Meet The Product & UI/UX Team

Introduction

Here you are! You presumably found this blog through a link on one of our social media platforms or directly from our website. Imagine If you want to look for "coding courses online," the first thing you'll do is head to the search bar.

Consider Google without a search bar or with a search bar but no search button. You will start to panic right? That is where product development comes in.

A product is a website or app and features that we can use. In general, a product is defined as "any item or service you sell to meet a customer's need or desire." In a business setting, a product might be physical or virtual, depending on the domain of the company. Now that we've established what the product is, let's look at what is the role of a product team in a business.

What is the role of a product team?

Product development teams are in charge of recognizing customer needs, developing new products, and bringing them to market. Aside from deciding what to develop, they must communicate the benefits and measure the product's success - both of which are critical responsibilities in any business.

For instance, students are unable to locate a specific assignment from a specific date. They must search through all of their logs to find the exact one. This is the problem statement that the user is facing, thus the product team will describe this problem statement and build a solution and execution method in this case. The solution was to add a filter so that students could sort their assignments by specific dates.

Let's get to know Masai's Product team, which works relentlessly to ensure the greatest possible user experience.

Pushkar - Connoisseur of stories

The product team is essential to the smooth functioning of Masai, just like Pushkar is to the product team.

An IIT Bombay graduate, Pushkar has worn a lot of different hats across the years. Graduating in Metallurgical engineering and material sciences didn’t stop him from trying his hands at marketing.

In fact, his zeal for finding creative challenges and desire to make a social impact has always informed his decisions. In college, this manifested in his passion for photography and deep interest in environmental engineering.

Afterwards, Pushkar worked as a UI/UX designer whilst slowly climbing the ladder to Product Manager. By this point, he had already decided to join Masai as it fits perfectly into the problem statement of making a positive dent in society.

A true cinephile, Pushkar routinely engrosses himself with all manners of art and cinema. From regional flicks to foreign films, he has likely seen it all. If not found with a bowl of popcorn and screen nearby, he’s likely lost listening to his favorite tunes or appreciating works of art. Some would say Pushkar has a thing for the storytelling.

With tremendous support from his team and the intrigue of the problem statements they’re faced with, he finds his time with Masai a highly rewarding experience.

Kaajal - Multiverse of talent

Being a good product manager needs one to have an understanding of the user and their persona, and Kaajal's experience in the brand and marketing industry gives her an edge making her a valuable asset to the Product Team. Having earned a degree in history with honors, Kaajal has a strong foundation in the humanities. Later, completing a Master's degree in advertising and marketing.

Kaajal began her time at Masai back when the company was just getting its feet off the ground and beginning to expand. She began as a freelancer before being hired as Masai's full-time Brand Manager. She highlights her experience at Masai and how it has been a period of significant growth for her as an individual.

Kaajal started out as a brand manager in marketing and is now the manager of an entire product line. New to the Product team, her primary responsibility is to work on the LMS (Learning Management System) Students and instructors use this product to access their lectures, assignments, attendance, and other information. Among her many duties are liaising with developers, planning the future of the product, and keeping everyone's expectations in check.

Kaajal has always had a passion for the arts and maintains that interest by creating digital artwork. She also enjoys getting her groove on to her favorite tunes, and she never misses a chance to dance. Her areas of interest are history and psychology.

Amogh - The peacemaker

In 2020, after completing his engineering degree in electronic communication, Amogh began working as a Product Analyst for Sprinklr, where he developed artificial intelligence and machine learning-based chatbots for large clients like Lenovo and Dell.

Amogh works as an Associate Product Manager at Masai, where he is responsible for improving user experience and resolving bugs and issues that arise on a daily basis.

Amogh decided to join Masai School because he wanted to work in the education technology industry and help improve the state of education in India. He joined Masai solely because he witnessed the care and affection that Masai extends to its students.

In his spare time, he enjoys reading fiction and nonfiction. He enjoys reading nonfiction stories, especially those of the horror genre because he can always learn something new from them. He is particularly interested in behavioral psychology because it improves his capacity to help users. He also enjoys taking photographs and writing in his spare time.

Amogh is a cool, collected, and methodical thinker who always follows the plan.

