Hazal Merve Akan

Staff UX Designer · Research-led product design

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Profile

I’m a curious designer: I keep asking why until I understand what people actually need and what the evidence really supports. Research is one of my core instruments, and I use it to turn open questions into product decisions. The part I enjoy most is strategic: shaping what the product should build next.

Industrial design taught me to take an idea from concept to production; product management taught me to weigh user needs against business goals and delivery. I’m always learning; right now that means designing for AI and using it to ground design decisions in evidence.

Experience

Commencis

Aug 2024 – Present

Staff UX Designer (since Aug 2026) · Senior UX Designer (Aug 2024 – Aug 2026)

  • Responsible for UX across Pegasus Airlines’ end-to-end digital journey on iOS, Android and web, with primary ownership of booking and payment.
  • Take work from brief to release: close gaps in the brief with the PO, align with BA and PO, hand off to development and support UAT.
  • Plan and run the research that informs product decisions across the journey.
  • Review every deliverable the team hands off for UX quality, so nothing ships incomplete or wrong.
  • With the team, shape Pegasus’s digital vision and the roadmap we propose.

Yenibiriş

Feb 2024 – Aug 2024

Product Manager

  • Owned roadmap, discovery, delivery with engineering and metrics for SmartInterview and SmartTest, AI-supported recruitment products.
  • A short role where I learned the product cycle from the PM side, the lens I now bring to design decisions.

Hepsiburada

Dec 2021 – Feb 2024

Product Designer

  • Product designer for the cart, Hepsiburada Travel (since closed) and gamification on one of Türkiye’s largest e-commerce platforms.
  • Worked on a food delivery product that was stopped before launch because it didn’t meet profitability targets.
  • Owned usability testing for my areas, planning and running the tests in partnership with the research team.

HediyeSepeti

May 2021 – Dec 2025

UX Consultant, part-time (Dec 2021 – Dec 2025) · UX Researcher & Art Director (May – Dec 2021)

  • Owned the user experience across the mobile app and website; turned competitor and trend research into input for engineering and product teams.

Vestel

Nov 2017 – Mar 2021

Senior Industrial Design Specialist

  • Designed TVs, remote controls and smartboard accessories, from early concepts through 3D modelling, rendering and presentation; work recognised with four international design awards.
  • Joined as Industrial Designer in 2017; promoted twice, in 2018 and 2019.

Writing

Selected case studies