Lead Product Design Engineer

DiUS; Sydney; Hybrid; AUD 140,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

DiUS seeks a Lead Design Engineer to take client challenges from discovery through to a working experience. You will prototype, implement and refine interfaces with engineers, leading design conversations and decisions while collaborating with product, AI and engineering teams.

This hands-on, client-facing role requires shaping direction, testing interactions, and using modern front-end and AI-assisted tools to bring ideas to life.

Qualifications

• Substantial experience designing and delivering digital products or services.
• Experience conducting or partnering on research, discovery, testing concepts.
• Confidence with design systems, accessibility, responsive interfaces.
• Sound product judgment to frame problems and decide what to test or build next.
• Hands-on ability to prototype and implement frontend interfaces; AI tools experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead design from discovery through to a working experience.
• Prototype, implement and refine digital interfaces with engineers.
• Drive client-facing design conversations and delivery decisions.
• Collaborate across design, product, engineering and AI teams.

Skills

Product design

Interaction design

Visual design

Design systems

Accessibility

Research facilitation

Client-facing

Workshop facilitation

AI-enabled products

Frontend prototyping

Git collaboration

HTML/CSS/JS/TS

React

Tools

Git

HTML

CSS

JavaScript/TypeScript

React

Job description

Lead Product Design Engineer

Location

This is a hybrid role based in either Sydney or Melbourne. You must be based in Australia with current working rights.

About DiUS

DiUS is an Australian B2B technology services company with an excellent reputation as a trusted consulting partner. We’re a go‑to company for helping organisations of all sizes tackle hard engineering problems, improve delivery practices, modernise applications, and deliver or scale new products to market.

Whether we are building a product using AI or building an AI experience, we work on problems our clients aren’t able to solve themselves, drawing on our deep range of capabilities: software engineering, experience design, data and analytics, machine learning and AI.

About The Role

We are looking for a Lead Design Engineer who can take a client challenge from discovery through to a working experience. You will combine the judgment and craft of an experienced product / experience designer with the technical fluency to prototype, implement and refine digital interfaces alongside engineers.

This is a hands‑on, client‑facing consulting role. You will uncover user and business needs, shape a practical direction, design and test interactions, and use modern front‑end and AI‑assisted tools to bring ideas to life. You will lead design conversations and delivery decisions, while knowing when to involve deeper engineering, research, product or accessibility expertise.

Each engagement brings different people, constraints and levels of ambiguity. You will build trust quickly, adapt your approach to the client context and help teams make sound decisions about what to build and how to know whether it works.

Required Skills

Design and product practice

• Substantial experience designing and delivering digital products or services, with strong interaction, visual and systems design skills.
• Experience conducting or partnering on research, facilitating discovery, testing concepts and using evidence to guide decisions.
• Confidence working with design systems, accessibility principles and responsive interfaces across different devices and contexts.
• Sound product judgment: you can frame a problem, identify assumptions and decide what needs to be tested or built next.

Technical and AI capability

• Ability to turn a design into an interactive prototype or working interface, use Git and collaborate effectively in a software codebase.
• Understanding of how front‑end experiences connect to APIs, data and application architecture, with good judgment about implementation trade‑offs.
• Hands‑on use of AI‑assisted design or coding tools, with commercial experience building and shipping products.
• Commercial experience with AI‑enabled products, agentic experiences, and conversational interfaces – including how people understand, control and recover from system behaviour.
• Bonus: Practical front‑end capability with HTML, CSS and JavaScript or TypeScript, and experience with a modern component framework such as React.

Consulting and leadership

• Experience leading client‑facing work, building relationships and influencing stakeholders with different priorities.
• Ability to facilitate workshops, present decisions clearly and guide multidisciplinary teams from ambiguous briefs to delivered outcomes.
• Experience shaping scope, estimates or proposals and working iteratively within agile or lean delivery teams.
• A collaborative, service‑oriented approach and an interest in mentoring and growing the capability of others.

Consulting Skills

• Able to openly collaborate and listen; understand and refine requirements, & iterate on delivery outcomes
• Able to problem solve; identify purposeful solutions, factoring in how to integrate into a wider solution/system
• Able to navigate ambiguity; land on your feet and find the way forward
• Adaptable to different paces and environments; from the complexity of a large enterprise or influencing in a fast‑paced start‑up
• Excellent communication skills
• Able to efficiently self manage and coordinate / prioritise tasks and workload
• Curious with a growth mindset, always seeking to learn and investing in own development
• Passionate about spreading change through thought leadership, mentoring, meetups, writing blogs or staying active on GitHub.
• A change champion who can influence and drive transformation