Architecture
Before Prompting
I sit at the intersection of product design, software architecture, and AI-assisted development. As a systems thinker, my core philosophy is Architecture Before Prompting: I model how your data, components, and user flows interact as a unified system first. Then I write the code that implements the system.
Darryl Mack
Lead Software Architect
My Approach
AI development tools are immensely powerful tools, but left unconstrained, they produce fast prototypes that break under real production conditions. They write lines of code, but they don’t understand systems
Most AI work fails before the build even starts — the team aims at the wrong thing, or stands the right thing on a foundation that can’t hold it. I’ve hit both walls myself, and I built an architecture-first method to prevent them. Twenty years across UX, frontend, and backend architecture means I work as a systems thinker, not a specialist handed a spec.
So I start upstream. I find the Big AI Idea — the highest-leverage thing AI should build in your business — then design the architecture it has to hold: the data model, API contracts, coding standards, and component patterns. Then I build it alongside your team, so the velocity is theirs to keep long after I’m gone.
One Engagement. Four Phases.
Idea
Defining where AI solves real customer problems and creates tangible business value.
Architecture
Product design, data model, API contracts, coding standards, and component patterns designed before the first prompt is generated.
AI
A validated pilot built on the hardest part of the system, using the architecture and standards we defined.
Launched
Working software built on the architecture we defined, and living documentation that your team references daily.
That is the method behind every engagement — and there are three ways in, starting with a free ten-minute read on where you stand.
The Full Stack
Product strategy through production code. Every engagement draws on all of these skills.
AI Product Strategy
I help companies see where AI creates product capabilities that didn't exist before. That means finding the specific places where RAG pipelines, LLM integrations, and intelligent workflows turn your existing data into features your competitors can't replicate.
Software Architecture
Every system needs a structural foundation the team can trust. I design C4 models, data model architecture, API contracts, and component dependency maps that become the single source of truth for how the system works.
AI-Assisted Development
I write the coding standards, rules files, and prompt guidelines that make tools like Claude Code and Cursor produce coherent, production-grade output instead of a patchwork of conflicting patterns.
Full-Stack Product Design
Twenty years across UX, frontend, backend, and database architecture means I see how all the pieces connect. I bring JTBD mapping, use case evaluation, and information architecture together into product roadmaps that hold up under real development.
From Idea to Launched
20+
Years Building Software
100+
Products Shipped
40%
Velocity Increase at Audacy
Professional Journey
Lead Software Architect · AI Engineer
Venture Maker LLC
AI architecture consulting for mid-market companies. I design the product strategy and software architecture that makes AI-assisted development produce real results — then build the pilot myself and hand off a system the team uses daily.
Lead Developer — React Native
Watts Water Technologies
Field technicians were losing data in environments with no connectivity. I bet on React Native, designed an offline-first state architecture, and built a sync system that reconciled data whenever connectivity returned. The app became a daily tool for field teams across challenging environments.
Senior Application Developer
PennyMac Loan Services
React was barely a year old and most enterprise teams wouldn't touch it. I saw that component-based architecture would change how frontend applications scale. The patterns I established became company standards — and the foundation for everything I've built in the decade since.
Digital Marketing Manager
Toyota North America
Coordinating across Product, Creative, and Engineering teams taught me that most project failures aren't technical — they're translation failures. I learned to hold both conversations: translating technical constraints for business stakeholders and business intent for engineering teams.
Director, UX/UI & Product Management
Bennett Productions
A digital television show needed to reach audiences across 20 different media platforms. The challenge — one system, many surfaces — is the same problem every modern product team faces. How does the architecture flex without breaking?
Founder | UX Designer | Developer
Next Level Studios
I started building for the internet when there were no playbooks. Disney/ABC, Interscope Records, Warner Bros. — these companies wanted interactive experiences and nobody knew exactly what that meant yet. So I figured it out by doing all of it: pitching, designing, coding, managing, shipping.
Think we’d work well together?
A 30-minute Discovery Call is the fastest way to find out. Bring what you’re stuck on — you’ll leave knowing whether there’s a Big AI Idea worth building, and which way in fits.