Gianluca CaicoLead Experience Designer, Bound

Melbourne · CX & experience design leadership

Over 14 years, I've shaped the everyday experiences of the banks, insurers, energy providers and sporting codes most Australians deal with every week.

I partner with executives to shape the strategy, then stay in the room until it lands. Boardroom to build, and the steady hand brought in when an at-risk program needs a reset.

Get in touch See the work
Gianluca Caico standing at a table of laptops in a bright office
Gianluca CaicoLead Experience Designer, Bound

Partnered with

  • NAB
  • Westpac
  • Bupa
  • Generation Life
  • Protecht
  • AGL
  • AFL
Gianluca presenting to a packed room from beside a screen
Facilitating training to stand up a full design function for a Tier 1 healthcare provider.

Most transformation work fails quietly, in the gap between the slide and the sprint. My job is to close that gap: aligning executives, designers and delivery teams around one plan, then staying close enough to it that it actually ships.

How I approach an engagement

Outcomes I've driven

Banking, wealth, health, energy, SaaS & sport
$3M+
sustained revenue enabled across Tier 1 financial services over 24 months.
$50k → $1M+
a healthcare engagement grown into a multi-year transformation program.
~$200K
additional funding secured in SaaS through a clear CX value narrative.
1 week → 1 day
CX blueprint delivery, via a reusable AI-driven component library.
100+
practitioners enabled through organisation-wide CX and transformation uplift.
40+
senior stakeholders aligned in high-pressure, regulated environments.

What I help with

The EXD agentic design thinking model

A proven foundation

Built on the double diamond and human-centred design, the industry-standard approach I've worked in throughout my career.

Agents assist, people decide

At Bound I helped sharpen the agentic role at each stage, with a human gate at every one.

Never linear

Work loops back whenever the evidence calls for it.

Where I add most is the full span, from shaping the commercial opportunity before Align to staying on as a trusted partner after Monitor. Tap any stage.

Diamond 1
Diamond 2
Diamond 3

Enter at any stage · Loop back anytime · A human gate at every one

Before the model

Business development

Opening the relationship

Shaping the opportunity with client leadership: the problem worth solving, the commercial case, pricing, resourcing and proposal. The engagement starts with a clear question and a reason to invest in answering it.

Stage 1 of 6

Align

Establish project vision

OutcomeProject frame and hypotheses

The common goal is explored across teams, organisations and customers.

Human gateSet intent

Define the goals, the areas to investigate, the research questions and how to achieve them.

Agentic lanePrepare and collect

Take notes across meetings and interviews, and assist in workshop and interview preparation.

Stage 2 of 6

Discover

Research and insights

OutcomeBlueprints, synthetic persona panel, prototype

The fuzzy idea becomes a grounded problem.

Human gateInterpret

Challenge assumptions, judge what counts as evidence and decide what matters.

Agentic laneAnalyse and synthesise

Classify claims, cluster the themes and architect the final deliverables.

Stage 3 of 6

Define

Prioritise solutions

OutcomePrioritised insights and roadmap

The problem is addressed with prioritised hypotheses.

Human gatePrioritise and direct

Theme the evidence into core insights, choose the few opportunities worth pursuing and set the direction.

Agentic laneRank and draft

Rank opportunities by impact, effort and evidence, and draft the blueprint and roadmap for review.

Stage 4 of 6

Design

Ideate, design and test

OutcomeValidated design direction

The idea becomes tangible, clickable, testable, valuable.

Human gateJudge and craft

Direct the concept, judge desirability and quality, decide what to test and interpret the results.

Agentic laneGenerate and prototype

Produce concept variations, draft UI and copy, assemble clickable prototypes and test scripts.

Stage 5 of 6

Deliver

Build, test and launch

OutcomeWorking, tested increment

The idea becomes real, tested software matching the spec.

Human gateOwn and assure

Own scope and acceptance, assure quality and risk, and make the release and go-live decisions.

Agentic laneBuild and test (assist)

Draft specs and acceptance criteria, accelerate code and coverage, and flag defects for triage.

Stage 6 of 6

Monitor

Check, control, correct

OutcomePerformance dashboard and backlog

The proven idea is measured to success and keeps improving.

Human gateGovern and decide

Set and own the measures of success, read performance against intent, decide what to keep, kill or scale.

