Product Designer

The USA TODAY NETWORK is looking for a talented Product Designer to join our Consumer Experience Team.

You have a passion for design craft and abilities as a strategic thinker. You enjoy work that combines the analytical with the creative. As a Product Designer, you will work with fellow designers, project managers, product managers, business analysts, and technology developers to shape next-gen consumer experiences.

This role goes far beyond improving news sites. We’re transforming the ways in which information is gathered, experienced, and shared. Imagine a world where reading, watching, and listening are not passive acts — where the distance between journalist and consumer evaporates.

Through our apps, websites, content verticals, and events, the USA TODAY NETWORK taps into the zeitgeist of neighborhoods and communities, in ways no other American media brand can. We are dedicated to building stronger communities. To do that, we inform, equip and empower people: fostering deep and vital connections between the members of our communities and the world around them.

By collaborating with multidisciplinary teams to take on our toughest business challenges and define compelling solutions for customers, you will leverage your expertise in:

Empathy – You have experience identifying and developing customer archetypes, planning and conducting various types of research, and prioritizing insights, data, and customer needs to drive product design solutions.

Storytelling – You understand how to influence through effective storytelling. You can demonstrate ways the stories you’ve told to sell a new idea, influence stakeholders, or represent the voice of the customer (VOC).

Rapid iteration – You know how to leverage the best of design thinking principles, you can facilitate discussions, design jams, and other working sessions to identify design opportunities and iterate effectively to achieve high-quality results

In this role you will:

Work on a wide range of projects. Some conceptual and innovative, and others with a focus on tactical outcomes.
Translate insights and strategy into prototypes, clearly communicating your vision through your concepts.
Define methodologies to make sense of the voice of the customer (design research and prototyping) to identify opportunity areas and unmet customer needs
Confidently share your discoveries, design solutions, user testing, and ethnographic study results, influence stakeholders, and create energy around an idea or an initiative
Design, launch, and analyze user tests. You must be comfortable independently writing a test.
Leverage a generative work style: you can visualize and iterate rapidly at different levels of fidelity (e.g., sketches, wireframes)
Iterate on UI design concepts and UX solutions that address business goals and customer needs
Ensure consistency in UI/UX flows and interactions across multiple platforms and devices

Key Qualifications:

Minimum BA or higher in related field (design strategy, UX or Visual/Graphic design, communication design, or industrial design)
Strong portfolio of design work covering both UI and UX designs (link to your portfolio is required for consideration)
2-5 years of design experience, preferably within a news, publishing, or agency setting.
Understanding of how to translate enterprise design solutions across breakpoints and/or key platforms
Hands-on experience with product design and agile methodologies
Strong experience with human-centered design and design thinking tools and methods
Experience with a digital product & services company

Preferred Background or Experience:

Ability to translate insights into design opportunities within constraints.
Thorough understanding of user-centered design processes and practical experience in working with consumer-oriented experiences and/or products
Fluent in empathy research methodologies, UX research, and usability testing
Experience in key UX areas like empathy research, design strategy, information architecture
The ability to think about the end-goal and higher strategy while understanding known constraints to produce an engaging design experience
Strong sense of collaboration; you should thrive in iterative, cross-disciplinary environments
Comfortable trying new things and failing quickly to get to an optimal solution
Use design to communicate complex concepts, whether they’re conversations, frameworks, or ideas
Ability to drive consensus via facilitation, storytelling, brainstorming
Hands-on knowledge of Design tools (Sketch, Adobe Creative Suite, Sketch, Invision, usertesting.com, Figma (not required), Microsoft Office Suite, etc.)