Product Design Director

About TrialSpark

On a mission to bring new treatments to patients faster and more efficiently 

Founded in 2016, TrialSpark is a tech-driven Pharma company differentiated by radically more efficient drug development. TrialSpark has built a technology platform that optimizes all aspects of clinical drug development, enabling more efficient trial design, faster trial completion, and higher quality trial data. 

The company acquires clinical-stage drugs from pharmaceutical and biotech companies and develops them faster, unlocking greater value per program and accelerating access to new treatments for patients. TrialSpark's current therapeutic areas of focus include rheumatology, dermatology, CNS, and cardiometabolic diseases.

About the Position

As Director of Design, you will oversee TrialSpark’s Product Design team. Along with Product Management, Engineering, and Operational partners, you will be responsible for leading our Tech organization in reimagining how clinical trials are run and overseen, developing technology with the goal of reducing the time and cost of running a clinical trial by an order of magnitude. You are an example of what TrialSpark Design should be, and will be responsible for setting the directional and cultural tone of our design organization. Ultimately, you are responsible for your team and their ability to deliver high-quality product outcomes and user experiences in a timely manner.

• Manage a team of product designers and ensure that they are able to deliver high-quality product outcomes and user experiences that are aligned with business goals and product vision
• Provide product/UX guidance and leadership to your team and your partners. Function as a design lead if necessary, but bias towards sponsoring and delegating to direct reports
• Utilize design expertise ability to inform resourcing, team composition, and performance management
• Advocate, empower, unblock direct reports to ensure that the entire team gets results; facilitate decision-making accordingly
• Establish team rigor around planning, testing, and measurement, as well as internal communications & evangelism
• Support growth of the team through career planning and skill development
• Handle minor team issues without escalation, create a culture of strong team co-ownership and collaboration with Engineering & PM counterparts, and know how to hold people accountable without pointing fingers

Relevant Experience

Required:

• 5+ years of professional experience in design or tech, including:
• 3+ years of experience in-house product design roles, including leadership of design strategy and project planning/management across multiple designers
• 1+ years of managerial experience with experience leading high-performing product design teams
• You have experience designing B2B products and/or tools for internal users
• You have experience designing user experiences in the context of operational workflows or other workflows that extend beyond the user interface
• You have a passion for building tools that make users more efficient and help them adapt to new ways of working
• You prioritize outcomes over process in your work and help your teammates to do the same
• You have excellent verbal, written, and visual communication skills and can craft the right framing for a wide variety of teammates and stakeholders
• You learn quickly and are deeply curious about the industry; We expect you to become an expert on clinical trials - from how studies are designed to how the FDA approves a new drug
• You are comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity, and know how to test hypotheses quickly, drive prioritization, and execute on action plans that solve problems from top-level strategic goals down to in-the-weeds UI details
• You roll up your sleeves and do what it takes to make your product and team successful
• You have a track record of leading high-performance teams and shipping successful products from genesis to launch and beyond

Preferred:

• Previous startup experience
• Experience building technology in highly regulated industries or enterprise/government spaces
• Experience with localization and other international product concerns
• Experience building for accessibility
• Experience building out design systems
• Experience conducting user research and product validation in enterprise or workflow-driven problem spaces

We offer competitive compensation because we want to hire the best people and reward them for their contributions to our mission. We pay all employees competitively relative to the New York City market, regardless of their location. In compliance with NYC’s pay transparency law and in pursuit of pay equity and fairness, we publish salary ranges for all open roles at TrialSpark. The target salary range for this role is $220,000 - $250,000.

On top of base salary, we also offer equity, generous perks, location flexibility, and comprehensive benefits – learn more about them and our compensation philosophy here.

If this range doesn’t match your expectations, please still apply because we may have something else for you.

You will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.