Built in complex environments. Shipped in production.
I have worked in the rooms where demanding products get decided, built, and measured — across finance, fintech and B2B.
Founder & Principal Consultant
7X Experience · Frankfurt / Remote
Independent practice serving tier-1 banks, fintech scale-ups and product-led organisations across Europe. Embedded research, design and product engagements — typically 8 to 16 weeks.
- —Six tier-1 financial services engagements shipped to production
- —Recurring advisory for two European fintech scale-ups
- —Coached three in-house heads of design through their first year
Lead User Researcher
Deutsche Bank — Private & Commercial Bank · Frankfurt
Founded and led the user research practice within the digital private banking division. Grew the team from one to nine, instrumented a bank-wide research repository, and partnered with product on the wealth onboarding redesign.
- —Built the research practice from scratch in a regulated environment
- —Shipped a research repository adopted across six product lines
- —Lead researcher on the wealth onboarding redesign (–58% time-to-account)
Senior UX Researcher
European brokerage platform · Frankfurt / London
Embedded researcher on the institutional trading platform team. Built the trader research panel that is still in use today.
UX Designer & Researcher
Digital consultancy · Cologne
Generalist design and research work across banking, insurance and B2B SaaS clients. The years that taught me how things really get built.
"Niels brought a quietness and rigour to a team that had been running on opinion for years. He left us with a way of working we still use."
"Few consultants understand both the trading floor and the design studio. Niels is one of them."
"He told us the truth about our product, kindly. We shipped a better one because of it."
62 certifications
Over sixty completed certifications across research, design and product — kept current, never collected for show. Click any item to open the linked certificate or PDF.
Interaction Design Foundation — Courses
18 / 62- 01Data-Driven Design: Quantitative Research for UX↗
- 02Service Design: How to Design Integrated Service Experiences↗
- 03Accessibility: How to Design for All↗
- 04Affordances: Designing Intuitive User Interfaces↗
- 05Get Your Product Used: Adoption and Appropriation↗
- 06Dynamic User Experience: Design and Usability↗
- 07Gamification — How to Create Engaging User Experiences↗
- 08Web Design for Usability↗
- 09UX Management: Strategy and Tactics↗
- 10Information Visualization: Getting Dashboards Right↗
- 11Psychology of E-Commerce: How to Sell Online↗
- 12How to Become a Freelance Designer↗
- 13Conducting Usability Testing↗
- 14How to Design for Augmented and Virtual Reality↗
- 15User Research — Methods and Best Practices↗
- 16The Ultimate Guide to Visual Perception and Design↗
- 17Mobile User Experience (UX) Design↗
- 18Human-Computer Interaction — HCI↗
Interaction Design Foundation — Masterclasses
24 / 62- 01Data-Driven Design: Metrics That Drive Real Results↗
- 02How to Make Your AI Project a Success↗
- 03Design KPIs: From Insights to Impact↗
- 04AI-Powered UX Design: How to Elevate Your UX Career↗
- 05Game UX Design Foundations: Starter Edition↗
- 06Beyond Interfaces: The UI Design Skills You Need to Know↗
- 07How to Break into UX Design and Product Design: A Career Change Guide↗
- 08User Journey Mapping for Better UX↗
- 09How to Design for an Aging Population↗
- 10Design For Agile: Common Mistakes and How to Avoid Them↗
- 11How to Use Card Sorting for Better Information Architecture↗
- 12Innovating in an Enterprise: The Challenges and How to Overcome Them↗
- 13Design for the 21st Century with Don Norman↗
- 14How to Prepare for the Future of Mobile UX↗
- 15How to Remove Bias from Your Products↗
- 16How to Attract Users Through Great Onboarding Experiences↗
- 17How to Design Forms Like an Expert↗
- 18How to Design UX That Users Love to Convert Through↗
- 19How to Deal with People Who Don't Get Design↗
- 20How to Conduct Effective User Interviews↗
- 21UX Magic: Achieve 10X Better Designs Through Semantic Interaction Design↗
- 22Win Clients, Pitches and Approval: Present Your Designs Effectively↗
- 23How to Design Experiences for AI↗
- 24Disruptive Design: Is your UX Future-Proof?↗
Nielsen Norman Group
17 / 62UserZoom
01 / 62IDEO U
02 / 62Want the long version?
A one-page CV and detailed engagement portfolio are available on request.