Human-Centered Research Design Lead

Company Overview

Wondros translates the complex stories of the world's most innovative organizations, companies, and individuals into dynamic content that informs the culture and inspires change. We work internationally with partners in all fields of business - from humanitarian nonprofits to public financials & health institutions from universities to retail brands.

Job Summary

The Human-Centered Research Design Lead will serve among the senior cadre of designers within the Research and Design team at Wondros. As a part of the senior leadership team, the Human-Centered Research Design Lead will help propel, grow, and mature all aspects of experience design for Wondros from the strategic to the tactical. This is a contract role with the possibility to hire.

The Human-Centered Research Design Lead will lead a team of talented designers through the full cycles of design; responsible for every aspect of design throughout a projects lifeycycle. Work collaboratively and closely with other team leads. As an example: They will work closely with the client teams including Program Manager, Chief of Strategy, and the Head of Research and Design, and Chief of Experience, and Marketing and Branding teams.

Key Responsibilities

• Drive the overall quality of design output and its contribution to business objectives.
• Define and manage strategic initiatives that improve product team efficiency and impact.
• Facilitate meetings to drive progress against goals and objectives, establish clear next steps and owners, and resolve blocks that impede progress.
• Proactively assess risk, raise flags, and resolve issues before they become problems.
• Refine and drive design philosophy, principles and guidelines, ensuring they are consistently applied to every product and experience.
• Manage the delivery of design projects, defining scope, goals, milestones, and deliverables in collaboration with key stakeholders across the business.
• Advocate for design thinking practices within the VA scope of work and represent design and user experience to senior management.
• Establish processes and velocity expectations that allow the design team to do their best work; balancing speed and creativity.
• Build trusting relationships between Wondros and clients in order to foster and grow future business opportunities.
• Partner with executive teams to develop growth strategies.
• Spearhead visioning, scoping, and the execution of activities supporting VA efforts for designing for community across germane stakeholders.
• Represent Wondros at client leadership meetings, steering committees, etc.

Minimum Qualifications

• 8+ years of digital product visual / experience design, with 2+ of those years in director-level management.
• A passion for managing and mentoring designers.
• Deep understanding of user-centered design methods – especially related to digital products – and the ability to work at all levels of the process.
• Background in healthcare, public health, and/or population health design work is a plus.
• Demonstrable UI and visual design skills with a strong portfolio - you must be able to showcase and speak to your portfolio, and how your work qualifies you for this role.
• Experience developing and evolving design systems.
• Experience designing mobile-first and for responsive websites.
• Experience with user research throughout the product lifecycle, incorporating data from multiple sources into decision making.
• Experience with Figma, Adobe Creative Cloud, HTML and CSS is a plus.
• Experience with JavaScript and/or React is a plus.
• Experience creating data visualizations is a plus.
• Experience working in an Agile / Scrum development process is a plus.
• Degree in design related field, or equivalent experience, is required.
• Must be energetic and proactive, someone who welcomes a challenge and is able to work in a fast-paced, fluid environment.
• Must be diplomatic and able to work well with professionals from a variety of different backgrounds and experience.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, as well as proactive with excellent follow-up ability.
• Must be highly organized and able to work well under pressure.
• Ability to learn new tasks quickly and willingness to pitch-in, as needed.

Ideally You Also Have

• High emotional intelligence and an ability to empathize with clients, co-workers, and users.
• Quantitative research experience is a plus!
• An ability to dig deep, turn information into insight and make the complex simple and digestible.
• An interest in working in dynamic, often ambiguous conditions requiring rapid transition.
• Ability to work flexibly and efficiently, exercise a balance between research and inspiration.
• Openness to critique from other disciplines and curiosity to learn from a variety of perspectives.
• A strong passion for improving people's lives through design.
• High emotional intelligence and an ability to empathize with clients, co-workers, and users.
• A strong passion for improving people's lives through design.

Wondros is an Equal Opportunity employer. In that spirit, we are particularly interested in receiving applications from a broad spectrum of qualified people who would assist our company in demonstrating values of leadership, diversity, engagement and sustainability.