Homepage Evolution
The Economist
Owned the evolution of The Economist's homepage, delivering new components and variants for one of the publication's most visible and commercially critical surfaces.
About me
Hi, I'm Ben. I live in London and work in Product. This site is a bit about what I've done and how I think about my work.
My degree was in psychology, and after graduating I got a job in my hometown, starting in billing operations and later helping teams improve their processes. It was an early introduction to how organisations actually function and how small operational fixes can make a real difference.
Between 2015 and 2017 I lived abroad, promoting entrepreneurship in Tanzania and teaching maths and science in Vietnam. Returning to the UK for a career reset, I took a Master's in Computer Science, where I graduated with a distinction and planned to become a software developer.
After early engineering roles, including work on the English league transfer system and building internal tools at a digital marketing company in London, I joined the BBC on the Software Engineering Graduate Scheme. Over time I realised I preferred shaping problems and planning work to writing code. I moved into business analysis rotations across the World Service, the 2020 US Election team and Short Form Video, before joining BBC Monitoring.
In 2022 I moved to The Economist, where product responsibilities grew alongside my BA role. I was promoted to Senior Business Analyst and later became a Product Manager, now leading the CMS and publishing platform that powers Economist content.
Selected Product Work
Platform Migration
The Economist
Led the migration of core publishing workflows into CUE and CPv2, modernising the platform that powers The Economist's global digital publishing.
AI Article Audio
The Economist
Delivered AI-generated audio for newly published articles, enabling near-immediate listening across the site and expanding reach to audio-first and younger audiences.
US Election Coverage
BBC
Helped deliver BBC News's 2020 US Election experience, including the homepage banner, election homepage and results pages, multilingual editorial controls, and data flows powering live results at global scale.
Universal Recs Engine
BBC
Contributed to the cross-platform recommendations engine used across iPlayer, Sounds, Sport and Video, improving content discovery for millions of users.
Short-Form Video Recs
BBC
Integrated short-form video with the BBC recommendations engine and ran A/B tests to optimise placement and engagement.
Insider Infrastructure
The Economist
Built the infrastructure and homepage components enabling delivery of Insider, The Economist's premium subscriber content.
BBC Monitoring Website
BBC Monitoring
Rebuilt article delivery and CMS workflows for a service used by governments and international institutions worldwide, enabling secure publishing from journalists working in sensitive regions and low-connectivity environments.
Podcast Publishing
The Economist
Enabled podcast publishing and featuring directly from the CMS, giving editorial teams full control over placement, imagery and metadata while removing the need for code changes.