Head of Design and Research

Upside

Lead design and research efforts in transforming consumer experience at fintech company. Ensuring design excellence and team growth in a hybrid workplace environment.

Posted 6/17/2026full-timeWashington, D.C. • District of Columbia, Washington • 🇺🇸 United StatesLead💰 $249,000 - $263,000 per yearWebsite

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Own the quality, consistency, and polish bar across the consumer and payments experience.
Lead a small, tightly knit team of designers and researchers embedded in delivery pods; systematically grow their craft and how the team operates.
Architect cohesive design systems and frameworks across fragmented journeys and surfaces — balancing design integrity against iteration speed.
Partner with Product, Engineering, and Marketing to pull design into discovery and drive measurable outcomes across onboarding, discovery, redemption, and retention.
Deepen the research practice and its integration into decision-making.
Apply an AI-native approach to how design and research scale.

Requirements

What you’ll need

Deep consumer product design experience where trust, credibility, and onboarding psychology drive conversion and retention — ideally fintech, marketplaces, or transaction-driven products.
Track record designing habit-forming systems (frequency, retention, cross-category adoption) at consumer scale.
Has personally helped scale a consumer app through hypergrowth (~3M → 10M+ MAU).
Strong systems-level product thinking; sound judgment on where consistency matters vs. where to move fast.
Comfort in highly analytical environments; uses data to drive and prove UX impact.
Has led design/research teams of ~5–10 and raised individual craft.
AI-centric approach to design and research.
Bias to action; effective in ambiguity without requiring a perfect environment.

Benefits

Comp & perks

Medical, dental, and vision coverage starting on Day 1
Equity (ISOs)
401(k) program
Family planning programs + paid parental leave
Physical fitness and wellness memberships
Emotional and mental health support programs
Unlimited PTO + 10 paid federal holidays + our annual, week-long Winter Break
Flexible work environment
Lunch reimbursement for in-office employees
Employee Resource Groups
Learning and Development stipend
Transparent culture
Amazing mission!

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

consumer product designdesign systemsUX impact measurementAI-native designhabit-forming systemsonboarding psychologydata-driven designsystems-level product thinkingdesign frameworksiteration speed

Soft Skills

leadershipteam managementanalytical thinkingdecision-makingeffective communicationbias to actionadaptabilitycreativitycollaborationproblem-solving