Agentic laneMeasure and surface

Instrument and collect performance data, surface anomalies and draft the performance readout.

After the model

Trusted partner

Staying in the room

Reading performance against intent with leadership, deciding what to keep, kill or scale, and shaping what comes next. This is where one engagement becomes a multi-year partnership, and where the loop back to business development starts.

The relationship rarely ends at Monitor. Trusted-advisor work loops straight back into new business development, which is why my accounts tend to grow into multi-year partnerships rather than one-off projects.

Spotlight

Dynamic blueprinting

One capability inside the EXD model

A service blueprint is usually accurate on the day it's signed off and out of date the day after. Dynamic blueprinting treats it as software instead: all evidence lands in one ledger, and the blueprint is simply a view over it. Here's the framework in four steps, using an everyday example: returning an online order.

Capture every input in one place

Interviews, site visits, data and workshops all land in the same ledger before anything is mapped. Nothing lives only in someone's notebook.

Customer interviewsStore visit notesReturns dataStaff workshop
One ledgerEvery input goes through the same door

Break it into sourced claims

Each input becomes atomic claims: one statement per row, typed as fact or hypothesis, with a source and a date. That's what makes a finding defensible months later.

Most customers start a return on their phoneFactReturns data
Customers find the returns label confusingHypothesisStaff workshop
Store staff re-scan every returned parcelFactStore visit notes

Flag contradictions, don't smooth them

When two claims disagree, both stay on the board with their sources attached. Often both are true and the real question is a definition, which is far cheaper to settle in discovery than in delivery.

Refunds are issued within 3 daysFactStaff workshop Flagged
Customers wait 10+ days for their moneyFactCustomer interviews Flagged

Both are true: one clock starts at the warehouse, the other at drop-off. One definition gets agreed and becomes the baseline.

Render the blueprints as views

The current and target state blueprints are views over the ledger. When new evidence lands, the views re-run and every step keeps its link to the claims behind it. Try adding a late input.

Current state blueprintRendered from the ledger
Target state blueprintRendered from the ledger

Illustrative example.

Evidence in days

Synthesis runs continuously, so findings arrive during discovery rather than in a block at the end of it.

Findings that outlast the room

Every claim keeps its lineage, so decisions survive challenge, sponsor changes and new delivery partners.

A target state in delivery units

Steps are marked proposed or retired against the step they replace: a build list and a stop-doing list, not a report.

A number without lineage is an opinion. An insight without a traceable source is the same thing in a nicer font.

Tech ecosystem

Tap any node

Research, agents, design system and code run as one loop, so evidence flows through to a live, versioned artefact instead of a static file, and what's learned in delivery feeds the next round of research.

01 · Evidence

Research

Interviews, ethnographic shadowing, workshops and analytics. Every input becomes a sourced, atomic claim in the ledger.

  • EvidenceResearch
  • IntelligenceAnthropic, Agents
  • Design systemFigma, Storybook
  • ArtefactHTML, CSS, JavaScript
  • DeliveryGitHub

↺ Delivery feeds new evidence back into research, and the loop runs again.

Career timeline

Tap any engagement to expand

Every client engagement since 2022 has been led from within Bound. They sit inside that role below, framed by what changed rather than what I was called.

  1. Oct 2022 – Present

    Bound, part of The Omnia Collective

    Lead Experience Designer

    Principal-level across the full arc of an engagement, from executive strategy through to hands-on delivery. Account leadership, pricing and resourcing, presales and capability uplift, and the first call for project rescue. Omnia is an Australian group of 300+ data, AI, digital experience and technology specialists.

    Engagements led at Bound7 highlights, newest first

    Showing all 7 engagements

    Generation Life Wealth · Latest Agentic, evidence-led discovery A traceable evidence layer for the next transformation phase

    Led an agentic, human-in-the-loop research engagement with financial advisers, building an evidence layer that turned insight into clean journeys and set up Generation Life's next phase of transformation.

    NAB Banking · Feb 2026 – Present Agentic digital sales transformation Weeks of journey mapping and synthesis compressed into days

    Leading CX strategy across digital sales journeys at the intersection of product, data and business. Agentic workflows turned fragmented digital sales operations into a prioritised, delivery-ready roadmap, and blended quantitative and qualitative insight now supports data-led decisions at executive level.

