RÉSUMÉ — AI / PRODUCT

Résumé

AI Product & Design

Local AI, systems thinking, and digital products — the full document.

Technology PM AI Product & Design

Ciarán O'Hara

AI Product & Design Builder — Local AI, Systems Thinking & Digital Products

San Francisco Bay Area, CA · ciaran.ohara@gmail.com · linkedin.com/in/ciaranohara

Executive Profile

Technology Program & Product Leader developing a portfolio of private AI systems, interactive products, and visual research tools. Combines 10+ years of formal program leadership with hands-on experimentation in local inference, RAG, AI infrastructure, UI design, product discovery, and rapid prototyping. Focused on turning complex systems into clear user experiences and practical products.

Core Capabilities
AI Product Strategy Product Discovery & Prototyping UI / UX Design Local & Private AI RAG & Knowledge Systems AI Infrastructure Vector Databases Systems Thinking Visual Information Design AI Governance Rapid Web Prototyping GitHub Ollama LM Studio OpenWebUI Hugging Face LangChain LlamaIndex FAISS Qdrant
Current Engagement

Sophurion

Product & Program (Part-time) · 2026–present
  • Current part-time product and program leadership engagement.
Independent AI & Product Work

Solas Sovereign Systems

Founder / Product & Systems Design
  • Developing a private AI infrastructure concept for organizations that need secure, locally controlled AI over sensitive enterprise data.
  • Designed the product around local inference, document ingestion, vector search, RAG, and an on-premises / air-gapped deployment model.
  • Developing the product and positioning around AI sovereignty, privacy, infrastructure control, and practical enterprise adoption.
  • Exploring secure demonstration appliances and local AI environments using Mac Studio-class hardware and open-source AI tooling.

Global Local AI Foundation / GLAM

Founder / Product & Design
  • Developed a public-interest initiative focused on local AI, privacy, and environmental sustainability, with Power, Privacy, and Policy as core themes.
  • Designed and delivered an Earth Day demonstration showing local AI operating independently of the cloud, incorporating live environmental data and a visible energy / carbon narrative.
  • Developed the organization, product concepts, messaging, and web presence around responsible local AI adoption.

White Mirror

AI Product Concept / UX
  • Developed a privacy-first AI concept centered on an elegant, frictionless, and emotionally human user experience.
  • Explored the product as a local-first AI environment where sensitive personal interaction can remain under user control.
  • Defined UX and product principles emphasizing simplicity, trust, privacy, and human-centered interaction rather than model-centric features.

AI Observatory

Interactive Product / Information Design
  • Designed an interactive exploration of the AI ecosystem intended to make models, companies, technologies, and relationships understandable through visual information design.
  • Explored ways to turn a rapidly changing technical landscape into an intuitive product experience rather than a conventional directory or database.
  • Developed the concept as a polished web experience and research / discovery tool.

Celtic Explorer

Digital Humanities Product / UX
  • Designed a digital museum and research experience for Irish mythology combining an interactive encyclopedia, narrated stories, character portraits, and source material.
  • Integrated mythology, Old Irish pronunciation, etymology, citations, manuscript sources, relationships, search, and filtering into a single exploratory interface.
  • Designed the experience around discovery, navigation, and storytelling, including narrated playback and relationship-based exploration.

LegalVault

Private AI / Product Concept
  • Developed a concept for a local encrypted AI appliance for small law firms, focused on private document search, eDiscovery, and retrieval-augmented analysis.
  • Explored local vector indexing using FAISS / Qdrant and the use of on-premises AI to avoid sending sensitive legal data to cloud services.
  • Developed the concept around a practical deployment model for organizations that need AI capability without surrendering control of their data.

ClarityNow

Product Concept / Browser UX
  • Developed a browser-extension concept for simplifying and improving the user experience of enterprise ServiceNow workflows.
  • Explored the use of an interface layer over existing enterprise software to reduce complexity without requiring changes to the underlying platform.
  • Applied product and UI thinking to a familiar enterprise problem: making complex operational systems easier for people to use.
AI Systems & Technical Experimentation
  • Built and tested local AI workflows using Ollama, LM Studio, OpenWebUI, and Hugging Face model ecosystems.
  • Explored RAG architectures, embeddings, vector databases, document ingestion, and retrieval using LangChain, LlamaIndex, FAISS, and Qdrant.
  • Experimented with local speech and language tooling including Whisper and Piper TTS, and with Apple local AI capabilities.
  • Indexed and worked with large document collections, including a corpus of approximately 50,000 court records for vector search experimentation.
  • Explored model sizes, inference constraints, local hardware, and the practical trade-offs between cloud and edge AI.
  • Developed an AI reading / research workflow using large source collections and structured prompting to investigate emerging AI technologies.
Systems Thinking & Product Philosophy
  • Developing the Five P Method: People, Picture, Plan, Perform, Pivot — a practical model for connecting systems thinking, visual understanding, and project execution.
  • Uses system maps, whiteboarding, Common Operating Pictures, and dependency visualization to turn complex technical environments into shared mental models.
  • Applies the same systems-thinking approach to infrastructure transformation, AI products, and emerging technology environments.
Design & Build Approach
  • Designs interfaces as working products rather than static mockups, using rapid web prototyping to test ideas in the browser.
  • Uses visual information architecture, system diagrams, and interactive prototypes to make complex concepts understandable.
  • Combines product discovery, systems thinking, UI design, and technical experimentation to move from idea to demonstrable prototype quickly.
Selected Tools & Technologies

Local AI: Ollama, LM Studio, OpenWebUI, Hugging Face

RAG: LangChain, LlamaIndex

Vector Search: FAISS, Qdrant

Speech: Whisper, Piper TTS

Product / Design: UI prototyping, information architecture, visual systems, browser-based applications

Development: GitHub, web technologies, rapid prototyping

Selected Ventures & Projects
Solas Sovereign Systems Global Local AI Foundation / GLAM White Mirror AI Observatory Celtic Explorer LegalVault ClarityNow EarthGPT / Gaia AI
Professional Foundation

10+ years of formal program and project leadership since around 2015, built on a longer technology career across Apple, Marvell, Meta, Pearson, San Francisco International Airport, Infoblox, Nimble Storage, Symantec, and Yahoo!. Experience spans data-center transformation, cloud migration, enterprise infrastructure, security, governance, and complex cross-functional delivery. Full infrastructure record: Technology Program Manager résumé →

Education & Certifications
PMP Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) Program & Project Management Certificate, UCSC Silicon Valley Extension B.A. Business (IT), LYIT, Ireland CCNA