Design Systems Lead (Staff Designer or Senior Design Manger)

Job Description:

Location: In-office location (preferably SF, NY)  

Rakuten International oversees 7 businesses with over 4,000 employees globally. The brand is recognized for its leadership and innovation in e-commerce, digital content, advertising, entertainment and communications, bringing the joy of discovery and access to more than 1 billion members across the world. Our teams deliver on the company’s mission to delight merchants and customers through innovation, optimism, and teamwork.

Rakuten Rewards is a leading e-commerce company that enhances the way people shop by offering Cash Back, deals and rewards from more than 3,500 merchants. Founded in 1999, Rakuten has grown to become the go-to shopping destination for consumers, having paid out nearly $2 billion in Cash Back to its 15 million members. The company also operates ShopStyle, a leading fashion discovery destination, and Cartera Commerce, a top rewards platform for airlines and banks. For more information, visit www.rakuten.com.
 

Job Summary:

We're looking for a Design Systems Lead to join our team of product designers, researchers, and UX writers building rewarding experiences our members and merchants love. This role will lead the next chapter of Radiant, our design system— and help us reimagine and evolve the foundations that power every touchpoint in our ecosystem.

You’ll play a key role in scaling our visual language, accessibility standards, interaction patterns, and design quality across platforms used by millions. Sitting at the intersection of product design, engineering, and brand, you’ll define a clear, inspiring vision for Radiant — and partner cross-functionally to bring it to life. This role reports to the VP of Product Design and will directly manage one mid-level Product Designer focused on Radiant.

Key Responsibilities:

• Audit and evolve our existing system (tokens, components, Figma libraries, documentation, governance)

• Bring clarity and refinement to foundational elements like color, type, motion, and spacing—and ensure accessibility is built in from the ground up

• Define a clear vision for our design system in partnership with our Product Design, Craft Studio, and Brand teams

• Partner with engineering to ensure strong design-engineering parity and scalable code implementation

• Help create tools, documentation, and contribution models that enable teams to move fast without sacrificing quality

• Drive adoption by creating clear, usable patterns and tools that meet real product needs

• Support (and eventually grow) a small but mighty design systems team, starting with one direct report

Qualifications:

• Deep proficiency in Figma, design tokens, and working with design-engineering workflows

• Comfortable leading work across platforms (native app, web, browser extension)

• A strong sense of visual and interaction design, with a track record of raising the bar

• Strong communicator who thrives in cross-functional environments

• Builder mindset: low ego, fast iterating, and always looking to unblock teams

• Opinionated but collaborative—able to set a vision while inviting contribution

• Experience mentoring or managing designers

• Strong understanding of front-end development principles and constraints—comfortable pairing with engineers and making tradeoffs

• Familiarity with multi-brand or theming systems at scale

• Comfort navigating legacy systems and complex stakeholder environments

Minimum Requirements:

• 8+ years of professional design experience with significant experience in Design Systems.

• Experience working in e-commerce, marketplaces, or consumer-scale products

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in design, Human- Computer Interaction (HCI), Industrial Design, Computer Science, or related field.

Five Principles for Success
Our worldwide practices describe specific behaviors that make Rakuten unique and united across the world. We expect Rakuten employees to model these 5 Shugi Principles of Success.

Always improve, Always Advance - Only be satisfied with complete success - Kaizen
Passionately Professional - Take an uncompromising approach to your work and be determined to be the best
Hypothesize - Practice - Validate – Shikumika - Use the Rakuten Cycle to succeed in unknown territory
Maximize Customer Satisfaction - The greatest satisfacti