Head Of Design

Quizlet; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Quizlet, the learning platform powering millions of students, is seeking a hands-on principal designer. You will set visual and experiential direction and build prototypes with AI-assisted tooling, delivering production-ready work.

Initially, you will ship and learn deep context, then lead design across the company, managing designers and contractors, reporting to the VP of User Experience in a fast-moving, AI-first environment.

Responsibilities

• Design core learning experiences used by 60M+ learners generating 1B+ interactions per week.
• Set the visual and experiential direction for the future of Quizlet and ship prototypes built with AI tooling.
• Build and maintain design systems across product, marketing, and internal tools.
• Own how design learns by partnering with user research, data science and product marketing.
• Execute high-visibility brand and marketing design for campaigns, presentations, motion work and launches.
• Transition into leading the design organization: hire, develop, and manage designers and contractors.
• Collaborate with product, engineering, marketing and leadership to keep design velocity high.
• Champion an AI-first way of working across design to raise the bar for output.

Job description

About Quizlet:

At Quizlet, our mission is to help every learner achieve their outcomes in the most effective and delightful way. We're a $1B+ learning platform used by two-thirds of U.S. high school students and half of college students, powering over 1 billion learning interactions each week.

We blend cognitive science with machine learning to personalize and enhance the learning experience for students, professionals, and lifelong learners alike. We're energized by the potential to power more learners through multiple approaches and various tools.

Let's Build the Future of Learning

Join us to design and deliver AI-powered learning tools that scale across the world and unlock human potential.

Why Join Quizlet?

• Massive reach: 60M+ users, 1B+ interactions per week
• Cutting-edge tech: Generative AI, adaptive learning, cognitive science
• Strong momentum: Top-tier investors, sustainable business, real traction
• Mission-first: Work that makes a difference in people's lives
• Inclusive culture: Committed to equity, diversity, and belonging

About the Team:

Design at Quizlet is a small but mighty team with outsized reach: our work touches 60M+ learners and over a billion learning interactions every week. We own design across the full surface area of the company - the Quizlet product itself, our brand and marketing, and the internal tools that make us fast.. We work embedded with product, engineering, and user research in tight weekly cycles, and we demo working software, not mockups. Right now we're doing the most exciting work in the company's history: reimagining Quizlet from the ground up as an AI-native adaptive learning platform.

About the Role:

This role has a deliberate arc. You'll join as a hands-on principal designer: for your first several months, your job is to get your hands dirty shipping the future of Quizlet - setting the visual and experiential direction of our next-generation learning experience and building it yourself, using AI tooling that lets a single designer produce working, production-quality prototypes at a pace that used to require a team. Once you've shipped and learned deep context, you'll step up to lead design across the company - managing our product designers and the contractor network behind our brand and marketing work. You'll report to the VP User Experience and work daily with product, engineering, and marketing leadership. If you've been waiting for a role where you get to both define what a company looks and feels like and build it with your own hands, this is it.

We're happy to share that this is an Hybrid position in our San Francisco/NYC office. To support collaboration, we ask employees to be in the office at least three days a week: Wednesday and Thursday.

In this role, you will:

• Design core learning experiences used by 60M+ learners generating 1B+ interactions per week - work where a small improvement reaches more students than almost any product in education.
• Set the visual and experiential direction for the future of Quizlet, and ship it: working prototypes built with AI-assisted design and development tooling, not static mockups handed over a wall.
• Build and maintain design systems that span product, marketing, and internal tools - systems robust enough that contractors, PMs, and marketers can build with them without heavy oversight, and that evolve as the product does.
• Own how design learns - partner with user research, data science and product marketing to turn learner insight, market trends, and brand signals into design standards the whole team builds against.
• Execute high-visibility brand and marketing design when the work demands it: campaigns, feature identities, executive and board presentations, motion work, and launch moments.
• Transition into leading the design organization - hiring, developing, and managing designers and a contractor network across product and brand, and owning design quality company-wide, with final sign-off on the look, feel, and experience of everything we ship.
• Partner closely with product, engineering, marketing, and executive leadership to navigate competing priorities and keep design velocity high as the company moves fast.
• Champion an AI-first way of working across design - raising the bar for what one designer can ship and helping the whole team operate at that new speed.

What you bring to the table: