Why "life-like"

Because the test of good work is whether it survives real life. A go-to-market plan that only works in the boardroom isn't a plan. An AI rollout that only works in the demo isn't a rollout. We named the practice after the standard we hold the work to.

The name has history. In 2017, Ash founded the original LifeLike, a human-centred product design practice built on one idea: products should honour the human experience and work the way life actually works. This practice carries the name, and the standard, forward.

life-like is a small, independent practice led by Ash (they/them). Ash sits between the technical and the commercial: close enough to the code to talk to engineers, close enough to the business to turn a vague ask into a spec someone can build. The skill underneath it all is coordination: keeping complex, multi-stream work moving.

The arc runs from enterprise to startup to AI. Seven years consulting at Altis, promoted to Managing Consultant, leading organisations in banking, government, airlines and healthcare through new platforms and new ways of working, including as architecture and team lead on the Qantas Money platform. Then Helix Collective, a startup studio, owning product strategy and coordination across the portfolio. Then Jubi, a crypto startup Ash founded and ran end to end, from product and code to marketing and shareholder reporting, until it exited via acquisition. Most recently Infinex, joining as a Solidity engineer and leaving as an AI-native one: the final eight months shipped with no hand-written code, and the final three spent leading the build of harnesses running AI agents to manage wallet operations autonomously. Ash also mentors early-stage founders through Blackbird's Giants in Residence.

life-like is new. The experience behind it isn't, and the advice comes from doing, not observing. We keep engagements few and hands-on, we teach as we go, and we'd rather tell you an honest no than sell you a comfortable yes. We work with pre-seed founders finding their first customers, and with businesses making AI part of how they operate.

If that sounds like the kind of help you want, the fastest way to find out is a conversation.