JOHN VUKUSIC
John Vukusic designs and builds enterprise platforms, design systems, and global design organizations.
UX Head of Design · Amplify25 years · Enterprise & Financial Services
Formerly JPMorgan Chase · BNY Mellon · IBM
AI is changing what a financial platform is — from screens people navigate to systems that understand intent and propose the next step. I design AI-assisted experiences that regulated institutions can actually ship: plain-language input, the system showing its work, and a person approving before anything moves. The work has to survive reorganizations, audits, and a decade in production. Mine does.
Four things I'm hired to do.
PracticeAI & Assisted Experiences
Natural-language and AI-assisted flows for financial products: intent capture, suggestion-and-review patterns, and the governance that keeps them auditable. AI that proposes, never applies.
- Plain-English rule generation
- Smart field mapping
- Human-in-the-loop review
- AI-readable design tokens
Enterprise Design Systems
Founding and governing the token architecture, component libraries, and accessibility baselines that let hundreds of engineers ship one coherent product — and now, the machine-readable manifests that let AI generate UI against governed standards.
- Universum · BNY Mellon
- Connect System · JPMorgan
- Amplify DS v8 → v10
- Carbon migration · IBM
Advisor & Client Platforms
Flagship digital experiences for wealth, custody, and private banking — client portals, advisor workspaces, secure exchange, onboarding — designed as one system across the household and the firm.
- Client Exchange
- Nexen 2.0
- Clarity · Amplify
- Form Builder
Global Design Organizations
Building and leading design teams across continents — hiring, operating models, budgets, rituals, and the executive narrative that keeps design funded and in the room where platform decisions get made.
- 1 → 33 designers · six cities, four countries
- 33 direct · 58 with DE partners
- Reported to CIO
BNY Mellon
Nexen 2.0 and Universum — the first unified design system across a $50T+ custodian. Adoption went from under 5% to 80%+ in twelve months, with 3× session engagement.
Selected work
2017 — 2026
Form Builder
Plain English → ruleAI that proposes, never applies — natural-language rules and smart mapping, reviewed by a person before anything changes
Start here · 02Amplify
Amplify Client Portal
0 → 1Wealth client portal, design system and mobile — shipped in a year as Head of Design
Start here · 03BNY Mellon
My Workspace
<5% → 80%Adoption in twelve months — a generic dashboard rebuilt as a persona-driven workspace
Start here · 04IBM
IBM Commerce
666 → 30Software catalog pages consolidated; three storefront directions to one shipped platform
Institutions and brands I've designed for.
Enterprise platforms today. Earlier career across J. Walter Thompson, Agency.com, iTraffic, Organic, and McCann — design and digital for the biggest brands in the market. Names shown as they were when I worked with them.
I built the design systems that run global finance.
I lead design at Amplify, a wealth management platform for RIAs and wealth managers, where every product — Marketplace, Proposal Tool, Form Builder, Clarity, the Client Portal — runs on an enterprise design system I architected: tokens, components, accessibility, interaction patterns, and the AI governance layer on top.
Before that I ran design at BNY Mellon, growing a global organization from one person to thirty-three across six cities in four countries. Universum, BNY's first unified design system, integrated 180+ API sources across every Nexen business line and became the firm's named benchmark transformation project.
At JPMorgan Chase I was Head of Design, Vice President — reporting to the CIO, presenting quarterly at global All Hands. The Connect System unified Client Exchange, Share@JPMC, Document Management, Secure Message Center, and the enterprise Style Guide. Eight years later, it's still the standard.
Based in the New York Metro area, with home offices in Europe — dual US & EU citizenship. Leads design organizations at the Head and Director level — systems, platforms, and the teams that ship them. Still hands-on in Figma every day.
- Sep 2025 —UX Head of DesignAmplify · Wealth management platform
- 2026UX Design Director, Expert ConsultantIBM · buy.ibm.com storefront
- 2025 — 2026Independent Design & Product LeadRentwise · with the CEO of CarWiz
- 2019 — 2024Senior Group Manager of UX, DirectorBNY Mellon · Nexen · Universum DS
- 2017 — 2019Head of Design, Vice PresidentJPMorgan Chase · Technology & Shared Services
- 2008 — 2016Digital Product Design DirectorBloomberg · BlackRock · J&J · Ernst & Young · WebMD · NYC DoE
- Pre-2008Agency leadershipJWT · Agency.com · iTraffic · Organic · McCann
Education
- M.Ed. — Pace University, New York · GPA 4.0
- B.I.D. — Syracuse University · Industrial & Interaction Design
Recognition
- Clio Award Nominee, 2007
- Guest Lecturer — NYU, Syracuse, General Assembly
- Speaker — UXPA International, AI Summit
- IDSA · UXPA · IxDA · NN/g · AIGA · DMI
The design leader institutions choose to envision tomorrow — and ship it today.