Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Ivy Designer

🎯 Role Definition

The Ivy Designer is responsible for defining and executing visual and interaction design across digital products, marketing materials, and brand channels. This role partners closely with product managers, engineers, marketing, and creative leadership to translate user insights into intuitive interfaces, consistent brand experiences, and reusable design components. The Ivy Designer will advance design systems, run usability testing, advocate for accessibility, and deliver polished deliverables that move metrics and delight users.

Key focus areas:

Product UI/UX for web and mobile
Brand identity and marketing creative
Design system development and component libraries
Cross-functional collaboration and stakeholder communication
User research, testing, and data-informed iteration

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

Junior Product Designer or UI Designer
Visual / Graphic Designer with digital experience
UX Designer or Interaction Designer

Advancement To:

Senior Ivy Designer / Lead Designer
Design Manager / Head of Design
Creative Director or Product Design Director

Lateral Moves:

UX Researcher
Product Manager
Content Strategist

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

Lead end-to-end product design for core features: conduct user research, synthesize insights, create wireframes, high-fidelity mockups, and interactive prototypes to validate concepts and drive feature adoption.
Own visual design and brand consistency across web, mobile apps, email, social, and marketing collateral, ensuring every touchpoint reflects Ivy’s visual language and brand values.
Develop, document, and maintain a scalable design system (components, tokens, patterns) in Figma/Sketch and coordinate with engineering to implement a living component library.
Translate complex user flows and business requirements into elegant interaction models and UI patterns that reduce cognitive load and improve task completion.
Collaborate daily with product managers and engineers to scope designs, define acceptance criteria, and ensure smooth handoff and implementation of UI/UX deliverables.
Create and iterate on responsive design solutions for multiple breakpoints and platforms, ensuring consistency and performance across desktop, tablet, and mobile.
Conduct usability testing (moderated and unmoderated), analyze qualitative feedback, and synthesize findings into action-oriented design improvements and A/B tests.
Produce production-ready assets, specifications, and redlines for engineering, including annotated prototypes, SVGs, exportable assets, and style guides.
Advocate for accessibility and inclusive design by implementing WCAG best practices, running accessibility audits, and collaborating on remediation plans with engineering.
Use analytics, user behavior data, and qualitative research to prioritize design work, measure the impact of releases, and iterate on designs to improve conversion and retention metrics.
Create motion and interaction designs (micro-interactions, transitions) that enhance usability, provide feedback, and support brand personality while maintaining performance budgets.
Lead design critiques and cross-functional reviews; accept and provide constructive feedback to elevate design quality across the team.
Partner with marketing and content teams to design campaign assets, landing pages, and product marketing creative that align with product launches and user acquisition goals.
Mentor junior designers, provide creative direction, run design workshops, and help grow the team’s craft and design thinking capabilities.
Maintain version control and file hygiene in design tools, document design decisions and rationales, and keep component libraries up to date.
Translate business KPIs and product metrics into design hypotheses and experiments that can be validated through testing and analytics.
Facilitate stakeholder alignment sessions and present design rationale to executive stakeholders, using storytelling and data to justify recommendations.
Drive cross-platform visual coherence by coordinating with native app teams, web engineers, and third-party vendors to ensure consistent implementation.
Identify opportunities to optimize user onboarding and first-time user experiences, design onboarding flows, tutorials, and contextual help to reduce friction.
Research market trends, competitor products, and emerging interaction patterns to keep Ivy’s product experience modern, differentiated, and relevant.
Balance long-term product strategy with short-term delivery needs, managing multiple design initiatives and deadlines across sprints and releases.
Create and maintain pattern and content libraries for copy, iconography, and imagery to accelerate design and ensure brand consistency.
Ensure quality control by reviewing implemented features in staging and production, raising design defects, and following through to resolution.
Participate in hiring and interviewing designers, helping to define role expectations, craft job descriptions, and evaluate candidate portfolios.

Secondary Functions

Support cross-functional research initiatives by creating design artifacts, journey maps, and personas to inform product discovery.
Help define and track design OKRs and success metrics in partnership with product analytics.
Assist marketing with creative direction for photoshoots, asset selection, and art direction to maintain a cohesive visual style.
Contribute to the organization’s design culture: run brown-bag sessions, write case studies, and publish playbooks or templates for team use.
Participate in sprint planning, refinement, and agile ceremonies to ensure design stories are estimated and sequenced for implementation.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

Mastery of Figma (design systems, components, prototyping) or Sketch + Abstract; ability to maintain shared libraries.
Strong visual design skills: typography, color theory, layout, iconography, and visual hierarchy.
Prototyping tools and motion design: Principle, Framer, After Effects, or Figma’s interactive components.
UX fundamentals: wireframing, user flows, information architecture, interaction design.
Experience with accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1) and tools for accessibility testing.
Familiarity with front-end technologies: HTML, CSS, and basic JavaScript knowledge for realistic handoffs and collaboration with engineers.
Experience building and evolving design systems and component libraries (tokens, guidelines, documentation).
Usability testing tools and practices: moderating sessions, run unmoderated tests (UserTesting, Maze), and synthesizing insights.
Data-informed design: comfortable interpreting analytics (Mixpanel, Google Analytics, Amplitude) to measure impact and iterate.
Product design process: discovery, ideation, prototyping, validation, implementation, and post-launch optimization.
Version control and design file organization best practices.
Experience producing production-ready assets for multiple platforms (SVG, PNG, responsive assets).

Soft Skills

Strong communication and storytelling: present design rationale clearly to cross-functional stakeholders and executives.
Empathy and user-centric mindset: advocate for users while balancing business goals and technical constraints.
Collaboration and teamwork: work effectively with PMs, engineers, marketers, and researchers.
Problem-solving and critical thinking: synthesize complex requirements into simple, elegant solutions.
Attention to detail and quality orientation: ensure pixel-perfect outputs and consistent brand application.
Time management and prioritization: juggle multiple projects and deadlines with a bias toward delivering impact.
Coaching and mentorship: support junior team members and foster a learning culture.
Adaptability and curiosity: learn new tools, methods, and industry trends quickly.
Negotiation and stakeholder management: influence without authority to align cross-functional partners.
Resilience and constructive feedback: incorporate feedback, iterate rapidly, and maintain positive working relationships.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design, Interaction Design, Human-Computer Interaction, Visual Communication, or related field OR equivalent professional experience and portfolio.

Preferred Education:

Bachelor’s or Master’s in Product Design, HCI, Industrial Design, or related discipline; additional certifications in UX, accessibility, or front-end development a plus.

Relevant Fields of Study:

Interaction Design / UX Design
Graphic Design / Visual Communication
Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
Industrial Design / Product Design

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 3–7 years of professional design experience in product, brand, or digital agency environments.

Preferred: 5+ years with demonstrated ownership of product features, a strong portfolio showing end-to-end design work, experience building or scaling design systems, and a track record of improving user metrics through design interventions.