Dónal is VP of Product Experience at Contentful and has over 20 years experience building and leading world class product design and research teams. He has worked in a succession of companies that have transformed their UX due to a seismic shift in technology, eg: an industrial design consultancy when the iPhone was launched, e-learning when the iPad was launched, vehicle IOT when 5G and edge computing launched, and now CMS and content generation right when GAI landed. Some would say the timing has been by design, others would call it pure luck!! One thing is for sure, it has never been boring.
Upcoming Talks
20 May 2025
In this talk, Dónal O’Mahony shares hard-earned lessons from a career at the forefront of industry disruption —from the iPad’s impact on e-learning, to GAI in content management and 5G and edge computing in connected vehicles. Grounded in real-world experience through seismic tech disruptions, company acquisitions and digital transformations, he explores how to move fast without breaking everything (including yourself) —turning uncertainty into opportunity.
- Balancing rapid innovation with smart decision-making, learning from past disruptions.
Applying the parabel from the book "Who Moved My Cheese?" parabel to UX and product leadership.
- Seeing change as a fun (!) opportunity, not a threat, with real-world lessons and advice.
- Keeping your eye on that directional North Star while staying curious and adaptable along the journey.
Past Talks
6 October 2021
Transformation isn't just a UX project, it's the whole company project. Donal O'Mahony, Global Head of Experience Design at IoT Saas company Verizon Connect, has been leading experience transformation in his organisation to create incremental experience improvements with his 70 person X team.
In his talk, Dónal will discuss:
- Directional CFT leadership alignment to help deliver multi-year digital transformation.
- 'That was a great service design workshop, now what do we do?!'
- Shared goals - unifying leadership around customer outcome OKRs.
- One vision - telling an evolving, multi-year customer outcome story every CFT believes in.
5 October 2017
- How Digital Transformation has taken place within each company?
- Complexities and realities of introducing design thinking into larger organisations
- Benefits and advantages of more focus on design thinking and UX methods
- Trickling design thinking culture within the organisation
5 October 2017
- Institutionalising experience design & accelerating the UX maturity model
- Hiring strategy - a phased approach to hiring (and no bean bags)
- Scaling up versus staying Agile: Running ‘squads’ like lean start-ups
- Outcomes – deliver on the promise of UX inch by inch in this new Verizon world
- Roadmaps, Lean and Kanban boards – cycle time, KPIs, Heart, ROI & metrics for UX
- The golden ratio – how many experience designers does it take to change a company?