Senior Design Operations Specialist

The job at a glance

Our mission reflects how design has been part of our DNA for more than a decade. Our UX Community has evolved through this time and today we are a team of 45+ designers and user researchers, including Design Operations, Design System, Design Foundation & Service Design roles.

We are spread across both the B2C and B2B sides of the business, providing an end-to-end experience, for both candidates and recruiters alike.

Within The Stepstone Group, we strongly believe that to become a world-class design organisation you need to have a critical focus on operations. We are investing in this design discipline to help set ourselves up for success, both in our immediate future and our long-term future.

This is an exciting role that will play a big part in our journey towards design excellence.

As our Senior Design Operations Specialist, you will join our existing Design Operations team, reporting into our Design Operations Manager. You will play a crucial role in helping us become an operationally excellent UX and product organisation.

You will establish strong relationships and partnerships with your key peers; Design Leadership, Product Operations, Technology and our Design & Research Team.

You will lead a number of both strategic and tactical workstreams that span across our five pillars of operations:

Your responsibilities

• Design Tools and Systems
  Facilitating design quality, and speed of execution, through standardisation and governance of toolsets and processes.
  Enable increased efficiency through documentation and file management processes.
  Improve our processes, contribution models and feedback loops to drive adoption and maturity of our design system.
  Introduce standardised ways of working, processes and templates for designers, to enable increased consistency and quality of craft.
• Culture and Community
  Elevate our Design Organisation's profile within the external design community, so we can attract the best talent
  Manage tools and platforms that facilitate the sharing and communication of design insights, ensuring they are effectively utilised by the team.
  Organise and manage our internal and external design events programmes.
  Run our social and engagement programmes to help foster a culture of inclusion and well-being.
• Learning and Development
  Develop and run educational programmes at scale that have the purpose of elevating the craft of the design and research organisation.
  Implement and own effective, human-centric hiring, onboarding and offboarding processes.
  Develop and manage a comprehensive internship/graduate program to attract and nurture future talent.
• Program Management
  Create and maintain forecasting models to predict future design resource needs.
  Develop and implement processes to enhance collaboration and communication between design, product, and engineering teams.
  Improve processes for regular design critiques and reviews, ensuring consistency and quality.
  Develop and implement a design quality framework to ensure consistency and excellence throughout the design process.
• Research Operations
  Facilitating research quality, through standardisation and governance of toolsets, processes and templates.
  Govern our user insights repository to centralise research findings and improve visibility and quality of insights across our organisation.
  Streamlined processes for submitting, reviewing, and prioritising research requests from product teams.

Requirements

Your skills and Qualifications

• You have proven experience in design operations, program management, or a related role within a design or creative environments.
• You have a strong understanding of design processes, tools, and methodologies, with a focus on optimising workflows and enhancing team efficiency.
• You have excellent organisational and multitasking skills, with the ability to manage multiple projects and priorities simultaneously.
• You have effective communication skills that enable you to work collaboratively with cross-functional teams, including design, product, and engineering.
• You can adapt to changing priorities and organisational needs, demonstrating flexibility and resilience in a fast-paced work environment.