Kai Cedeno - Product Manager, Chegg, Nike, Zappos

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Work Background

Chegg Inc.Product Manager II

Apr. 2023Hybrid

Chegg Inc.Senior Software Engineer

Apr. 2019 - Apr. 2023Portland, OregonAs a founding engineer tasked with the critical responsibility of migrating a legacy tool for our internal customers, I recognized that a mere feature-for-feature migration would be insufficient as it was essential to ensure the new product would truly meet our customers' needs. ● I proactively assumed the role of product manager, and embarked on a comprehensive customer research initiative. ● This involved analyzing feature usage, conducting customer interviews, and gathering feedback through UAT to ensure that our new product would not only meet our customers' needs, but also align with business objectives. ● By taking this proactive approach, we delivered a high-quality product that reduced the time to search and issue exchanges as well as the overall page load time, thereby saving our customers time and lowering the business's cost per interaction. After our team proved the success of our product, we grew in size and brought on additional resources such as QE, Engineers, and a dedicated Product Manager. I utilized Agile/Scrum methodologies to effectively manage and prioritize tasks, ensuring timely completion of development projects. I worked closely with the QE, Engineers, and Product Manager to identify requirements and design solutions. I also provided technical leadership and mentorship to the team, helping to increase their productivity and efficiency by advocating for further adoption of Scrum. Our team exceeded project objectives, delivering high-quality products on time and within budget. Our success in these projects helped to further establish the success of our product and contributed to the growth of our team.

NikeSenior Web Application Engineer

Apr. 2018 - Apr. 2019Portland, Oregon AreaI was entrusted with the responsibility of developing a product for the Nike Sports Research Lab, which is utilized by professional athletes and others for testing, that would enable researchers to locate, schedule, and obtain consent from participants. ● Collaborated with internal customers and stakeholders to obtain feature and compliance requirements, translated them into technical requirements and user stories. ● I developed proof-of-concept (POC) and production web applications that simplified scheduling research subjects, data collection, and online consent. ● The researchers were able to expediently collect human subjects, efficiently schedule participants, and securely document regulatory consent, thereby reducing the time they spent on study preparation.

ExpertVoiceSoftware Engineer II

Aug. 2017 - Mar. 2018Salt Lake City, UTI was responsible for developing and implementing the UGC components, which involved close collaboration with the product and design teams to ensure a seamless user experience. I worked on all teams from my account, to UGC, and user profile, taking on any tasks needed to achieve project objectives. Through my efforts, we successfully implemented bleeding-edge frontend languages and built UGC components similar to Instagram. The use of new technologies helped to increase our product's functionality and maintain its competitiveness in the market. The UGC components I developed received positive feedback from users and improved the overall user experience. By working on all teams, I was able to effectively contribute to multiple areas of the product and ensure its overall success.

ExpertVoiceUI Engineer

Apr. 2015 - Aug. 2017Greater Salt Lake City AreaDuring my early days at Expert Voice, I worked on various teams and was responsible for advocating and implementing new frontend technologies. I implemented new frontend languages, such as Polymer and React and Redux. Additionally, I built User Generated Content (UGC) components similar to Instagram for posting, liking, commenting, and tagging images. I also worked on all teams from my account, to UGC, and user profile.

Zappos Family of CompaniesFront-End Developer

May. 2013 - Apr. 2015Las Vegas, Nevada AreaAfter Zappos was acquired by Amazon, all of Zappos engineering was tasked with migrating all landing, product, and account pages to Amazon's internal tooling. These proprietary systems were most similar to AWS and required significant effort to implement. My main responsibility was to onboard to Amazon's internal tooling as part of the larger effort to migrate our teams sign-in, password reset, and account pages. This task required a deep understanding of Amazon's internal tools and their integration with Zappos' existing technology stack. I took a proactive approach to onboarding to Amazon's internal tooling by investing significant time and effort into learning about the tools and their integration with Zappos' existing systems. I worked closely with the engineering teams at Amazon in Seattle and remotely to identify areas where the tools could be implemented and developed innovative solutions and proof of concepts to ensure a seamless integration. Through my efforts, I was able to deliver cutting-edge software solutions that exceeded expectations, resulting in positive feedback from users and stakeholders alike. My work also laid the foundation for future development, ensuring that the code and libraries I built could be reused for future projects. - and, it was a really fun place to work where I left with lifelong friends!