Product Designer

## About the Role
We are seeking a **Senior Product Designer (UI Focus)** to create thoughtful, user-centered digital products and experiences across complex, content-rich web and native mobile platforms. This role emphasizes **UI design excellence, usability validation, accessibility, inclusive design, and design systems**.
You will work across cross-functional teams, partnering with product managers, engineers, researchers, designers, and stakeholders to discover opportunities, shape product direction, validate solutions, and deliver high-quality production-ready designs. The role requires strong visual design craft, systems thinking, attention to detail, and the ability to independently manage defined problem spaces while maintaining alignment with teammates and design leadership.
## Key Responsibilities
### Product Discovery & Design Strategy
* Contribute to **design sprints, envisioning sessions, workshops, and discovery activities** to explore problem spaces and align teams around shared outcomes.
* Synthesize research, usability findings, behavioral data, and operational inputs into clear design directions.
* Use qualitative and quantitative data to inform, validate, and refine design decisions throughout the product lifecycle.
* Champion **human-centered and inclusive design practices** informed by accessibility standards.
* Communicate design rationale, insights, and product vision through clear artifacts, narratives, and presentations.
* Identify patterns across complex systems and translate strategic thinking into practical design solutions.
### UI Design, Usability & Design Systems
* Deliver polished, production-ready **UI designs** with strong visual hierarchy, interaction clarity, and attention to detail.
* Design high-quality experiences across **web and native mobile platforms**.
* Work extensively with robust **web design systems and native mobile design systems for iOS and Android**.
* Apply design-system components, patterns, and tokens accurately while identifying gaps and opportunities for improvement.
* Plan, conduct, and synthesize **usability testing** to validate flows, components, and interactions.
* Incorporate usability findings into iterative design improvements.
* Create prototypes at appropriate levels of fidelity to explore, test, and communicate design solutions.
* Apply inclusive design principles and accessibility standards when designing and testing experiences.
* Use **plain language** to improve clarity and comprehension.
* Design responsive, mobile-first web experiences and native mobile applications.
* Use AI-assisted design tools where appropriate to support ideation, prototyping, exploration, and iteration while maintaining a user-centered design process.
* Maintain organized design files, documentation, specifications, and design artifacts.
### Collaboration & Communication
* Partner closely with **product managers, engineers, researchers, designers, and stakeholders** throughout discovery, design, and delivery.
* Maintain organized and well-documented design files and artifacts to support collaboration and continuity.
* Follow established team workflows and design processes while providing constructive feedback to improve team practices.
* Participate in **standups, sprint planning, design reviews, critiques, and QA cycles**.
* Translate design decisions into clear, implementation-ready specifications and annotations.
* Present design ideas, research insights, rationale, and solutions clearly in synchronous and asynchronous settings.
* Collaborate with engineers to understand and work through technical constraints.
* Advocate for users and equitable experiences throughout the product development process.
## Required Qualifications
* **3–7 years of experience** in product design or service design.
* Portfolio of relevant design work included with the application.
* Strong product design mindset with experience designing **complex, content-rich websites and applications**.
* Extensive experience working with **design systems for both web and native mobile platforms**.
* Strong ability to create and communicate design artifacts, including:
* User flows
* Wireframes
* Prototypes
* High-fidelity UI designs
* Strong understanding of **design thinking and human-centered design methodologies**.
* Experience translating research and user insights into actionable design direction.
* Experience planning and conducting **usability testing** and incorporating findings into design decisions.
* Strong understanding of **responsive design, inclusive design principles, and accessibility standards**.
* Excellent UI design skills with strong visual hierarchy, interaction design, and attention to detail.
* Clear and effective communication skills.
* Ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams.
* User-advocacy mindset with strong problem-solving and systems-thinking abilities.
* Bachelor’s degree in a related field such as **interaction design, HCI, industrial design, information science, social sciences, computer science, graphic design**, or equivalent years of work experience.
## Preferred Qualifications
* Experience collaborating closely with engineers and discussing technical constraints.
* Experience with front-end technologies.
* Familiarity with emerging design tools and trends.
* Experience incorporating **AI-supported design workflows** into ideation, prototyping, exploration, or iteration.
* Experience designing for both responsive web and native mobile applications.
* Curiosity and adaptability toward evolving product design practices and technologies.
## Design Tools & Technologies
Experience with tools such as:
* **Figma**
* **FigJam**
* **Miro**
* **Adobe Creative Cloud**
* **Lovable**
* **DScout**
* **User Insight**
* Web design systems
* iOS design systems
* Android design systems
* Prototyping and usability-testing tools
* AI-assisted design tools
## Core Skills
**Product Design | UI Design | UX Design | User-Centered Design | Design Systems | Design Thinking | Interaction Design | Visual Design | Usability Testing | User Research | Prototyping | Wireframing | User Flows | Responsive Design | Mobile-First Design | Native Mobile Design | iOS | Android | Accessibility | Inclusive Design | Plain Language | Figma | FigJam | Miro | Adobe Creative Cloud | Cross-Functional Collaboration | Design Strategy | AI-Assisted Design**
## Work Arrangement & Employment
* **Position:** Senior Product Designer (UI Focus)
* **Seniority Level:** Mid-Senior level
* **Employment Type:** Contract
* **Location:** Reston, VA, US
* **Work Arrangement:** 100% Remote
* **Engagement:** Long-term contract
* **Compensation:** Not specified in the provided posting
## Screening Topics
Candidates may be asked to discuss:
* Experience inheriting and working within an existing design system while designing UI for complex, content-heavy features.
* How usability testing or accessibility reviews influenced and improved an initially strong visual design.
* How conflicting stakeholder opinions were resolved using design artifacts, data, research, or prior experience to establish a UI direction that ultimately shipped.
## Apply Now
Submit your application with a **portfolio of your work** demonstrating your product design, UI design, design-system, usability, and user-centered design experience.

Work arrangement
Yes