Ariel Pérez

Product & Engineering Leader | Systems Thinker

I build high-performing, adaptive, deeply collaborative product & engineering organizations that deliver exceptional value at high velocity. With 20+ years across startups, scale-ups, and Fortune 50s, I bridge product and technology to drive growth—accelerating release cadence, cutting lead times, creating products that matter, and saving millions in operational costs. I lead through systems thinking, cross-functional collaboration, and AI-enabled innovation, building adaptive teams that scale and thrive together.

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What I excel at

I transform organizations by building adaptive systems that scale faster than market changes. Whether you're struggling with slow decision-making, siloed teams, or technology that's become a bottleneck, I help you create high-performing, collaborative environments that deliver exceptional value at unprecedented velocity.

Experience

20+ years learning that slow product and engineering teams aren't slow because of bad developers or old technology. They're slow because their systems make collaboration hard and individual heroics necessary. When you redesign the human systems around how people connect, communicate, and make decisions together, the technical problems solve themselves.

History

Head of Product & Technology, Field CTO

Tinybird
2024 - Present

AI-first development requires fundamentally different team structures and approaches — stability comes from cross-team operations, sustainable growth requires intelligent cost management and optimization

VP of Engineering - Measurement & Learning

Split Software (acquired by Harness)
2022 - 2024

Transformed product & engineering culture achieving 6x product releases and 10x deployment frequency while saving $1.2M annually

Head of Digital and Communications Platforms, Head of Marketing Technology

JP Morgan Chase - Chase International Consumer Bank (Chase UK)
2019 - 2022

Built mobile-first, cloud-native digital banking from scratch while learning regulation drives innovation

Head of Product & Engineering - Dark Canary, Head of Core Web Engineering and Solution Architecture

JP Morgan Chase - Chase Digital (Chase Online/Chase Mobile)
2017 - 2019

Built JPMC's first feature-flagging platform enabling 1,200+ concurrent releases to 65M+ users while optimizing core systems for 4.25-second performance gains.

...

Prior Roles

Various Companies
2003 - 2017

MSCLVR (CTO/Co-founder), Try the World (CTO), Birchbox (Senior Engineer), JP Morgan Wealth Management (Engineering Lead) - Customer obsession beats technical perfection

Built across

Financial ServicesDeveloper ToolsE-CommerceAI/ML PlatformsReal-time AnalyticsFeature Management & ExperimentationFinTechAdTechMarTechStartupsScale-upsFortune 50
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Media and publications

Sharing insights on adaptive leadership, organizational transformation, and product & engineering across various platforms

Article
ClearPurpose

Adaptive Leadership: What It Means and How to Do It with Ariel Pérez

Russell McGuire sits down with Ariel Pérez to explore why adaptive leadership beats traditional control, and how teams closest to problems make better decisions.

2025-09-09Read
Article
Tinybird Blog

Outgrowing Postgres: How to run OLAP workloads on Postgres

A deep dive into running analytics on Postgres, from basic optimizations to advanced techniques and knowing when to quit.

2025-01-31Read
Article
Tinybird Blog

Outgrowing Postgres: Handling increased user concurrency

Learn how to optimize Postgres for high concurrency scenarios, from connection pooling to query optimization and when to consider scaling strategies.

2025-01-24Read
Video
Beyond the Code

Unlocking Engineering Productivity with Ariel Pérez & Cesar Rodriguez

In the second session of the 'Unlocking Engineering Productivity' webinar by Typo, host Kovid Batra engages engineering leaders Cesar Rodriguez and Ariel Pérez in a conversation about building high-performing development teams.

2025-01-23Watch

Also available on:

Video
The Mob Mentality Show

Complex Adaptive Organizations, Org Topologies, and FAST Agile with Ariel Pérez

Chris Lucian and Austin Chadwick discuss all things agile and product development from a MobProgramming perspective. Exploring the fascinating intersection of Complex Adaptive Organizations, Organizational Topologies, and the FAST Agile Framework.

2024-12-17Watch

Also available on:

Video
groCTO Originals

Tackling Communication Gaps in Cross-functional Teams

Welcome to episode #35 of the 'groCTO Originals' podcast. Ariel Pérez, VP of Engineering at Split, shares insights on creating an environment for success and enabling cross-functional teams to establish the right context.

2024-05-01Watch

Also available on:

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Latest from my blog

Exploring adaptive leadership and organizational design at The Adaptive Alchemist

Multi-dimensional engineers are dominating in AI-augmented teams hero
September 2025•5 min read

Multi-dimensional engineers are dominating in AI-augmented teams

AI isn't replacing engineers—it's making narrow specialists much easier to replace while multi-dimensional engineers dominate in AI-augmented teams.

Read more
Why technical due diligence focused on adaptability beats traditional architecture audits hero
September 2025•8 min read

Why technical due diligence focused on adaptability beats traditional architecture audits

Traditional tech due diligence audits architecture but misses adaptability. Smart VCs evaluate a startup's capacity to evolve, not just code quality.

Read more
The futile chase for predictability in software development hero
September 2025•10 min read

The futile chase for predictability in software development

Software estimation fails because development is inherently complex, not predictable. Stop chasing false certainty through story points, velocity, and hard commitments. Here's the adaptive approach that works.

Read more
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Working with me

I love collaborating with organizations and individuals who are passionate about building adaptive, high-performing teams and systems. Whether through fractional/interim CTO/CPTO engagements, speaking, or writing collaborations, I'm always excited to share insights and work together on challenging problems.

Advisory & fractional leadership

I work with companies to build systems that adapt faster than market changes by transforming your organization through adaptive leadership, cross-functional velocity, and strategic product & technology alignment.

I don't just diagnose problems. I get hands-on to fix them, whether reviewing code, redesigning team structures, or sitting in strategy and planning meetings.

Important Note: I deliver my services exclusively through Adaptive Alchemy, LLC, a US-based consultancy. I focus on delivering exceptional value while Adaptive Alchemy handles business operations.

Speaking & collaboration

I'm passionate about sharing insights on adaptive leadership, organizational transformation, and the intersection of technology and human systems. Let's explore opportunities to collaborate, share knowledge, and push the boundaries of what's possible.

Please reach out for:

  • Speaking engagements and media appearances
  • Writing collaborations and guest posts
  • Direct professional networking
  • Full-time role opportunities (for compelling fits)

Ready to explore what's possible?

The best conversations start with curiosity about what could be different. Whether your team is stuck in coordination overhead, your product and engineering groups aren't aligned, or you're wondering if there's a better way to organize for growth, I'd love to explore what might be possible.

Let's start a conversationLearn about my approach