Aligned Curation.
Curation—adding to playlists & Your Library—is a key retention driver for Spotify. In 2023, we set out to create a unified system of curation actions that would clearly signal intent to our personalization models and seamlessly adapt to both new and existing audio formats.
Scope
Company
Duration
Year
Action system that was duplicative, ambiguous, and not designed to scale for multiple audio formats.
Years of iteration left us with overlapping actions, unclear signals (both for listeners and personalization models), and technical systems that weren’t prepared to function across music, podcast, and audiobook verticals.
A unified system of curation actions.
One that would clearly signal intent to our personalization models and seamlessly adapt to both new and existing audio formats. I worked closely with insights, engineering, and product to define this system and guide its delivery through a fast-paced, iterative process. We initially explored a wide range of models and rigorously debated/tested each of them to identify the most promising directions. Once we had narrowed our focus, I partnered with an engineer in my team to develop a proof of concept, which allowed us to further refine the system and gather more actionable feedback.
Designed for What’s Next — Built to Move Faster
Validated at scale, the work maintained neutral topline performance while delivering two outsized wins: a flexible foundation ready for new formats (podcasts, audiobooks, video, and beyond), and a unified tech stack that replaced fragmentation with a shared system. The result wasn’t just an experience update—it unlocked faster experimentation, cleaner iteration across surfaces, and long-term speed and agility for Spotify.
A curated selection of projects that reflect our commitment to simplicity and purposeful design.
