOS app for yoga teachers to manage classes, track attendance, and build community
- **Key work**: Production-ready MVP in 3 days; automated social engine, smart attendance/earnings tracking, cloud notification system, community follower layer
- **Lesson**: Validated that while the cost of building falls toward zero, the value of deep discovery is only increasing

## Optional

For full case study details, see: https://pietrodipalma.com/llms-full.txt