Senior Interaction Designer

Reed Talent Solutions; Bedford; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) is seeking a Senior Interaction Designer to improve engagement and digital services across the UK. You will work with a multi-disciplinary team to develop user-centred designs that are usable, accessible and inclusive, aligning with GDS standards and MaPS strategic goals.

You'll mentor others, run workshops, and translate research into design decisions, ensuring recommendations meet customer needs, scheme rules and data protection requirements while delivering

Qualifications

• Clear documentation and communication of design decisions, risks and issues.
• Ability to build consensus around a design approach.
• Design for inclusive, accessible and sustainable content/services.
• Ensure designs meet accessibility standards and regulations.
• Understand how user-centred design supports organisational goals.
• Ability to plan and run design sessions with teams and stakeholders.
• Coordinate design work across teams and disciplines.
• Analyse evidence to inform design decisions.
• Iterate designs based on research and feedback.”

Responsibilities

• Guiding a collaborative design process for multiple or complex projects.
• Leading workshops, reviews, critiques and handovers.
• Helping evolve and champion the interaction design practice within MaPS.
• Building interaction design capacity within a multi-functional team by sharing insights, principles and best practices with non-designers.
• Collaborating with a cross functional team to implement the user experience vision for MaPS’s digital channels.
• Advising and teaching colleagues of all levels in your areas of special expertise.
• Helping internal colleagues and external delivery partners define and evolve agile ways of working.
• Identifying, understanding and mitigating the ways design decisions and processes may negatively impact users, especially those who are vulnerable or experience some form of exclusion.
• Working with Business Analysts, Policy and Proposition Managers, and Product Managers to understand business requirements and ensure they are addressed in your designs.
• Collaborating with relevant internal teams to ensure our services meet MaPS, DWP and GDS standards for suitability, efficacy, usability, accessibility, quality, security and data protection.
• Building prototypes for testing and review.
• Identifying and prioritising design assumptions.
• Helping user researchers to plan research to gain the insights needed to advance the design.
• Working with user researchers and performance analysts to use analytics, customer feedback and other internal and external data to identify areas for improvement and inform designs.
• Conducting user experience audits, heuristic evaluations, competitive reviews and other desk research.
• Creating and socialising experience maps, process flows and other design artefacts to understand and communicate the customer journey.
• Creating design documentation and assets including sketches, wireframes, low and high fidelity prototypes, sitemaps & specification documents.
• Helping Product Owners, Policy and Proposition Managers, and Omnichannel Analysts define KPIs and measure the success of our website against them.
• Performing design quality assurance on the final delivered product or service.

Skills

Information architecture

User research

Prototype design

Accessibility

Inclusive design

Design leadership

Design systems

Collaborative teamwork

Communication

Agile design

Job description

At the heart of the Money and Pensions Service are our values – caring, connecting and transforming, which are the foundation of our success. They permeate every area of our work and define all our business relationships and the way we work with each other. We’re not only looking for the best people to come and work for us, but we need people who align themselves to our values. Caring. We care about our colleagues and people whose lives we are here to transform. Connecting. We will transform lives through our ability to make positive connections. Transforming. We are committed to transforming lives and make a positive societal impact. We help people – particularly those most in need – to improve their financial wellbeing and build a better, more confident future. Working collaboratively across the UK, we make sure customers can access high-quality money and pensions guidance and debt advice throughout their lives, however and whenever they need it. By fostering our values, we are very proud of the inclusive working environment that we have created. We are committed to attracting people of all backgrounds, we want our colleagues to reflect our customers and the people we assist.

