I’m a senior IC-track product leader with a technical and business background. I’m motivated by aligning cross-functional teams on product strategy, creating enough clarity in vague situations to act, and building products that deliver expected business value.
Most recently, I owned Staffbase’s external communications product, taking it from proof of concept to closed beta and open beta until a strategic pivot away from external communications led to reassignment. I then joined Staffbase’s App / Intranet group, where I owned Social and Community features including chat, communities, and employee recognition. Before Staffbase, I was Product Lead at mobileJobs, where I improved the core product, launched two new products, led an analytics initiative, and supported leadership with product due diligence work tied to M&A.
I started my career in finance and corporate development, then moved into growth-oriented marketing focused on acquisition, conversion optimization, and analytics. The technical side of marketing pushed me into frontend development. After teaching myself how to code, I spent five years building web apps before moving into product management.
That mix of finance, marketing, engineering, and product is the main thread in my background. It gives me enough interdisciplinary knowledge to connect dots between business goals, user needs, market dynamics, technical constraints, and financial outcomes without getting lost or myopically focusing on one of them.
I do my best work in ambiguous product spaces where the team needs clearer direction, sharper trade-offs, and better decision logic. I like taking vague problems, breaking them down, and helping teams get to starting points everyone can commit to.
I care about good judgment more than process theater. Frameworks are useful when they help people make better decisions. They are a problem when they are substituted for critical thinking.
I bring strong measurement discipline from finance, marketing, and product. I care about instrumentation, analytics, and connecting product decisions to measurable outcomes. I also care about technical details. Caring about technical details does not mean I want to make engineering decisions. It means I want to understand technical trade-offs, collaborate better with engineers, and uncover technical risk earlier than I would have otherwise.
My communication style is direct. Over time, I’ve learned to adapt that directness to different people and situations. I still value clarity, honesty, and saying what I mean, but I’m more deliberate about my delivery than I was earlier in my career.
I’m focused on senior, staff, or lead product roles on the IC track. I’m most interested in roles with meaningful product problems, thoughtful colleagues, and enough complication to make trade-offs interesting.
I’m not trying to become a people manager. I want to keep growing as a senior individual contributor, work with strong teams, and help build products that are worth people’s time and money.
I’m originally from Alameda, California, and I’ve lived in Berlin, Germany, since 2012. I have a daughter, technically my stepdaughter, but I’ve been raising her since she was four. She’s my top priority in life.
Outside work, I spend a lot of time thinking about thinking. I’m curious about how things work, which usually leads me into subjects outside my job. Right now that includes complexity science, cognitive science, finite math, AI, and whatever else helps me understand systems, behavior, and decision-making a little better.
I like to read, write, hike, do sports, take pictures, travel, and spend time with close friends. I also still enjoy technical side projects because they help me stay close to implementation and changes in web technology.
I know HTML, CSS, JavaScript, React, TypeScript, and basic SQL. My technical background is strongest on the frontend, but the bigger value is that I understand how software gets built well enough to discuss trade-offs, ask better questions, and work closely with engineers on product decisions.
Right now, I’m focused on improving my German (and becoming a citizen), sharpening my coding skills, and spending more time learning automation via both deterministic and AI-supported approaches. I like staying close to technical work, even though I’m not trying to return to engineering as my primary role.
I’m happy to talk about product management, web development, emerging technology, economics, and the broader question of how people think and make decisions.
- Based in Berlin
- Bay Area native
- MBA, EDHEC Business School
- B.S. in Finance, California State University, Los Angeles
- Project Management Institute Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP®)
- Website: georgebullock.dev
- My blog: George Bullock
- My photography: Unsplash