    Protecht SaaS · Jan – Feb 2026 Agentic native platform transformation ~$200K incremental funding; CX institutionalised as a funded capability

    Engagement lead for the CX stream. Combined CSAT, CES and SUPR-Q with UX/UI heuristics to pinpoint critical experience gaps, used agentic tooling to accelerate synthesis and prioritisation, then handed ownership to a senior team member for sustainable delivery.

    Westpac (UNITE) Banking · 2024 – 2026 Business & consumer transformation $3M+ sustained revenue and ~20–30% less rework

    Led a design squad inside Westpac's national tech simplification program, spanning Controlled Monies, Business and Consumer banking, Mortgages, Credit Cards and High Net Worth. Grew the engagement from one contributor to 5+ embedded team members and built an AI-driven component library that cut CX blueprint delivery from about a week to a day.

    AFL Sport Digital homepage discovery Discovery that grew into a lasting advisory partnership

    Directed research, hypothesis validation and executive playback to reimagine the AFL homepage for new and casual fans, embedding product-led thinking that reshaped internal workflows and decision-making.

    Bupa Health · 2022 – 2024 Enterprise design system strategy $50k engagement grown into a $1M+ multi-year program

    Engagement lead across cross-functional teams of up to 15. Facilitated high-stakes workshops to land a governance framework and roadmap that reached ~80% completion in 12 months, securing lasting adoption and stakeholder buy-in.

    AGL Energy Login, authentication & CDR Adaptive MFA and CDR Tranche 2 compliant experiences shipped

    Led CX and DesignOps for AGL's login and authentication refactor, balancing usability, trust and risk posture while streamlining agile delivery and aligning to the enterprise design language.

  2. Jul 2021 – Oct 2022

    No Moss Co

    Lead Product Designer (UX/UI)

    Built the design practice from the ground up: standards, component library governance and design-led revenue streams. Led design thinking workshops with teams of 14, from C-suite to junior, on a global LMS, health and recruitment platform.

  3. Mar 2020 – Jul 2021

    atisfy

    Senior UX/UI Manager

    Two promotions in under 18 months, from UX/UI Designer to leading UX, UI and branding globally across atisfy and its subsidiaries, including Growth Marketing Genie and Game Marketing Genie.

  4. 2012 – 2020

    Foundations

    Design, brand and operations

    Eight years across interactive, print and brand work, often client-facing, that built the commercial instincts I still use.

    Show roles
    • Rutledge AVOct 2016 – Mar 2020
      Content Creation Designer (UX) / Marketing & Design Coordinator

      UX, UI and motion for interactive touch apps, digital signage, kiosks and video walls, plus the company website redesign end to end.

    • Kwik Kopy AustraliaMar 2013 – Oct 2016
      Creative & Operations Lead

      Client workshops, brand strategy and account management alongside print and digital design, pre-press and quality control.

    • The Champagne DameSep 2012 – Mar 2013
      Digital & Graphic Designer

      Graphic and web design for a growing masterclass business. My first experience working alongside a successful entrepreneur.

    • VISY2007
      Work experience, internal design studio

      Two weeks in pre-press and packaging design that confirmed design was the right path.

Sep 2009 – Present

Running in parallel

Creative Director, Gianluca Caico Design

A freelance illustration, branding and graphic design practice that has run alongside every role above. It's why the strategy work always holds together visually.

Credentials

AI, consulting & leadership

  • Generative AI LeaderGoogle
  • Claude 101Anthropic
  • BD Catalyst ProgramCollective IntelligenceMar 2026
  • Consulting EssentialsCMA Consulting GroupSep 2024
  • Manager Foundation AcceleratorThe MintableOct 2023
  • Design Sprint MasterclassAJ&SmartSep 2021

Design education

  • Advanced Diploma of Advertising & Graphic DesignTractor Design School2011 – 2012
  • Advanced Diploma in Printing & Graphic Arts (Multimedia)RMIT University2009 – 2010
  • Certificate II in MultimediaMelbourne Polytechnic
Gianluca mid-swing on the driving range

Outside the work, I'm a proud father and family man. The rest of my time goes to music and drumming, fitness, golf and AFL footy.

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