Harsha Vemulapalli

About

Creativity that listens and learns.

Harsha at five, leaning on his father’s Chevrolet Impala

Curious from the start.
Me at five, with my father’s Chevrolet Impala, Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Great products need the imagination to see something better, the systems that let hundreds of people build it well, and the evidence that it truly works for customers. I’ve spent my career building teams that bring all three together, and growing the people who lead them.

How I got here

My mother was an artist. My father was a quality control engineer who worked on nuclear reactors during their startup phase, and each new plant meant a new town every two or three years: Vicksburg, Long Island, South Jersey, Pittsburgh, Augusta… Being the new kid taught me to watch closely, understand people, and see things from their side.

I started college in physics and engineering, which was all numbers and no people. Then I spent five years running restaurants, which was all people and no numbers. Back in school in Atlanta, I found the middle: understanding why people do what they do, and being able to build on that understanding.

My first real lesson came at an energy trading company, when usage of a trading tool I’d designed fell from 800 people to 3 in two days. I spent a week on the trading floor learning how traders actually worked, and we rebuilt the tool around them. Every project I’ve led since has started the same way.

At the CDC I took on my first leadership role, in a scientific culture where only evidence counted; our redesign of HIVTest.org lifted HIV testing conversion 70%. At General Motors I led the design of the owner journey across seven brands, and learned that design was expected to grow revenue and loyalty. At Bosch I joined as employee zero in North America and built a practice of about 120 people, and learned that design leaders don’t just make things: they change how organizations think. At VMware I led design and research through the company’s move to SaaS.

Today at Siemens I lead a 70-person design, research, and content organization across seven countries, with AI built into how we work. It’s the biggest stage yet for bringing the creative and the quantitative together.

How I work

My job is to help teams see what we’re building toward, then give them what they need to get there. That means ways of working we build together, room to grow into leaders, and a high bar measured by customers and business results, not opinions.

  1. Shared vision and values

    It starts with a clear picture of what we’re building toward, shaped with the team so it’s theirs too. Then we build how we work, together: shared values, clear roles and decisions, and new processes whenever the old ones slow the team down.

  2. Trust, and high standards

    People need to feel safe to speak up, and the work needs a bar that doesn’t bend. One without the other gets you a comfortable team or an anxious one. The bar is kodawari, the Japanese idea of an uncompromising, personal commitment to craft, held by everyone, not enforced by me.

  3. Creativity, tested with real people

    Diverse ideas are the raw material. Critique is feedback to test, not a verdict, so real customers settle debates instead of whoever is most senior.

  4. Growth, in people and results

    When it works, both grow. An AI product finder lifted conversion 23%, and a redesigned quoting tool cut time on task 30%. At Siemens, a career-growth tool shows everyone the skills for the role they want next.

  5. Leaders at every level

    Leadership is behavior, not title. The people I grow hold the values, co-create, flag questions and decisions early, and treat critique as something to test. More than ten have stepped into manager and director roles.

Then it starts again, with more leaders to carry it.

In their words

“When Harsha speaks, people listen. … In one meeting, I could tell that I was talking to the design leader that I’ve always wanted to be. … His command of user experience ensures user advocacy at the most senior levels.”

Jorge (Jay) Bustamante, reported to me at VMware
Joined my team from Polaris Alpha, where he was Director of Marketing & Design Services

“His leadership and mentorship enabled other employees to grow and take on new responsibilities that weren’t possible before. Harsha made it possible to grow the team while expanding the potential of all involved. … Anyone looking to build a world class user experience department would be lucky to have him on the team.”

Micah Stroud, my manager at General Motors
Later Head of Product, Digital at Lucid Motors

Read the full recommendations on LinkedIn

Outside work

I’m fascinated by how things are designed: pens, watches, and especially cars. I’ve owned 24 of them, not to collect, but to live with each one and understand the thinking behind it. I’m still enamored with black holes and time as a fourth dimension. And watching my daughter navigate technology with native fluency keeps revealing my own biases.