UX Designer

NOCN; Sheffield; Hybrid; GBP 35,000 - 52,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid working

38 days leave incl. bank holidays

Pension scheme

Wellbeing support

Training and development opportunities

Flexible working

Life assurance

Modern office spaces

Dress down Fridays

Job summary

NOCN Group's Digital Services team seeks a motivated UX Designer to help deliver high-quality services aligned with our strategic objectives. While the role is remote, there will be an element of office-based work in Sheffield once a week/a few times a month.

Reporting to the Group Director - Digital, you will conduct discovery, run user research, design in Figma, and collaborate with developers and data colleagues to ship accessible, user-centred solutions.

Qualifications

• Degree in a Design, HCI, Psychology, social science or related discipline OR equivalent practical experience.
• Evidence of continuous professional development in UX research, interaction design, accessibility, AI tooling or related disciplines.
• Experience operating within an Agile / Scrum, discovery-led environment.
• Proven experience planning and running user research and translating findings into design decisions on products that shipped.
• Strong design thinking to frame the right problem and justify design decisions.
• Solid interaction and visual design craft with a communicating prototype portfolio.
• Track record of producing prototypes at speed to test ideas with real users.
• Confident with Figma and modern prototyping tools.
• Practical knowledge of WCAG accessibility standards and inclusive design.
• Able to facilitate workshops and bring stakeholders along.
• Exceptional use of AI tools to support research, ideation and prototyping.

Responsibilities

• Plan and run discovery and evaluative research throughout the product lifecycle.
• Apply design thinking to frame problems, create personas, journey maps and prioritised opportunities.
• Facilitate workshops and cross-functional thinking with the team.
• Design wireframes, prototypes and interaction flows in Figma for rapid testing.
• Use AI tooling to accelerate research synthesis and ideation.
• Collaborate with developers and data colleagues to move from design to working software.
• Champion accessibility and inclusive design across deliverables.
• Establish a shared design language and reusable pattern library.
• Help set design and research direction at NOCN and raise the bar for user collaboration.

Skills

UX design

Research methods

Design thinking

Agile / Scrum

Workshop facilitation

Prototyping

Figma

Accessibility WCAG

AI tooling

Education

Degree in Design, HCI, Psychology or related discipline

Level 2 Literacy and Numeracy

Tools

Figma

Job description

NOCN Group is an international charity which delivers future‑fit skills solutions with social impact for colleges, training providers, employers and individuals. To find out more, visit our website.

Overview of the role

We are seeking a motivated and professional UX Designer to join our Digital Services team.

Please note that while this role is classed as remote, there will be an element of office-based work in Sheffield once a week/a few times a month.

Reporting to the Group Director - Digital, you will play a key role in delivering high-quality services aligned with NOCN's strategic objectives.

Key Responsibilities

• Plan and run discovery and evaluative research - interviews, usability testing, surveys and contextual enquiry - throughout the product lifecycle.
• Apply design thinking to frame the right problems: turning research into actionable insight, personas, journey maps and clearly prioritised opportunities before jumping to solutions.
• Facilitate the team's thinking - workshops, sketching, service mapping - so the whole team designs with users, not just the designer.
• Design wireframes, prototypes and interaction flows in Figma at pace, so ideas can be tested with real users within days.
• Use AI tooling to accelerate research synthesis, ideation and even the shaping of UX plans - applying human judgement to the outputs.
• Work in continuous discovery with developers and data colleagues to move seamlessly from validated design into working software.
• Champion accessibility (WCAG) and inclusive, user‑centred design across everything we build.
• Establish and grow a shared design language and reusable pattern library as our design maturity develops.
• Help set the direction for design and research at NOCN and raise the bar for how the whole team works with users.

About You

• Level 2 in Literacy and Numeracy.
• Degree in a Design, HCI, Psychology, social science or related discipline OR equivalent practical experience - we care about what you have built, not how your learned it.
• Evidence of continuous professional development in UX research, interaction design, accessibility, AI tooling or related disciplines.
• Experience of operating within an Agile / Scrum, discovery-led environment.
• Proven experience planning and running user research and translating findings into design decisions on products that shipped.
• Strong design thinking - able to frame the right problem before designing a solution, and to explain the reasoning behind design decisions.
• Solid interaction and visual design craft, with a portfolio of prototypes and delivered services - enough to communicate and validate ideas clearly (this is not a pure visual‑UI role).
• Track record of producing and validating prototypes at speed to test ideas with real users.
• Confident with modern design and prototyping tools (Figma).
• Practical knowledge of accessibility standards (WCAG) and inclusive design.
• Able to facilitate workshops and bring stakeholders along - sharing research, building shared understanding and driving decisions.
• Exceptional use of AI tools to support research, ideation and prototyping - or clear evidence of being a fast learner with a strong desire to work this way.

Why Join NOCN Group?

Company values

• Responsive
• Supportive
• Honest
• Ethical
• Sustainable
• Respectful
• Innovative

What we can offer you

• We offer 38 days of annual leave this includes 8 bank holidays and 3 closure days between Christmas and New Year
• We can offer hybrid working
• 35-hour working week
• We can offer flexible working for a better work-life balance
• Buy/Sell Annual leave
• Flexible bank holidays for religious holidays
• Pension scheme
• Wellbeing support
• Training and development opportunities
• Free parking at both offices
• Life assurance
• Modern office spaces
• Enhanced family leave
• Optional tax-free childcare schemes
• Dress down Fridays

Please note:

Due to the high volume of applications, we can only provide feedback at the interview stage.

As a proud member of both Disability Confident and Inclusive Employers standard, we celebrate and recognise the benefits of equity, diversity, inclusion and belonging. As such, we welcome and encourage applicants from all backgrounds, and should you require any reasonable adjustments at any stage of the recruitment process, please let us know and we will do our best to accommodate.