The role

This role is aligned with DDaT Senior interaction designer https://www.gov.uk/guidance/interaction-designer#senior-interaction-designer A senior interaction designer is an experienced designer who works with minimal support and can influence and mentor others. At this role level, you will:

• work with service managers and programme directors to develop design concepts
• potentially have responsibility across complex services
• help set direction and embed good practice within teams
• make important decisions based on research and understand how this research impacts others

Role details As a Senior Interaction Designer at Money and Pensions Service (MaPS), you will be responsible for improving engagement, customer satisfaction and ultimately the financial wellbeing of millions of people across the UK, particularly those with vulnerabilities. Working within a multi-disciplinary team, you will use your interaction design skills to ensure our digital products and services are desirable, effective, usable, accessible and inclusive. You will also work with the rest of UCD team to champion and evolve the practice of user centred design at MaPS and align it with the GDS Service Standard. Your design skills and experience will help MaPS achieve our mission of helping everyone in the UK make the most of their money and pensions.

Key accountabilities

• Guiding a collaborative design process for multiple or complex projects.
• Leading workshops, reviews, critiques and handovers.
• Helping evolve and champion the interaction design practice within MaPS.
• Building interaction design capacity within a multi-functional team by sharing insights, principles and best practices with non-designers.
• Collaborating with a cross functional team to implement the user experience vision for MaPS’s digital channels.
• Advising and teaching colleagues of all levels in your areas of special expertise.
• Helping internal colleagues and external delivery partners define and evolve agile ways of working.
• Identifying, understanding and mitigating the ways design decisions and processes may negatively impact users, especially those who are vulnerable or experience some form of exclusion.
• Working with Business Analysts, Policy and Proposition Managers, and Product Managers to understand business requirements and ensure they are addressed in your designs.
• Collaborating with relevant internal teams to ensure our services meet MaPS, DWP and GDS standards for suitability, efficacy, usability, accessibility, quality, security and data protection.
• Building prototypes for testing and review.
• Identifying and prioritising design assumptions.
• Helping user researchers to plan research to gain the insights needed to advance the design.
• Working with user researchers and performance analysts to use analytics, customer feedback and other internal and external data to identify areas for improvement and inform designs.
• Conducting user experience audits, heuristic evaluations, competitive reviews and other desk research.
• Creating and socialising experience maps, process flows and other design artefacts to understand and communicate the customer journey.
• Creating design documentation and assets including sketches, wireframes, low and high fidelity prototypes, sitemaps & specification documents.
• Helping Product Owners, Policy and Proposition Managers, and Omnichannel Analysts define KPIs and measure the success of our website against them.
• Performing design quality assurance on the final delivered product or service.

Skills & experience

• Design communication (Skill level: practitioner) - You can clearly explain complex problems and ideas to teams or stakeholders outside of design.
• - You can clearly document and communicate design decisions, related risks and any unresolved issues.
• - You can build consensus around a design approach, for example, by asking difficult questions and challenging assumptions.
• Designing for everyone. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can advise teams on how to design inclusive, accessible and environmentally sustainable content or services.
• - You can design and deliver ethical content or services that consider the personal and social context of users.
• - You can ensure a design meets appropriate standards, for example accessibility regulations.
• Designing strategically. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can help a team understand how user-centred design helps it meet its goals.
• - You can help teams align their work to the goals and vision of their organisation.
• - You can use risks, opportunities and constraints in technology, systems and policy to shape design.
• - You can identify and create new design patterns and components.
• Designing together. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can advise others how to effectively plan and run design sessions with a team, users or stakeholders.
• - You can adapt a design session to ensure you achieve a useful outcome.
• You can effectively involve the right people throughout the design process.
• - You can work across team or profession boundaries, for example with policy teams.
• Evidence-based design. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can analyse, synthesise and clearly explain complex evidence relevant to users or a service, for example, large data sets.
• - You can help your team use design hypotheses effectively.
• - You can use complex research and data to develop and test design ideas.
• Iterative design. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can help other designers apply iterative design principles and agile methodologies to their work.
• - You can iterate and improve complex designs based on successive rounds of research.
• - You can independently prototype complex ideas at an appropriate fidelity.
• - You can adapt designs quickly to changes in requirements, priorities or user needs.
• Leading design. (Skill level: practitioner) - You can lead and coordinate design work in your team, with support.
• - You can communicate the value of user-centred design to your team.
• - You can support other designers.
• You can work with digital and data leaders in your organisation, when needed.