Dear reader in search of a speaker,

I'm always looking forward to the next time I get to share a stage with a curious audience.

I was in my early 20s when I joined Spotify and was made responsible for the user interface design of the Spotify apps. Designing Spotify on everything from iOS and Android to Windows and obscure stereos, my life over the next few years turned into a crash course in how to build a successful product and startup. Back then the entire product team fit around a small table, and the design team was made up of two people: Andrea Rosengren and me. Today, Spotify is the world’s most popular music streaming service with over 60 million paying customers, and with a product design team of over 100 people. I was lucky to take part in that journey.

After leaving Spotify I moved from Stockholm to San Francisco and GitHub, and took up front-end development as part of my work. In 2017 I joined Mojang to lead the experience design of Minecraft, and I joined the jury of the Swedish Design Awards.

  1. Spotify

    Early Product Designer

  2. Hyper Island

    Industry Leader

  3. GitHub

    Designer & developer

  4. Jury Member

  5. Minecraft

    Experience Design Director

I kept coming back to my old school Hyper Island to share what I’d learned. It was here that I year after year shed away my shyness. I fell in love with speaking and teaching, and the wonders of helping students master new skills, overcome obstacles, and reach new goals. Over time that grew from a hobby into working as an Industry Leader for the school—speaking several times a week—recruiting new speakers, writing and rewriting the curriculum for one of the programs, and joining the steering committee for the Digital Data Strategist program.

At some point I spoke at a meet-up, then at a few more, and that escalated into speaking at other schools, at company events, and at conferences. Here are some that I've worked with:

Fronteers Sweco Expressen Spotify ustwo Hyper Island Aarhus Alpha Linköpings Universitet Codegarden iCodex WebExpo HybridConf Berghs School of Communication Code Pub Sthlm Sthlm.js Smatweb Cocoaheads Stockholm Bontouch DIBI - Design it build it Knightec Friends of executive United Europe Onedayout Full Frontal Stratiteq Pixel Pioneers, Bristol Northern Glow, Oulu Better by Design, Madison, Wisconsin Nackademin, Stockholm Alma Talent Nordic.Design

Today, as speaking opportunities have started taking me all over the world, from northern Finland and Bucharest to Madison, Wisconsin, I meet thousands of brilliant minds that teach me more about my profession and myself, and they're inspiring me to study harder and think more critically about product development and creativity than ever before.

In my talks and workshops I talk about how to deal with the rapid innovation that’s changing our society (digital transformation, how education needs to change, and how to build innovative and creative cultures) all the way down to the nitty gritty details of building successful products; data driven design, idea and risk management, creativity, decision making in groups, and product design. I use the stories from Spotify, GitHub and Minecraft to weave a story around my learnings, and make a point of grounding my advice in sound academic research.

If you’re interested in having me speak or host a workshop at your event or conference, please feel free to reach out. I’d love to work with you.

Sincerely,
Tobias Ahlin

hello@tobiasahlin.com

Say hi.

hello@
tobiasahlin.com

I love to design and make things. I used to make things at Spotify and Minecraft, and am currently a design engineer at GitHub. Say hi!

Tobias Ahlin Bjerrome
Stockholm, Sweden