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Lead Product Designer

Are you a conceptual creative wizard who thrives on designing products that make a measurable impact on people’s everyday lives? ustwo is looking for a Lead Product Designer to join our Malmo studio. We are a global studio operating across Malmo, London, Tokyo and Lisbon who are dedicated to developing products and services that have a lasting valuable and transformative effect on both users and businesses. To do this, we work across the entire product lifecycle; from visioning and discovery, validating propositions through to launching products and services that are valuable to both users and businesses.

Our design team is made up of versatile designers who have, and are constantly developing and broadening their wide skill sets and deepening their process knowledge. Our designers are skilled, confident, and multi-faceted, collaborating across all disciplines involved in the product and service development process. We are interested in designers who want to be a broad minded versatile designer who can span a range of products and users to make a real difference. We believe passionately that diverse teams help us make better services and products. We actively hire for cultural growth. We welcome people of all ages, stories and backgrounds. It adds value and impact to our clients and industry.

Location

We have a wonderful studio in central Malmö which is very close to station Triangeln. We have one universal studio day a week but lots of the ustwobies work from the studio 2-3 times a week. We would expect that you would live in a commutable distance to the studio and if you are based in Copenhagen then we also offer a competitive commuter bonus in addition to your salary to account for the difference in living costs.
Alternatively, if you are based elsewhere and are interested in relocation we would be open to discussing this opportunity, please make it known on your application.

The Role

As Design Lead at ustwo, you’ll be intuitive on how best to support the needs of the people, projects and studio. You know when to get hands-on with the detail yourself, and when to set your teams up for success by delegating work, while directing and nurturing. You’ll be responsible for ensuring that our designers are learning and developing through role modelling, and you’ll provide guidance and support to individual designers and teams, bestowing vision and direction during projects; from discovering value, validating propositions all the way through to delivering product and services.

You will often be hands-on during projects, working with other designers, developers, and delivery coaches to define, build, and iterate solutions for our fantastic clients and partners. In addition, you’ll have the opportunity to work with other senior members of the design team, helping us improve process, approaches, and strategy for both the design team and the studio as a whole.

ustwo is known for exceptional design craft, we are looking for a Design Lead that can help lead teams to create experiences that not only express brands within products but resonate emotionally with audiences.

You are…

• Comfortable, confident and competent at managing and directing individuals and teams.
• Able to frame and communicate challenges and opportunities to clients and teams, and create alignment on a way forward.
• Adept at growing client relationships and contributing to business development
• A brilliant and accomplished designer with proven experience working on things that exist in the real world, not only as prototypes.
• You take a wide strategic view of problems, seeking multiple inputs and solutions and challenge the thinking of the teams and clients you work with.
• Someone that enjoys being hands-on. We believe lead designers shouldn’t be separated from the reality of making things.
• You'll be w ell versed in conducting research, creating and validating ideas, creating prototypes and make confident recommendations to our businesses.
• Able to understand progressive ways of working to drive both commercial and design value and have the ability to simplify complexity.
• Successful stories about how you have helped others to develop, both in their craft and soft skills.
• Has proven experience creating and leading brand expressive, effective and emotionally joyful digital experiences
• The ability to multitask and contribute to more than one project at once.
• Experience in being involved in projects that have not always followed the status quo, and can demonstrate times you have challenged dominant design perspectives and broken new ground where traditional design paradigms didn’t make sense.
• Able to think strategically and systemically about opportunities and challenges & e xperienced and confident in visualising and prototyping concepts fast to communicate ideas.
• Has a product mindset and is able to make pragmatic trade-offs while holding a bigger strategic goal in mind as well as having a s olid understanding across other disciplines - Brand strategy, Business design, product ownership
• A clear written and verbal communication style and a natural storyteller and presenter who can speak to a range of professionals from different backgrounds.

Once you’re in the role you will…

• Work with multidisciplinary teams on a range of products as the design authority on the project, often managing designers from a range of backgrounds
• Advocate for the user at all times to drive value for our client businesses. These projects typically range from 6 weeks to a year and vary from early-stage opportunity discovery through to producing products that go into the market through to recommending changes to existing products and services.
• Work very closely with other designers, technologists, coaches and business partners to successfully deliver projects from kick-off through to delivery for our clients. You will own the design process, outputs and integrity of the project(s).
• Give and action feedback and input into all aspects of the design process.
• Advise on team resourcing for the projects you are working on.
• Support your line managers with career development, if you are asked to line manage people.
• Work with the team to develop prototypes, alphas, betas and live services.
• Regularly conduct testing with users, design the methodology for these and turn the output into intelligence.
• Carry out client-facing workshops and presentations and help develop accounts that you are working on.
• Work with the new business team on developing pitches
• Be an expert who is continually learning about your field and help your colleagues improve their design practice
• Participate in regular sprint ceremonies for your projects - daily stand-ups, show and tells, retrospectives, sprint planning etc.
• Contribute to progressing & improving our culture and ways of working - offering up new approaches.

Interested but think your experience doesn’t perfectly align with this job description? That’s ok. Research shows underrepresented groups in particular are less inclined to apply for jobs where they don’t meet 100% of the requirements listed. We’d still love to hear from you if you feel passionate about this role! We are committed to creating an inclusive environment for our colleagues, clients, community, and the users of our products. We don’t have all the answers but we’re on a journey, and we are learning together.