Adilson Chicória

Field Notes series

13 articles on how companies define the Product Engineer role, combining hiring evidence and practitioner voices.

13 Field Notes articles on the Product Engineer role.

Weights: Tech 30%, Design 30%, Business 40%. theproductengineer.net

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AI due-diligence platform for buying a home in Portugal: 22 Claude skills in four levels across an 11-stage buyer journey.

• Covers seismic risk, flood zones, noise, mobility, urban development, rental yield, mortgage and bank-contract analysis, insurance proposals and a clause-by-clause CPCV review.
• Used it in my own home purchase: 6 months, 40+ apartments visited.
• Next.js 15, TypeScript, PostgreSQL, Drizzle ORM, Playwright, Claude Code.

22 Claude skills across an 11-stage buyer journey.

Weights: Tech 50%, Design 30%, Business 20%.

DECOLE Plano de Voo

AI career coaching for ESG careers: a 7-prompt n8n pipeline writes a personalised career flight plan and delivers it by email (Next.js 14, TypeScript, PostgreSQL, n8n, Brevo).

Weights: Tech 50%, Design 20%, Business 30%.

VTSD AI Skills Library

An end-to-end launch pipeline for digital products: 9-axis market research, product conception, ad creatives, sales-page copy and email sequences, with human approval at each stage.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 10%, Business 50%.

Funnel & sales-page measurement platform

Server-side tracking (GA4 + Meta Ads) from first touch to purchase on Cloudflare Workers, fed by Hotmart webhooks, applied to two ESG-career products.

• Sales pages instrumented by section, call-to-action and sales-video watch-through.
• Ran funnel and campaign reports directly with Claude Code and Codex to drive experiments on copy, section order, CTAs and targeting.
• In one Meta campaign, sending a new ad to the page section that continued its message (instead of the hero) raised click-to-conversion by 70%.

+70% click-to-conversion after matching the ad to its page section.

Weights: Tech 45%, Design 10%, Business 45%.

Harnessing Agents

A curated library of AI engineering patterns distilled from practitioners including Peter Steinberger, Kent Beck, Andrej Karpathy, Simon Willison, Armin Ronacher and Mitchell Hashimoto.

Weights: Tech 80%, Design 10%, Business 10%.

Edit Data transaction manager

The core transaction manager for the new Edit Data experience, letting developers edit app data directly in the OutSystems IDE.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Multi-platform IDE experiences

New experiences and web components for the Windows and Mac OutSystems IDE in C#, React and TypeScript.

Weights: Tech 100%.

OutSystems IDE Onboarding Experience

Designed and implemented the new onboarding so prospective users perceive value within 5 minutes.

5 min for a new OutSystems user to perceive value.

Weights: Tech 60%, Design 30%, Business 10%. Weights are my reading.

Guided Tour Framework

Bridged Avalonia, C# and the web layer so engineers could create guided tours highlighting IDE features.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Application-group mapping API

A REST API for the cloud-native Identity Platform so authorisation rules apply to app groups.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Glossary Tool redesign

Refactored the UI of the main workflow for three different user types, generating customised glossaries for client brands.

Weights: Tech 80%, Design 20%. Weights are my reading.

End-to-end testing with Cypress

Designed and implemented an end-to-end testing scenario with Cypress.

Weights: Tech 100%.

IBM IoT Automation Console

Let non-engineers provision IBM Maximo and TRIRIGA SaaS environments and trigger complex tasks without a senior DevOps engineer.

• Facilitated requirements through remote design thinking workshops over three sprints (6 weeks).
• Played the Scrum Product Owner, breaking storyboards, journeys and needs into epics and stories.
• Designed high-fidelity prototypes with the Carbon Design System in Sketch and validated them with users and stakeholders in InVision.
• Defined and built the React and Redux frontend architecture on Carbon for React.
• Built RESTful/RPC backend APIs in Java (Jersey, Morphia, MongoDB).
• Deployed microservices on Kubernetes in IBM Cloud with Maven 2 and Jenkins pipelines.
• Led and coached a team of 3 to 7 frontend engineers.

Weights: Tech 50%, Design 40%, Business 10%.

Scaling IBM Design Thinking

2014–2019

Innovation Catalyst and Design Thinking facilitator: more than 30 Enterprise Design Thinking workshops for employees, plus client workshops to find openings for IBM Cloud and hardware.

