Founding Product Designer

Knit; New York (NY); Hybrid; USD 210,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity options

Healthcare (medical, dental, vision)

Company laptop

Technology stipend

401(k) with company match

Flexible time-off

Hybrid working

Job summary

Knit is hiring a Founding Product Designer to define and elevate the product experience. You will own end-to-end user experiences, set the design language, and shape how humans and AI agents interact.

This is a hands-on, individual contributor role with autonomy and future leadership potential. Salary ranges from $210,000 to $240,000 per year, with a competitive package including equity options, healthcare, a hardware stipend, 401(k) matching, and flexible time-off.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of product design experience owning, designing and shipping digital products from discovery through launch.
• Design systems: scalable design systems with reusable components and patterns.
• Speed and execution: prototype, test, iterate and ship quickly while balancing polish.
• Visual craft: portfolio showing polished interfaces with strong visual taste and attention to detail.
• Strong UX and product judgment: simplify complex workflows and align with business goals.
• Technical collaboration: work with frontend engineers and care about implementation quality.
• User research: conduct interviews and usability testing to inform design decisions.
• Communication: clearly explain design decisions and tradeoffs to cross-functional teams.

Responsibilities

• Own design projects from concept through production.
• Build and own Knit's design system.
• Rethink and improve the product experience.

Skills

7+ years design

Design systems

Speed & execution

Visual craft

UX & product judgment

Technical collaboration

User research

Communication

Job description

Knit is the AI-native research agency. We help the world's most iconic brands make confident decisions through deep customer understanding. Knit pairs our AI-native tooling with world-class researchers to run quant and qual at scale - delivering executive, decision-ready insights to inform billion dollar decisions. Teams at Amazon, Mars, T-Mobile, Paramount, McCormick, Nestle, Medtronic and 100+ others trust Knit to bring real customer voices into their biggest decisions.

Knit recently closed its Series B, raising $60M+ to date. Our team of ~80 is US remote friendly, with headquarters in our NYC midtown office. Our team is built with operating talent from Kantar, Ipsos, Doordash, Square, Hatch, and unicorn startups.

Overview

We're looking for a Founding Product Designer to define and elevate the product experience at Knit. As our very first designer, you will own the end-to-end user experience, set the standard for our product design language, and shape how human researchers and AI agents interact. You'll build the foundation for our design system, rethink complex workflows, and pioneer the future of intuitive, high-impact agentic software.

We want someone who combines exceptional visual taste with strong UX thinking and product judgment. You'll work directly with our Chief Product Officer, PMs, engineers, researchers, and customers. This is a hands-on, individual contributor role with significant ownership and autonomy. Over time, you'll have the opportunity to build a team and scale the design function as Knit grows.

Responsibilities | What you will own...

1. Own design projects from concept through production

Lead design initiatives from problem discovery and early concepts through prototyping, implementation, and iteration. Work closely with PMs and engineers to turn ideas into shipped products. Move quickly, make thoughtful tradeoffs, and take ownership of the quality of what ships.

2. Build and own Knit's design system

Create and maintain a design system with reusable components, patterns, and guidelines that PMs, engineers and AI agents can use across the product. Establish clear design standards that help humans & AIs make good decisions independently. Own the visual quality and consistency of our product, ensuring every interface is polished, intuitive, and true to Knit's brand.

3. Rethink and improve the product experience

Continuously evaluate our product to identify usability issues and opportunities for improvement. Simplify complex workflows, rethink information architecture and interactions, and design intuitive end-to-end experiences. Know when to improve an existing interface and when to rethink the experience entirely.

Use a mix of qual and quant research. Work directly with enterprise customers, researchers, and internal teams to understand their needs, workflows, and challenges. Observe users, conduct interviews and usability tests, and use what you learn to inform designs. Use tools like Amplitude to understand what users are doing at scale. Look beyond what users ask for to understand the problems they're trying to solve.

Required Skills & Experiences

We're looking for a senior, hands-on product designer with exceptional visual craft, strong product instincts, and the independence to establish design at Knit.

Must-haves

• 7+ years of product design experience: A track record of independently owning, designing and shipping digital products, from discovery through launch at early stage startups. Experience as a founding or early designer who helped establish a company's design standards and practices.
• Design systems: Experience building and maintaining scalable design systems, reusable components, and consistent patterns that PMs, engineers, and AI agents can use.
• Speed and execution: Experience working in fast-moving environments. Able to prototype, test, iterate, and ship quickly while knowing when to prioritize speed and when to invest in polish.
• Visual craft: A portfolio of beautifully designed product interfaces that demonstrates strong visual taste, attention to detail, and polish.
• Strong UX and product judgment: Able to simplify complex workflows, solve ambiguous user problems, and design intuitive experiences. Understands both user needs and business goals.
• Technical collaboration: Understands frontend development principles and constraints, works closely with engineers, and cares about implementation quality.
• User research: Experience conducting user interviews, usability testing, and workflow analysis to inform design decisions.
• Communication: Able to clearly explain design decisions, discuss tradeoffs, challenge assumptions, and work effectively with cross-functional teams.

Nice-to-haves

• Experience designing complex B2B SaaS, enterprise software, data-heavy products, or productivity tools.
• Experience designing AI-native products, including conversational interfaces, agentic workflows, or human-in-the-loop experiences.
• Familiarity with consumer research, analytics, or research operations.

Upon joining the Knit team, you will receive a competitive salary + commission plan if applicable to role, Equity Options, Healthcare (medical, dental, and vision), and Additional Coverage, a company laptop and one-time, onboarding Technology Stipend, a 401(k) with company match, flexible time-off, hybrid working, and more!

In accordance with New York pay transparency requirements, the salary range for this role is $210,000 - $240,000. Final compensation will be determined based on the candidate’s level, experience, and qualifications upon joining Knit.

Our Company Values

We are the Championship Team. This means we:

• Are 1% better every day: We approach situations with a growth mindset and ask, “How can we make the business better?” and “What would it take?”
• Play to win: We set audacious goals and push ourselves to achieve them with a bias towards action (When we see a need, we take initiative, and hold ourselves accountable to seeing it through).
• Keep the main thing the main thing: Identify what has the biggest impact and prioritize to focus on it.