Senior Human Factors Engineer - Robotics

Socket.dev; Cambridge (MA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Lila Sciences is building Scientific Superintelligence to accelerate discovery across medicine, materials and energy with autonomous lab software. This UX researcher role focuses on making complex, high-stakes interfaces clear, safe, and trustworthy under pressure, partnering with engineers and researchers to translate research into scalable design systems.

Join a mission-driven environment that values truth, trust, curiosity, grit, and velocity, and help shape how rapidly and reliably the

Qualifications

• 4–8 years in UX research or human factors for complex operational, industrial, or scientific software — this is a research-first role.
• Operational-display design with high-density, high-stakes interfaces such as control rooms or dashboards.
• Core research methods including contextual inquiry, task analysis, and usability testing, translated into clear direction.

Responsibilities

• Lead usability research: run contextual inquiry, task analysis, and usability testing to ground UI decisions in real workflows.
• Design for high-stakes displays: shape information architecture and interaction patterns for high-density orchestration and SCADA-style monitoring.
• Prototype and validate: build Figma prototypes and testable flows for simulation, lab, and capacity-planning UIs, iterating from evidence.
• Design human-in-the-loop workflows: define supervision, intervention, and trust in automated and AI-driven processes.
• Partner with engineering: embed with software engineers to translate research into specs, patterns, and design-system contributions.
• Champion accessibility: set and uphold accessibility and interaction standards as the platform grows.

Skills

UX research

Contextual inquiry

Usability testing

Information architecture

Prototyping (Figma)

Accessibility

Cross-functional collaboration

Tools

Figma

Job description

Your Impact at LILA

You will be the human-factors voice for Robotics, working on the software that runs Lila's autonomous labs. Partnering with software engineers and researchers, you'll make its most demanding surfaces — simulation, research operations, orchestration, and SCADA-style monitoring — clear, safe, and trustworthy under pressure, directly shaping how fast the factory runs and how few mistakes it makes.

What You'll Be Building

• Lead usability research: run contextual inquiry, task analysis, and usability testing to ground UI decisions in real workflows.
• Design for high-stakes displays: shape information architecture and interaction patterns for high-density orchestration and SCADA-style monitoring where situational awareness is paramount.
• Prototype and validate: build Figma prototypes and testable flows for simulation, lab, and capacity-planning UIs, then iterate from evidence.
• Design human-in-the-loop workflows: define how operators supervise, intervene in, and trust automated and AI-driven processes.
• Partner with engineering: embed with the software engineers who build these UIs, translating research into specs, patterns, and design-system contributions.
• Champion accessibility: set and uphold accessibility and interaction standards as the platform grows.

What You'll Need to Succeed

• UX research depth: 4–8 years in UX research or human factors for complex operational, industrial, or scientific software — this is a research-first role.
• Operational-display design: high-density, high-stakes interfaces such as control rooms, monitoring dashboards, or data-heavy tooling.
• Core research methods: contextual inquiry, task analysis, and usability testing, turned into clear direction.
• Interaction & IA craft: strong information-architecture and interaction-design skills, with prototyping in Figma or equivalent.
• Human-in-the-loop & situational awareness: designing for operator supervision and error prevention.
• Cross-functional communication: partnering with engineers and domain experts and defending design decisions with evidence.

Bonus Points For

• Human factors in regulated, safety-critical domains: systems-engineering rigor and prior HF/UX work in aerospace, manufacturing, or healthcare/life sciences. Grounding in ISO 9241-210 (human-centred design) or WCAG 2.2 (accessibility) a plus.
• Scientific or lab context: laboratory, robotics, manufacturing, or other regulated/operational environments.
• SCADA & control systems: familiarity with control-room HMI design (ANSI/ISA-101), SCADA, or MES interfaces (you'll design the UI, not own the system).
• Quantitative methods: survey design, behavioral analytics, or other quantitative research alongside qualitative work.
• AI-driven interfaces: designing interfaces for AI-assisted or autonomous workflows.

About LILA

Lila Sciences is building Scientific Superintelligence™ to solve humankind's greatest challenges. We believe science is the most inspiring frontier for AI. Rather than hard-coding expert knowledge into tools, LILA builds systems that can learn for themselves.

LILA combines advanced AI models with proprietary AI Science Factory™ instruments into an operating system for science that executes the entire scientific method autonomously, accelerating discovery at unprecedented speed, scale, and impact across medicine, materials, and energy. Learn more at www.lila.ai.

Guided by our core values of truth, trust, curiosity, grit, and velocity, we move with startup speed while tackling problems of historic importance. If this sounds like an environment you'd love to work in, even if you don't meet every qualification listed above, we encourage you to apply.

We’re All In

Lila Sciences is committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status.

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