Josh Silverman

Founder, CritKit

San Francisco

For 25 years, Josh Silverman has created successful relationships through design. He speaks and hosts workshops globally, teaches and guest critiques nationally, and is always connecting people and communities.

Currently, he is launching CritKit (critkit.co), consulting in design operations (New York University, Salesforce, Blend), and advising startups. Most recently, he advised and designed for the portfolio of companies with Sequoia Design Lab, served as Twitter's first hire in design operations, and was one of the founding designers of the IBM Cloud Garage.

In 1997 he founded Schwadesign, a lean, holacratic-model business, where he managed diverse teams and scaled the business for 18 years. Together, their work was recognized by The Wall Street Journal, Rebrand.com, The Boston Globe, and more.

His wide range of clients have included startups (iRobot, Buildium, Trinity Pharma), educational institutions (MIT, Harvard Medical School, Brown University), global corporations (UBS, Wells Fargo, Accenture), cities (Providence, RI, and Bethesda, MD), non-profits (American Heart Association, Friends of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute), and many more.

Josh is preternaturally curious about patterns in decision making and the shapes of teams. On the daily, he is driven by great pairings, trusting relationships, and long bike rides.