Head of Product Design

Location: Porto (Portugal), Remote
Annual Salary: DOE

Contract: Permanent
Hours: 40 hours (Core hours 10:00 am-2:00 pm Monday-Friday)
Hiring Manager: Anu Costa Reis
Recruiter: Rikki Spencer-Cox

About Twinkl

We're here to help those who teach. It's what brings us to work every day. At Twinkl, we’ve been providing educators across the world with high quality, trusted teaching and learning resources for over a decade now. They’re all written and checked by our wonderful team of experienced educators, and there are hundreds of thousands of resources to download, with new ones added daily.

About the Digital Product Team

The digital product team is dedicated to creating innovative and engaging digital experiences for children and educators. We are committed to enriching the lives of users through interactive and educational applications that inspire creativity, learning, and fun. We’re looking for an experienced and visionary Head of Product Design to be responsible for driving the overall design & research vision and strategy for our products. You will lead a team of talented designers, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and ensure that our products are user-centric, visually compelling, and aligned with our business goals.

Ongoing projects/how you’ll spend your day:

• Building a product design culture: Educate and advocate for user-centric product design across the organisation. Put in place methods to allow a design-thinking approach to flourish both inside and outside of the design organisation. 
• Design & UXR oversight: Oversee all design and UX research projects, ensuring high-quality output and consistency across all products. Provide guidance and feedback to designers and researchers, helping them refine their work and achieve excellence. Review and approve deliverables, including wireframes, prototypes, and high-fidelity designs and research plans.
• Strategic leadership: Define and articulate the design and research vision and strategy for our product portfolio. Lead and mentor a team of designers and researchers, fostering a culture of creativity, collaboration, and continuous improvement. Work closely with senior leadership to align design goals with business objectives and product strategy.
• Establish a design system and standards: Lead the way in establishing a functional design system and toolkit  (partnering with engineering, product and brand to do so) that ensures and on-brand and consistent user experience that’s functional and time-saving for all product designers across the organisation 
• Collaboration: Collaborate with senior leadership across engineering, product, UXR, data, education teams and the wider business to ensure cohesive and effective design and research solutions. Present design & research concepts and strategies to stakeholders, incorporating feedback and aligning with overall company goals. Facilitate design workshops, brainstorming sessions, and user testing activities.
• Team development: Recruit, structure and grow a product design function that serves the end-to-end experience at Twinkl across all channels, including learner apps, the core website, and teacher tools
• Advocate for the customer: Champion a user-centric approach to design, ensuring that user needs and feedback are at the forefront of the design process. Lead the user research team to gain insights into the needs, behaviours, and pain points of educators and students. Ensure that accessibility and inclusivity are integral parts of the design process.

To succeed in the role, you will:

• Be a Visionary Leader: Have a clear vision for the future of design and research in education technology and the ability to inspire and guide your team towards that vision.
• Be a Skilled Communicator: Possess excellent communication and presentation skills to articulate design & research concepts and strategies to diverse audiences.
• Be User-Centric: Demonstrate a deep understanding of user-centred design principles and a commitment to creating exceptional user experiences, reinforcing decision making with UX research and data.
• Be Collaborative: Work effectively with cross-functional teams, foster a collaborative and inclusive work environment and be able to collaborate at all levels from Junior Designer to Senior Leader..
• Be Detail-Oriented: Maintain high standards for design quality and attention to detail, ensuring that all design outputs are polished and effective.
• Be Innovative: Nurture creative problem-solving skills among the team and model a willingness to explore new ideas and approaches to design challenges. Empower the team to leverage innovation appropriately in their design solutions.
• Be Adaptable & have a growth mindset: Thrive in