Design Director

Summary

Join Khan Academy's Design team as a Design Leader and lead a team of approximately 20 product designers, visual designers, and UX researchers. You will be responsible for operationalizing the product vision, collaborating with product management and engineering leadership, and owning the execution of the product roadmap. The role requires deep experience in technology-based product design and strong leadership skills. You will work closely with the Chief Learning Officer and other product leaders to drive product strategy and vision. Khan Academy offers competitive salaries, ample paid time off, a remote-first culture, generous parental leave, and comprehensive benefits.

Requirements

• Deep, relevant experience in technology-based product design, building and shipping joyful user experiences
• Strong leader of people, with proven ability to lead teams, prioritizing mentorship and career growth
• Record of helping growing design teams level-up in maturity through deep understanding of our users, operations, and design standards+frameworks
• Able to collaborate, influence, and quickly build trust and respect across the organization
• Exceptional communicator, collaborator, and facilitator who enjoys leading through influence and working across functions and levels to establish and deliver on shared goals
• Strategic thinker who can build frameworks and connect ideas
• Track record of combining customer-focus with mission alignment, engaging in, data-informed decision making that delivers an exceptional customer experience as well mission-driven outcomes
• Demonstrated experience supporting and enabling a user experience research team, guiding the team to integrate qualitative and quantitative insights into the design process
• A positive mindset that is energized by ambiguity and bringing clarity and structure to new opportunities
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with a keen eye for detail
• Motivated by the Khan Academy mission “to provide a free world-class education for anyone, anywhere”
• Proven cross-cultural competency skills demonstrating self-awareness, awareness of other, and the ability to adopt inclusive perspectives, attitudes, and behaviors to drive inclusion and belonging throughout the organization

Responsibilities

• Help Khan Academy develop our offerings through design leadership
• Lead the ~20 person design team in operationalizing the product vision and strategic priorities
• Together with product management and engineering leadership, own execution of our product roadmap
• Collaborate with our founder and other product leaders to drive the product strategy and vision which lays out our unique path for engaging teachers and learners and driving accelerated learning; working collaboratively across content, product management, engineering, learning science and research & efficacy
• Influence product priorities in ways that are rooted in a deep understanding of the evolving education landscape, tech/AI opportunities, and industry dynamics and policies
• Help operationalize, codify, and scale the pedagogical vision of our CEO / Founder, Salman Khan and Chief Learning Officer, Kristen DiCerbo
• Own the design team’s budget, working closely with finance and leadership to forecast needs, manage headcount planning, and making strategic trade-offs to maximize impact while maintaining sustainability
• Seamlessly shift between high-level visionary strategy and detailed execution, ensuring alignment across all team deliverables
• Know our customers and products inside and out. Inspire others to a similar depth of knowledge - and to use customer/product insights to guide product decisions
• Motivate and grow our world-class design team to deliver best-in-class offerings in service to user growth and accelerated learning outcomes
• Level-up design team maturity and set the bar for delivering high-impact, high-quality products rooted in a deep understanding of the business and customer needs
• You are responsible for coaching, career planning, career path development, and performance management of this critical function
• Drive data-informed decisions
• Lead our User Experience Research team in developing insights from their work and collaborating with our analytics and efficacy teams to provide information to the organization at the time it is useful for driving decisions
• Provide and develop a culture of feedback where designers are encouraged to iteratively improve on their work

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience creating products for K-12 districts and classrooms, knowledge of the educational technology market, and/or experience working in schools a plus
• Introspective, mature, low-ego, and emotionally intelligent
• Growth mindset, willingness to learn and to teach others
• Proactively seek out the people and info you need to move work forward and unblock yourself
• High comfort level working within a strong top-down product vision led by our CEO, Sal Khan
• Able to balance the immediate tactical needs of helping deliver and ship features with scouting ahead for what’s next
• Comfortable with ever-shifting priorities and ambiguous situations, like you’d experience in a startup
• Willing to roll your sleeves up and pitch in when a project goes off-script
• Excited about education and engaging learning experiences, deeply curious about how and why people learn

Benefits

• Competitive salaries
• Ample paid time off as needed – Your well-being is a priority
• Remote-first culture - that caters to your time zone, with open flexibility as needed, at times
• Generous parental leave
• An exceptional team that trusts you and gives you the freedom to do your best
• The chance to put your talents towards a deeply meaningful mission and the opportunity to work on high-impact products that are already defining the future of education
• Opportunities to connect through affinity, ally, and social groups
• 401(k) + 4% matching & comprehensive insurance, including medical, dental, vision, and life