“Growth happens when fear meets excitement”

Senior Product Design Director Rannie Teodoro on design leadership, learning from her work as a researcher, and what’s next for her at Faire

Rannie Teodoro didn’t plan to become a product design leader. She was on track to join academia after getting her Ph.D. But one chat with a tech recruiter changed her trajectory — and eventually took her from Facebook to South Korea’s largest e-commerce company to now leading the Brand pillar at Faire.

We sat down with Rannie to learn more about her background in research, how her Ph.D. in Communication influences her work today, her biggest lessons from working in South Korea, and why she believes authenticity is one of her biggest strengths as a leader.

What do you do at Faire?

I currently lead design for the Brand pillar, which focuses on the end-to-end experience for brands on Faire. We help onboard and guide new and existing brands, making sure we’re helping them grow their businesses with our platform.

Rannie presenting on “Mastering the Message: Persuasive Communication in UX” at the UX+ Conference in Manila in 2024.

What did your career journey look like before coming to Faire?

Before joining Faire, I spent the last four years leading design teams at Coupang, which is known as the “Amazon of South Korea.” It’s an e-commerce marketplace where you can shop for anything including electronics, apparel, and groceries.

I led different teams within the organization, including UX teams responsible for unfinished journeys, the gateway experience, and product details pages. I also led the design systems and the brand experience teams, which set the foundational components and branding for the overall company.

Before Coupang, I was in the Bay Area leading the design organization for Thumbtack. The team included the product design, content strategy, research, and category strategy teams (there are over 400 different categories on Thumbtack). And before that, I worked at Facebook back when it was still called Facebook, leading core search research teams as well as overall internationalization of the search experience.

What did you learn from working and living in Korea? How do those insights show up in your work today?

I always knew I wanted to live abroad at some point and push myself to think beyond a Western lens. You start to realize how many assumptions you’ve internalized about users, communication styles, even what “good design” looks like. I remember thinking, if not now, then when? So when the opportunity in Korea came up, I took it as a challenge to be a stronger, more diversified leader.

For example, ninety percent of my team only spoke Korean, so I worked through interpreters every day. That changes how you lead. When everything is translated, you become much more thoughtful about your words. You have to be clear about your intent, crisp in your rationale, and deliberate in your decisions. I was determined to become a more disciplined communicator. It’s one thing to design in English. It’s another to ensure your hierarchy, clarity, and trust signals still hold up across different languages and cultural norms.

Also, there’s a deep work ethic and tenacity in Korean culture. Speed and excellence aren’t tradeoffs, they’re expected to coexist. That’s something I really like about Faire as well. There’s a culture at Faire for making it happen fast while raising the bar. That stood out to me during my interview process.

NYC designers and Head of Design Tim Hoover at dinner at an offsite in NYC.

What was it like transitioning into product design from your research background?

Honestly, it wasn’t something I had planned. During a moment of transition our Head of Design stepped down, and leadership was looking for someone who could connect strategy and execution. My name came up, which surprised me, since I was leading Research at the time.

When our CEO asked if I’d step into the role, I felt both honored and stretched. I knew it would push me. But I’ve always believed that growth comes from leaning into moments where fear meets excitement. If I’m not learning, I’m not growing.

I had already been partnering closely with designers and PMs, but I had to quickly deepen my craft fluency and think more holistically about how design drives business outcomes. Ultimately, it reinforced for me that leadership isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about creating clarity, empowering great people, and raising the bar together.

How does your PhD in research show up in your work today?

I have a PhD in Communication, which is really just a fancy way of saying I really, really like questions. I love pulling on threads and trying to make sense of complex systems. Ambiguity doesn’t scare me, it energizes me!

Research trains you to be comfortable sitting in ambiguity. You learn to resist the urge to jump to conclusions and instead ask for intentionality, “What are we actually trying to understand here?” That habit has been incredibly useful in product design. When things feel messy or fast-moving, my instinct is to slow down just enough to clarify the problem. What’s the real goal? What’s primary, what’s secondary? What would success actually look like?

Helping a team align on the right question before we design the solution usually makes everything stronger downstream. Better questions, better answers.

What excites you most about working at Faire now?

What stands out is the shared sense of purpose. There’s real alignment around the mission, and that creates energy. When everyone cares deeply about the outcome, the conversations get better and the bar naturally rises. That combination of mission, trust, and high standards is rare. The more people I meet across the company, the more excited I am about what we’re capable of building together.

An artsy photo from the Brand Design Team offsite.

What’s a recent project you’re excited about?

One project I’m especially excited about is helping brands seamlessly upload their products onto our platform. You can imagine the pain points a user faces when they have to manually input information like product titles, sizes, country of origin, ingredients, images, etc. What if we can make that as simple and frictionless as possible by scraping their website, places where this info already exists, and syncing their catalog? We’re finding ways to innovate here.

When it comes to design, it’s easy to get in the trap of just adding more. But I get excited by integrating meaningfully into a workflow that already exists. It’s something powerful for both the user and the business.

What makes a great design leader in your perspective?

I think the best design leaders understand that the role isn’t about being the most visible person in the room. It’s about creating the conditions for great work to happen.

Leadership can look like the front of the room and it sometimes is, but it’s often built in the background. My job isn’t to be center stage, it’s to make sure my team is. Backstage, I’m clearing obstacles, aligning stakeholders, and advocating for the resources they need. Side stage, I’m coaching, asking hard questions, and helping sharpen their thinking. When the team steps forward with confidence, clarity, and strong execution, that’s usually a sign of strong design leadership.

Rannie and her family.

What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned as a design leader?

Authenticity scales better than authority. People can tell when you’re performing leadership versus actually embodying it. It’s counterintuitive, but being honest about what you’re still figuring out builds far more trust than pretending to have all the answers.

When leaders create that kind of openness, it gives teams permission to do the same. You get fewer ego-driven decisions and more real conversations about the work. And that’s when the quality actually elevates.That kind of environment — high standards, low ego, plus a mission to believe in — is when teams do their best work.