Redoctober Industrie is the studio / portfolio of 👋 Andi Rusu, a Seattle-based design director specializing in turning product and marketing complexity into desirable clarity for global clients.
Andi also designs and publishes special projects and explores design, technology and creativity.
A selected collection of product design work, special projects, and teaching engagements from recent years.
Contact me if you'd like details on other projects from the client list.
Crafting impactful product and marketing experiences for leading global brands.
Engagements & brands — product and marketing, strategy, technology and design.
See a selection of product design projects in the Work section.
Work and project details access as needed. Contact me for info.
Effective experience design through integrated strategy, creativity, and technology.
A brief timeline:
2024-Present: The Walt Disney Company — Engaged in the Workforce Technology group, where I shape the digital experience for 250K+ employees across all company business segments.
2021-2024: Axon Enterprise — Product Design and Research Director. Led the Connected Devices experience team. The work was bringing together devices, apps, and cloud services into a unified first-responder workflow, using AI, sensors, and media capture devices to collect, tag, process, and review evidence. The experinece spans on-device UX, mobile and desktop platforms, stateful and workflow design, research, strategy, and deployment.
2018-2021: Sonos — Senior UX Product Design Manager, heading the Setup, Configuration, Onboarding, and Product Lifecycle UX experiences UX team. I helped launch major initiatives, including the S1/S2 app split, and led a full overhaul of the Setup and Onboarding platform.
2016-2018: Microsoft — Design Director / Principal Creative Director. Driving work across the Maps, People, and Communications teams. Within the Mixed Reality Studio, I directed the new Xbox Avatars initiative, guiding UX, visual design, and art to advance identity representation and strengthen connections across mixed-reality and traditional experiences.
2014-2016: Deloitte Digital — Creative Director, led the Seattle experience design and research teams serving multiple fortune 500 clients and projects.
2004-2014: IF/THEN — Co-founded and led a Seattle technology focused design studio, working with clients like Microsoft, Xbox, National Geographic, and McGraw Hill.
Product design and marketing projects:
At The Walt Disney Company, I lead the design of employee experiences, bringing together design, product, engineering, AI, and research teams to create and evolve the platforms and tool experiences used across the enterprise by 250,000 employees daily.
Challenges / Solutions
Employees across multiple business segments and regions lack a cohesive, modern AI-powered experience, leaving engagement fragmented and inconsistent. → Defining and implementing AI-powered experiences that reach employees across every business segment and region.
No current Digital Employee Experience Strategy, leaving tools, processes, and long-term experience planning undefined across business segments. → Collaborating with business segment leaders and partner firms to define and implement the Digital Employee Strategy, including new tools, processes, and long-term product roadmaps.
Fragmented employee experiences across platforms, with no cross-org cohesive design strategy connection. → Partnering with Product and Engineering to design and deliver a cohesive, multi-platform employee experience vision that will work seamlessly org-wide.
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Design & Design SystemDirection
- Cross Pillar Collaboration and Alignment
- UX Processes, Standards and Tools Scaling
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Planning and Allocation
At Axon, I led Connected Devices Experience Design and Research, overseeing the end-to-end experience for law enforcement officers and first responders across a multi-platform ecosystem spanning mobile and web applications, device interfaces, desktop configuration tools, and digital evidence workflows.
Challenges / Solutions
Device design and implementation lacked a unified, connected roadmap, causing operational and coordination gaps. → Initiated and drove the Connected Device Experience roadmap end-to-end, lifting operational efficiency 11%.
Hardware deployed across national and international agencies had no standardized design-research methodology, causing inconsistent feedback loops. → Planned and implemented a standardized approach, improving feedback-driven efficiency 15% network-wide.
Strategy, org planning, and device design team/process performance lacked cross-functional alignment, limiting the impact of individual initiatives. → Partnered with the executive team to close that gap, improving outcomes across the organization.
