Digital Product Design Lead

Sean Oakes bio picture Sean Oakes
We believe in teamwork, complex projects, and elegant solutions for digital products. How about you? We’re looking for a Design Lead with the drive, passion and ninja design skills to help us make edTech experiences that are just better – one project at a time.

About us:

Backpack Interactive is a small but mighty creative studio, specializing in design, strategy and UX with a focus on educational technology products. We leverage nearly 20 years of experience in the edTech space to concept, design and build digital products that create transformative educational experiences for teachers and learners of all ages. As education technology specialists, we believe in the power of thoughtful design and delightful user experience to enable better teaching, learning and communication.

Role description:

We’re seeking a Design Lead to join our collaborative creative team. Working on a wide range of clients from large educational companies to small startups, you’ll architect, design, develop and produce the creative strategy, concepts and designs that fuel our mission-driven client work.

As the Design Lead you’ll be in the trenches, but also guiding the overall goal. You’re passionate about stunning, elegant and forward-thinking design. You’ll provide direction and leadership to, and collaborate with, our talented UX/UI designers and technology partners to develop powerful, user-centered experiences. You’ll present to stakeholders and guide them in design thinking. You’ll be involved in all levels of impactful educational work, and see them through, from concept to execution.

What you’ll bring:

  • 6-8 years experience leading design for a variety of web products, evolving your work from idea to execution
  • Incredible design aesthetic and robust samples of your smart, conceptually-led design work, using your skills to level-up the UX and visual design for organizations
  • Proven experience leading designers, projects, and processes including insights, ideation, validation, and implementation
  • Familiarity working in an agile and fast-paced environment
  • An ability to blend craft and form – balancing pixel-perfect visual design with strategic thinking, thoughtful interactions, and systematic, user-centric approaches to problem-solving
  • Ability to get it done; As a nimble team, we’re all doers
  • Knowledge and prowess with the latest best practices, design trends, accessibility standards, and design software
  • Expertise communicating, discussing, and defending your designs to a range of stakeholders
  • Experience partnering with Engineers and Product Managers to ship work on time and scale in line with tech implementations/limits
  • How we get the work done is as important as the work we do; positivity and a can-do attitude is required
  • Ability to execute, lead, and oversee functional visual and interaction designs – including layout, hierarchy, typography, composition, UX, and UI applications
  • Relentless desire to push your limits, critique your own work and elevate the work of those around you
  • Experience working collaboratively with all levels of designers and copywriters—we want Design Leads who will be strong leaders while fostering team camaraderie

Would you like to join…?

  • A team of highly-motivated creatives that care about creating impactful products
  • An inspiring, social, collaborative and playful work environment, with an open-minded culture
  • Full health coverage, retirement matching and more

How to apply:

For consideration, please send your resume, cover letter and portfolio to jobs@backpackinteractive.com

Thanks! And if you’ve read all this way through, please include your favorite emoji in your response to let us know. We like you already.

Let’s build the future of digital products together.