30+ Enterprise Design Thinking workshops delivered.

Weights: Design 80%, Business 20%.

IBM Studios Summit ’16

2016

Studio leader: wrote the 2016–2017 studio strategy for design practice and collaboration at IBM Brazil.

Weights: Design 60%, Business 40%.

IBM Studios External Eminence

2017

Program lead: promoted IBM Design practice in design and engineering communities, presenting at the IBM Studios Summit 2017 to representatives of 58 studios.

58 IBM studios at the 2017 Summit.

Weights: Design 70%, Business 30%.

Lab Studio Activation Program

2018

Service designer and facilitator: put the studio collaboration strategy into practice by combining Design Thinking, Agile and DevOps; more than 150 participants since 2017.

150+ participants in the Lab Studio program.

Weights: Tech 20%, Design 60%, Business 20%.

São Paulo Design Thinking Chapter

2018

Chapter head: meetings, shared challenges and coaching so IBMers in São Paulo could earn Design Thinking certifications.

Weights: Design 90%, Business 10%.

IBM Brazil Lab Tech Day

2018

Lead coordinator: took a volunteer team through design thinking to understand the audience and run the call for papers.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 50%, Business 10%.

Saint Paul Innovation Lab

2018

Facilitator: with Saint Paul Business School, created a strategic innovation lab for leaders exploring disruptive technology and innovation tools.

Weights: Tech 10%, Design 50%, Business 40%.

TREE Lab (FDC–IBM)

2018

Service designer and facilitator: designed and built the first cognitive lab inside a business school.

Weights: Tech 30%, Design 50%, Business 20%.

Javelin Program for Bradesco

2019

Facilitator: helped IBM executives adopt Enterprise Design Thinking in the Javelin Program for Bradesco, Brazil's largest bank.

Weights: Design 60%, Business 40%.

IBM Enterprise Thinking Conference, Brazil

2019

Organiser and speaker: accelerated Enterprise Design Thinking among practitioners, managers, executives and clients.

Weights: Design 70%, Business 30%.

IBM IoT Status Dashboard

Redefined the whole experience of the Watson IoT Platform service-status page for the public and more than 290 dedicated clients (React, Bootstrap, Node.js, REST, Java EE).

290+ dedicated clients on the Watson IoT status page.

Weights: Tech 70%, Design 30%. Weights follow the role split, with more UX for this project (my reading).

IBM IoT Executive Dashboard

Designed and built an executive dashboard for the Watson IoT division: aggregated client data and offering visualisations for data-driven decisions.

Weights: Tech 70%, Design 10%, Business 20%. Weights are my reading.

Bootstrapped IBM Studios São Paulo

2015

Studio leader: set up a design studio inside IBM Brazil's Software Lab so engineers, managers and directors could adopt a user-centred strategy.

Weights: Design 70%, Business 30%.

IBM GBS On/Off Boarding Tool

Designed, built and maintained the tool used by more than half of IBM's contractor population to join and leave projects.

50%+ of IBM's contractor population used the On/Off Boarding Tool.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Accelerating the Graduate Hiring Program

Program coordinator: IBM professionals teaching undergraduates in universities and technical schools to meet demand in the Global Delivery Center.

• Pitched and ran the program for three audiences: executives, students and teachers, across five cities and 10 universities in São Paulo state.
• Managed 20-hour classes with universities, instructors and HR partners.
• Trained a pool of more than 500 undergraduates in Java, SQL, .NET, shell scripting and COBOL within six months.

500+ undergraduates trained in six months.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 20%, Business 40%. Weights are my reading.

São Paulo City Health Department

2007–2009

Lead architect and developer of purchasing-management software and the “Medicine at Home” health-program software (Spring, JSF/RichFaces, JPA, MySQL, Maven 2).

Weights: Tech 100%.

Due diligence audit for Unimed of Brazil

2008

Lead technical consultant auditing best practice and security across 27 applications of a health insurer.

• Audited best practice and security across 27 applications.
• Built a custom tracking system on Jira and Confluence to follow every interaction, integrated with Sonar for code analysis.

27 applications audited at Unimed.

Weights: Tech 60%, Business 40%.