Abhishek - All things management

Abhishek is someone who knows how to get things done. Completing his graduation from IIT Kanpur in the Earth Science Branch, he always had a penchant for management. Honing his interests within the strong student-driven culture of the IIT, he even took consumer behavior courses to get to better know the end user.

He has worked as an IT Consultant in the past, tasked with salesforce development. However, his perennial desire to get into all things management coupled with the preference for a more challenging work environment to further grow and learn from resulted in Abhishek joining Masai as Associate Product Manager.

Abhishek places great importance on creation and innovation and on giving back to society. And his role at Masai is his way of serving that end.

When not in the office you’ll find him dancing to his own tailored playlist, or perhaps maintaining his painstakingly curated collection of over 150 coins. He finds expression in art of all kinds, be it paintings, body art, or tattoos, Abhishek dabbles in it all.

Teammates often use phrases like "Abhishek is full of energy," "super energetic," and “very passionate” to describe him.

Kunal - The Level headed

In 2018, Kunal, a BITS Pilani alum, began his professional career by working for a Food tech startup, where he gained invaluable experience in the field of product development.

During his time at college, Kunal was active in the National Service Society (NSS) BITS Pilani chapter, where he and his friends provided tutoring for low-income students in and around Pilani, a small village in the Indian state of Rajasthan.

As a result, when he came across Masai, he felt connected to Masai's mission of bridging the gap between people with skills and the opportunities available to them in the market. Kunal is developing a platform for hiring partners at Masai in order to streamline the placement process and reduce manual labour.

Kunal enjoys playing Cajón (Box drum instrument) when he is not working. Pablo, his pet dog, is his best friend and constant companion. On the weekends, his favourite activities are poker and late-night basketball games.

Kunal is someone who helps his teammates put things in perspective, and they know they can count on him.

What is UI/UX?

One aspect of working on a product is defining a problem statement and building the product itself, but another is giving the product a polished, professional look.

For instance, a rectangular search bar with several symbols representing your most recent searches is displayed directly below it. Let me give you an idea of what that might look like if it were actually implemented in a real-world design.

Now that the visual is in place, you can envision the final product. The design team's job is to give visual form to your idea. At Masai, our design team is comprised of Masai Alumni who were once students and are now improving the student experience.

Learn more about our Design team and how they work alongside the Product team.

Rakshith- Bike Maniac

Rakshith is a calm, controlled individual who handles things with patience. Rakshith has always had a strong interest in design and intended to pursue a B.Sc. in animation and design. But, because of the higher future prospects, he chose engineering, but the design was always his true passion.

He was always attempting to learn some design here and there, but when he heard about the possibility to learn UI/UX, he jumped at it and joined Masai.

Rakshith joined Masai as a Junior UI/UX designer after completing the 7-month training. Masai's vision and mission are very personal to Rakshith because Masai also enabled him to learn and pursue his passion. He had always felt compelled to contribute to society by resolving people's problems and improving their lives.

Rakshith is a biker at heart and refers to himself as a Bike Maniac. He also enjoys creating silhouette artworks in black and white.

Preety Rao - The Artist

Pretty is a commerce student seeking a Master's degree in commerce, but her main interest since childhood has always been art, and she is really brilliant at it. She was always painting as a child, and it became a means of expression for her. She was studying for an MBA but knew it wasn't what she wanted.

She had limited awareness of what was included in arts, so she began investigating ways to study creating on the internet. Initially, she began by learning graphic design, but she then discovered UI/UX and chose to learn about it. She fell in love with the idea of designing images from scratch right away.

During her college days, she was involved in several projects such as the placement cell, where she learned how the hiring process works, and the entrepreneurship cell, where she learned a lot about businesses. She was also a member of the dramatics and theatre club.

In her spare time, she enjoys dancing, painting, and reading inspirational and business novels.

Conclusion

The success of every company or organization depends heavily on the product team. They are the people that stay in regular contact with customers and take the feedback they provide into consideration at all times.

The product team works in short sprints with strong deadlines and deliverables, which keeps the team on their toes at all times and ensures that they are always producing high-quality work.

“Building product is not about having a large team to manage. It is about having a small team with the right people on it.”

- Fred Wilson