Mathis Thomsen

Product Strategy · UX · Digital Product Development

I like the point where a difficult question becomes a workable direction.

I work with teams on digital products, especially when the next step is still up for debate. Over more than a decade, I’ve learned to connect what people need with what a business is trying to achieve and what its technology can support. I enjoy turning that tension into a direction people can understand and act on.

My background includes a master’s in German studies with a strong cultural anthropology component, followed by editorial work, technical delivery and UX. Reading closely, questioning terminology and understanding different perspectives have proved surprisingly practical skills in product development. Requirements, too, benefit from a careful reader.

At VR-NetWorld, I coordinated delivery across clients, agencies and a shared banking platform. At Sedo, my work extended into discovery, product strategy, design systems and executive discussions. More recently, I built Aura to bring UX reasoning and human decision-making into agentic workflows. These experiences shape how I work: with enough technical understanding to make a proposal practical, and enough curiosity to question the proposal itself.

From an open question to a shared direction

Before discussing a solution, I want to understand the problem, its significance and what evidence would count as improvement. Research, usage data and conversations across functions help me develop requirements and recommendations that product managers and engineers can work with.

A useful direction also has to survive implementation. I’ve coordinated dependencies, scope and external partners, often from roles formally labelled UX or content. That experience makes me attentive to the distance between agreeing on an idea and getting it delivered.

  • Product strategy and discovery at Sedo

    Contributed UX requirements to product direction, advised senior executives and designed and facilitated discovery workshops with functions including Analytics, Trust & Safety and Account Management.

  • Modernising vr.de

    Coordinated mobile modernisation from its business case and component priorities through agency briefing and incremental delivery, working across the BVR, internal teams and the central CMS provider.

  • Making CMS requirements actionable

    Gathered and structured user requirements, worked through them with engineering teams and developed user stories for delivery within SAFe.

  • Alignment across twelve companies

    Led six workshops for a shared B2B platform, developed the resulting information architecture and refined it through a tree test with 20 participants.

  • Connecting experiments to business outcomes

    Used behavioural and commercial data to reshape sales landing pages and evaluate A/B tests. Reported project results included conversion increasing from 0.8% to 2% and an 8% rise in gross revenue.

  • Influence across functions

    Clarified requirements, worked through decisions with business teams and governance bodies, and coordinated agencies and engineers around the resulting work.

Build the conditions for better product work

I’m interested in the foundations that let teams make good decisions repeatedly: shared components, explicit rules and tools that bring expertise into the workflow. Their value depends on whether people can understand, use and maintain them.

Experience with frontend development, component systems and data modelling helps me explore these ideas in concrete terms. I can build a prototype, discuss dependencies with engineers and recognise when a seemingly small product choice reaches deep into the implementation. I particularly enjoy creating something a team can take forward independently.

  • Aura: UX reasoning inside agentic workflows

    Designed and built an agent system used by the team for reviews and UX specifications, with separate knowledge and workflow layers, escalation rules and human approvals.

  • A shared design foundation across products

    Built the component architecture and Figma library for a proprietary system, developed it alongside frontend engineers and supported the transition to MUI from the design-system side.

  • Technical understanding in product decisions

    Developed implementation concepts for web projects, advised on frontend questions and worked through technical dependencies with internal teams and external partners.

  • Evidoxa: taking an idea into working software

    Developed a research-data MVP from conversations with historians, taking on product definition, data modelling and AI-assisted implementation. Broader validation in research practice remains ahead.

  • Paperless Life: sustained product development

    Worked across the structure, interface and implementation of a Shopify store over several years, including its initial setup and subsequent development.

Keep the people affected in the picture

Products direct attention and shape the choices available to people. I want to understand who benefits from a decision, who might be excluded and what its unintended consequences could be. Commercial goals belong in that discussion alongside people’s ability to make informed choices.

I bring accessibility into requirements, design and evaluation, and challenge patterns such as false urgency or deliberately difficult cancellation. An improvement in a metric is evidence to consider; it is not the end of the conversation.

  • Accessibility work at Sedo

    Conducted audits, derived requirements, prepared design-system changes and engineering guidance, and retested fixes. I also developed a framework for systematic integration; its wider organisational rollout did not go ahead.

  • Accessible Web Design · XDi, 2024

    Completed certified training covering design and technical foundations, standards and different access needs, including contrast, screen readers and alternative input methods.

  • Research and evaluation

    Planned, conducted and analysed interviews, cognitive walkthroughs and usability tests to examine requirements and proposed improvements against use.

  • Human judgment in AI workflows

    Designed Aura to explain recommendations and involve human judgment. Ethical findings require individual approval, including after a request for bulk action.

  • UXQB CPUX-F

    Certified Professional for Usability and User Experience, Foundation Level, complementing my practical experience in human-centred product development.

What it’s like to work with me

  • I enjoy getting to grips with unfamiliar domains. So far, those have included banking, domain trading and medical history. I ask questions, read closely and expect my first explanation to need revision.
  • I try to make uncertainty useful: what do we know, what are we assuming, and what would make us change our minds? The aim is to give the team a sensible next move.
  • I lead through reasoning, collaboration and decisions people can follow. Having worked in editorial, design and technical delivery helps me understand what each discipline needs from the others.
  • If I see a problem with a direction, I say so and help develop an alternative. I prefer a good conversation, but I’m willing to have the awkward one when the work needs it.