Head of Product Design

News UK; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Private medical insurance

HarperCollins discount

25 days holiday + bank holidays

Volunteering days

Job summary

News UK is seeking an experienced Head of Product Design to lead a multidisciplinary team of designers across The Times Media Product team. You will oversee research, UX and UI, drive an emerging design system, and ensure high usability and aesthetics across formats.

You will collaborate with product management, editorial leadership, engineering, marketing, and stakeholders to craft intuitive, engaging experiences, while championing accessibility and innovation.

Qualifications

• Proven experience leading a digital product design team in a fast-paced environment.
• Strong portfolio showcasing expertise in UX/UI design, interaction design, and visual design.
• Understanding of user-centred design principles with data-driven UX implementations.
• Deep understanding of user research methodologies, usability testing, and analytics.
• Experience with industry-standard design tools such as Figma and research tools like Userzoom.

Responsibilities

• Lead, mentor, and grow a high-performing digital product design team.
• Implement user-centered design strategy aligned with business goals.
• Oversee end-to-end design process from research to prototyping and implementation.
• Champion design thinking and best practices across the organisation.
• Advocate for accessibility, inclusivity, and usability in all decisions.
• Use interviews, research tools, testing and analytics to understand customers and validate decisions.
• Maintain weekly customer touchpoints and a frequent feedback loop.
• Manage design budgets, resources, and vendor relationships.

Skills

Leadership

UX/UI design

User research

Analytics

Figma

Agile methodologies

Communication

Front-end collaboration

AI-first design

Accessibility

Tools

Userzoom

Job description

Job Description

Job Description

Your team:

The Times Media Product team is organised around three core pillars of Subscription Growth, Reader Experience and Commercial. As Head of Product design, you will lead a talented and engaged group of product designers contributing across each of these pillars.

The goal is to deliver clean, engaging ways of attracting customers and telling stories. Our overarching aim is to deliver a beautiful product that serves our journalism in the best way possible, with new and innovative ways of reaching existing subscribers and attracting potential new readers.

Your role:

We are looking for an experienced Head of Product Design to lead, mentor and inspire a multidisciplinary team of user research, UX and UI experts in creating intuitive, engaging, and high-performing digital experiences.

You will work collaboratively across the product team alongside product management, editorial leadership, engineering, marketing, and other key stakeholders. Oversee the execution of an emerging design system, foster innovation, and ensure our digital products meet the highest standards of usability and aesthetics.

In this role, you will collaborate within a guild of senior designers across brand, editorial, marketing, and product to ensure consistent execution of our core design principles across all formats and platforms.

Day to day you will:

• Lead, mentor, and grow a high-performing digital product design team.

• Implement our user-centered design strategy that adheres to core design principles and business goals.

• Oversee the end-to-end design process, from research and ideation to prototyping and implementation.

• Champion design thinking and innovative best practices by participating in the border design guild across the organisation.

• Advocate for accessibility, inclusivity, and usability in all design decisions.

• Use customer interviews, research tools, testing and data analysis to help understand the customers and validate design decisions.

• Continuous discovery - be outcome-oriented with the goal of weekly touchpoints with customers, creating a feedback loop with users, testing in small increments and frequently.

• Manage design budgets, resources, and vendor relationships as needed.

What we're looking for from you:

• Proven experience leading a digital product design team in a fast-paced environment, with a track record of developing top design talent. Ideally within media or similar audience centric, digital-first industries.

• Strong portfolio showcasing expertise in UX/UI design, interaction design, and visual design.

• Understanding of user-centred design principles. A track record of making impactful change through smart, data-driven UX implementation.

• Deep understanding of user research methodologies, usability testing, and analytics.

• Experience and knowledge of industry-standard product design software, such as Figma, as well as research tools such as Userzoom etc.

• Ability to balance business objectives with audience needs to create impactful design solutions.

• Excellent communication and collaboration skills, confident leading workshops and presenting, with the ability to influence stakeholders at all levels.

• Understanding of front-end development principles and experience working closely with engineering teams.

• Experience with AI first & AI augmented product design processes and methodologies

• Passion for innovation, problem-solving, and continuous learning.

• Familiarity with Agile and Lean UX methodologies.

• Ideally editorial/publishing or subscriber-based product experience, but not essential.

News UK is one of the leading media businesses in the UK and Ireland. Our newsbrands include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun, The Sun on Sunday and The TLS. Our national broadcast brands include talkSPORT, Times Radio and Virgin Radio UK, and we have market-leading local stations across Ireland. Our world-famous brands provide news, analysis, opinion and entertainment to almost 40 million people each month. Spanning print and pixel, audio and video, events and experiences, our multi-format brands are home to a plurality of opinion, representing the diverse communities we serve. Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose, we exist to promote a fair society, freedom of speech and a little bit of fun. Rethinking continually the business of storytelling, we represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter.

At News UK, we embrace a hybrid work model, currently requiring a minimum of three days per week in the office. This approach fosters collaboration, innovation, and team spirit within our workspace. Certain roles may necessitate additional in-office days; please discuss this with your recruiter for specific requirements.

Life at News

Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose. We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter. We inform our audiences so that they can make decisions based on trusted information.

We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter most. To ensure these stories resonate with as broad an audience as possible, it is essential that our organisation reflects the diversity of the people we reach. Whether through age, gender, ethnicity, disability, social class or sexuality, we are committed to representing the rich variety of voices that make up our society. And we champion a culture where everyone has the opportunity to contribute and thrive as we continue to innovate and drive long term sustainable growth. This is done through our Diversity Strategy.

At News UK, we take pride in our exceptional employee-led networks that bring together individuals with shared interests and create a vibrant sense of community. We believe our networks play a vital role in fostering a collaborative and supportive work culture at News UK. Groups that we support include the African & Caribbean Network, Parents and Carers, and LGBTQ+ group News Is Out, and the Apprentice Society.

Benefits

Some of our benefits include:

• Private medical insurance including coverage for pre-existing conditions

• Discounted gym memberships, free ClassPass at Home, weekly in person/ virtual exercise classes

• 'Bikes for Work' and 'Electric Car' scheme

• Up to 60% discount on Harper Collins books

• Maternity leave up to 18 weeks full basic salary & paternity leave up to 2 weeks

• Access to exclusive events and competitions with exciting brands such as talkSPORT, Virgin Radio UK & The Times. Weekly virtual panel chats with top journalists and celebrities

• Access to wellbeing benefits such as EAP, physio/massage and counselling

• A generous pension scheme with employer contributions of up to 5%

• Wide range of training available, plus full LinkedIn Learning access

• 25 days holiday plus bank holidays, as well as an extra anniversary day off

• Up to 3 paid volunteering days per year to support causes you care about

We are committed to providing an inclusive recruitment process. If you require reasonable adjustments due to a disability or health condition at any stage of your application or interview, please let us know. You can contact us at [e-mail] to discuss how we can support you to perform at your best.