The Role
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Experience Tracking and Monitoring
- Cross Pillar Collaboration and Alignment
- Cross Platform Design Direction (Hardware and Software: Mobile + Desktop)
- UX Processes, Standards and Tools Scaling
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Planning and Allocation
- External Resource Vetting, Contracting and Direction
During my time at Sonos, I established, led, and grew the Configuration, Setup, and Onboarding UX team in Seattle. I provided design leadership, strategic planning, and hands-on direction for secure product setup, user onboarding, and lifecycle experiences across the Sonos ecosystem.
Challenges / Solutions
The Sonos app experience was outdated and difficult to use, weighing down NPS and driving up support call volume. → Led a complete overhaul of the Sonos app experience, driving a 1.5-point increase in NPS and a 12% reduction in customer support inquiries.
Setup, configuration, and onboarding across Sonos products were inconsistent and misaligned with user expectations, suppressing satisfaction across a base of over 10.2 million households. → Redesigned and streamlined setup, configuration, and onboarding across all Sonos products by realigning design with user expectations, raising the Product Setup Satisfaction Score to 8.3.
Once customers moved past initial setup, lifecycle management lacked a defined UX strategy, leaving engagement and support inconsistent as products aged or needs changed. → Led UX initiatives extending design ownership into lifecycle management, establishing consistent engagement patterns across the 10.2 million household customer-base.
The Role
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Cross Pillar Collaboration and Alignment
- Design Direction
- UX/UI Delivery Process Development and Implementation
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Planning and Allocation
- External Resource Vetting, Contracting and Direction
Press
Tech Radar"Setting up the Sonos Roam took us just a few minutes."
"There's also a 'product tour' within the app, to help you get to know the Sonos Roam's controls and features – it's a neat touch that makes the setup process feel really easy."
Digital Trends"If you're a Sonos owner, you don't need me to tell you how easy it is to set up the company's wireless speakers. A few taps in the Sonos app, a few button presses on the speaker, and less than two minutes later, you're done. But with the Roam, Sonos has simplified this process even further. No buttons to press and no passwords to enter. Every tech product should be this easy to configure."
BGR"As is the case with all of Sonos's wireless speakers, setting up the Roam is quite easy. As a matter of fact, the Roam is by far the simplest Sonos speaker to set up thanks to the addition of NFC. Simply open the Sonos app, tap over to settings, launch the function to add a new speaker, and the app pretty much does the rest. The only other manual step is to tap your smartphone to the back of the Roam when the app gives you the cue. And of course, Bluetooth is even easier to set up — just turn on the speaker, hold the power button until you hear two chimes to indicate you're in Bluetooth mode, and pair."
Tech Hive"Setting up the Roam in my Brooklyn apartment, the Sonos app discovered the Roam almost instantly. It then prompted me to tap my iPhone on the side of the speaker between its four feet, thus allowing the devices to identify each other using their respective NFC (near-field communication) chips. It took a couple of tries for the NFC handshake to work, but once it did, the Sonos app connected the Roam to my wireless network and automatically downloaded a firmware update. Once that was done, the Roam was ready to go, with the whole setup process taking less than five minutes."
At Microsoft, I directed a 25-person cross-functional Avatar Identity team, delivering the next generation of Xbox Avatars and shaping the future of digital identity. My work centered on representation, trust, and connection across social, workplace, and mixed reality experiences powered by cloud-based platforms.
Before leading the Avatar Identity initiative, I directed design for Windows Maps and People, shaping the future of location-driven and identity-centered experiences. I oversaw the vision, design, and delivery of secure cross-platform products spanning mobile, desktop, and emerging mixed reality environments.
The Work
The Xbox app lacked an inclusive avatar design strategy, limiting engagement and reach across its diverse user base. → Boosted Xbox app engagement 11.3% by evolving the avatar design strategy towards a more inclusive approach, reaching 59 million monthly active users.