Fundepag

2008–2009

Lead architect of a web system to track customised service offerings, integrating Spring, Struts 2, JPA, MySQL, MS SQL and Microsiga.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Business intelligence for EMS Pharma

2008–2009

Lead architect and developer of BI solutions, a Liferay portal and software to synchronise controlled-medicine records.

R$500K a month saved in mobile services at EMS Pharma.

Weights: Tech 60%, Business 40%.

3M Brazil reference architecture

2009

Designed the reference architecture for Java EE intranet applications and led two intranet apps: tracking government-controlled substances and running cost forecasts.

Weights: Tech 100%.

A pharmaceutical product, and the product-market fit lesson

Led the development of a pharmaceutical product and had to move from a quality-driven mindset to a customer-development one to find product-market fit.

Weights: Tech 35%, Design 20%, Business 45%. Weights are my reading.

Co-creator of Business Model Generation

2009

Contributed to the book's processes and tools for analysing and designing business models with visual thinking.

Weights: Design 35%, Business 65%. Business Model Generation (Strategyzer)

CpqD Telecom & Utilities Billing Solution

Core business components, built test-first, kept consistent across industries.

• Designed, developed and maintained core business components following Java EE practice: EJBs, persistence layers and an in-house tag library.
• Worked test-driven with Ant, Maven 1 and 2 and shell scripts inside an in-house continuous integration framework.
• Kept core components consistent across industries and branches with ClearCase.
• Played developer, designer and architect in the Rational Unified Process, from requirements to testing.

Weights: Tech 100%.

ETMS: ATM Management System

The company's first product, funded by HSBC Bank.

• Built the company's first product, funded by HSBC Bank, while keeping Java 1.3 compatibility.
• Created a monitoring interface with vanilla JavaScript and Java applets, using frame sets to mimic what AJAX would later do.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Pamcary PAMCARD: smart-card payment for freight

Money uploads to smart cards from the browser.

• Simulated desktop application behaviour with early JavaScript and frame sets for Internet Explorer and Firefox.
• Kept transaction integrity while uploading money to smart cards through OCX and JavaScript integrations.
• Built SOAP web services with Apache Axis so Delphi systems at transport clients could integrate.

Weights: Tech 100%.

SIGEN: telemetric utilities management

Web applications that behaved like desktop software, using JavaScript and synchronised agent/command processes.

Weights: Tech 100%.

Website for a music college (fmcg.com.br)

2000–2002

Bilingual website with a Flash 4 intro for Faculdade de Música Carlos Gomes in São Paulo, credited for design in 2001 and for web design in the 2002 redesign with the agency Mais Integrada.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 30%, Business 30%. Weights follow the split of the freelance role: I sold, designed and built each site. Archived site, 2001 · Archived page, 2002

Website for an animal health plan (vetplan.com.br)

2000–2003

Website with dynamic pages and a Flash 4 intro for an animal health plan in Ribeirão Preto, built with the partner MDLim and credited "Desenvolvido por Adilson C. Jardim e MDLim".

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 30%, Business 30%. Weights follow the split of the freelance role: I sold, designed and built each site. Archived site, 2001

Websites for a course company (Vision)

Sites for a course company, built with the partner MDLim. The client kept coming back for more sites, including negociadores.com.br.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 30%, Business 30%. Weights follow the split of the freelance role: I sold, designed and built each site.

Website for negotiation courses (negociadores.com.br)

Dynamic ASP site for the same course client, credited "Desenvolvimento - Adilson C. Jardim" on its contact page.

Weights: Tech 40%, Design 30%, Business 30%. Weights follow the split of the freelance role: I sold, designed and built each site. Archived contact page, 2004

Newsstand management system

Stock, cash flow and consignment for the newsstand I ran with my brother, first in Clipper and then in Delphi. Seven newsstands used it until magazine distributors began handing out their own system, and it was sold.

Weights: Tech 60%, Design 10%, Business 30%. Weights are my reading.

Parking-lot management system

Custom Delphi software for one client, built in cycles of requirements, build and validation with the owner.

Weights: Tech 80%, Design 20%. Weights are my reading.

Java report daemon for a Consoft client

A one-off job and my first professional Java: a daemon on the server that generated HTML report pages for one of Consoft's clients. It opened the door to Java at HST.

Weights: Tech 100%. Weights are my reading.