The Windows People app had stagnant engagement, with an experience that hadn't kept pace with user needs. → Led a 12-person design team to deliver user-centric design improvements, achieving an 18% increase in monthly active users for the Windows People app.
AR/VR product design and development had no defined guidelines for ethical, actionable decision-making, leaving teams without a shared standard. → Defined AR/VR experience crafting principles, establishing guidelines for ethical and actionable product design and development.
The Role
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Cross Pillar Collaboration and Alignment
- Cross Platform Creative and Design Direction (Mobile, Desktop, Hololens)
- UX/UI Delivery Process Development and Implementation
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Planning and Allocation
For the launch of Windows 10, I led the design and development of the web and CRM experience, building a responsive design system that enabled consistent, localized customer experiences across more than 60 markets worldwide.
Challenges / Solutions
The Windows 10 launch account's site and CRM design wasn't grounded in testing or experimentation, risking a launch built on assumption rather than evidence. → Led the agency's 12-person design team through testing and experiment-driven site and CRM design for the Windows 10 launch, delivering a 20% increase in user engagement and a 370% surge in partner hardware sales during launch month.
The Role
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Agency to Client Collaboration and Alignment
- Creative and Design Direction
- UX/UI Delivery Process Development and Implementation
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Planning and Allocation
As Creative Director, I led a team of 33 multidisciplinary practitioners, guiding the vision, execution, and growth of digital programs that spanned agency initiatives and client engagements. Our work focused on creating meaningful customer experiences at scale.
Challenges / Solutions
Fortune 500 companies pursuing digital transformation needed the design leadership scale to execute complex initiatives across teams and stakeholders. → Led a 33-member team delivering digital transformation projects for a number of multinational companies.
Client of record: HP's web Customer Support platform delivered an inadequate digital experience, limiting customer satisfaction. → Led customer service transformation design for HP, enhancing the customer support digital experience and achieving a 3% uplift in NPS for the web Customer Support platform.
The Role
- Experience Strategy and Validation
- UX and Research Roadmapping
- Agency to Client Collaboration and Alignment
- Creative and Design Direction
- UX/UI Delivery Process Development and Implementation
- Team Lead & Management
- Resource Allocation
A selection of independent experiments and projects:
Because clawing your way to the middle is hard work — The only corporate career fortune-telling system you'll need. Get automated, ironic career advice daily to help you navigate the corporate jungle—KPIs, OKRs, and especially... the meetings. All the meetings. Get it today in the Apple App Store. More info available at the Corporate Mystic site.
See the traffic before you hit the traffic. — A different kind of driver assistance web-app. Instead of showing traffic slowdowns, it shows you why they're happening. As you drive, the app automatically displays the next available traffic camera up to one mile ahead in your direction of travel, giving you a real-time view of conditions before you reach them. Additional features include a focused view, live alerts, mapped incident alerts, etc.
Coverage: British Columbia, Washington, Oregon and California. Over 7800 cameras, traffic data and alerts from the local departments of transportation.
Don't be the DUMBO! — A fast and fun spelling game you play against the computer. Spell words, rack up points, and show your phone who's boss. And yes, the DUMBO reference will make sense once you play the game.
Generate typographic patterns — input a letter, generate a pattern, enjoy. Move your mouse to accelerate or slow down the rotation of the pattern. Hit "spacebar", change the letter. Hit "r" and change the pattern.
A teaching perspective shaped by 20+ years of entrepreneurship, agency work, and client-side product design leadership.
Andi's background spans product design, marketing, communications, and brand experience, providing a broad foundation for mentoring the next generation of creative talent through teaching and speaking engagements.
For over 15 years, Andi has taught college and continuing education courses, at Seattle University / Cornish College of the Arts, University of Washington and the School of Visual Concepts.
Courses developed and taught include:
- Product / Interactive Design
- Type in Motion
- Entrepreneurship and Design
- Business Practices and Principles
- Typography
- Illustration
