Design Director (United States)

The company

As a hybrid innovation consulting and product studio, Siberia specializes in unsticking and accelerating brands through the major pivots and big swings necessitated by tech and cultural disruption. Our mission is to help our clients chart and navigate a future where technology has improved but not over-optimized the human experience.

To do this, we embed within and collaborate with world-class client teams working through mission-critical problems, creating and evolving digital-first products, brands, and businesses. Our client partners range from enterprise organizations (Ford, Comcast, Humana), to culture drivers (The Met, James Beard Foundation, Gensler), and ambitious start-ups (Function Health, CoreWeave, The Cannabist Company).

That work recently earned us Silver in Ad Age's Small Agency Awards for Business Impact. A reflection of both the results we deliver for clients and the kind of indie agency we're continuing to build.

The role

Our Design Director will work alongside our Head of Design, and closely with strategy, engineering and PM counterparts to pitch and lead teams and clients through projects ranging from whitespace research and far-field vision setting, to zero-to-one business and product launches, and everything in between.

We are looking for a versatile design leader with a focused background in digital product and service design, with significant agency-side experience. In addition to a solid understanding of design processes, the ability to lead branding, creative ideation, UI/UX, and content design work is required.

This position is equal parts hands-on and hands-off, as context switching from heads-down design work to leading teams to co-creation with clients will be the norm.

Developing elegant, strategic solutions to client business problems comes first; however, we are equally interested in your ability to create and drive processes, meet deadlines, and play a critical role in a small independent agency environment. This means you’ll touch everything from helping Siberia evolve culture, to building our brand as an outward-facing steward, to developing key client relationships.

What you’ll do

• Partner with clients to understand their business and project objectives, including designing, pitching and selling project solutions as part of the larger new business process.
• Partner with Product Management counterparts to create macro project schedules and detailed project and sprint plans, and advocate for design throughout the strategy and development process.
• Own the success of project design efforts and provide hands-on senior-level leadership to ensure smooth collaboration between strategy, engineering and client teams and senior-level stakeholders.
• Lead and create elegant, beautiful solutions to client briefs, from brand identity and art direction to design systems and detailed UI design.
• Maintain an understanding of new tools, technologies and best practices and be able to educate internal teams and clients about them.
• Partner with design leadership to create an engaged, enthusiastic Siberia design team culture; developing standards and practices, team planning and mentorship of both full-time and freelance designers.
• Align with and proactively communicate project direction, status and risk mitigation to Siberia’s Head of Design and Partner team.

What we’re looking for

Aside from an 8-10+ year track record of delivering world-class digital products and services for high-profile clients on time and on budget, we seek candidates who align with Siberia’s values and ways of working.

• Positive leadership and a cultural standard setter.
• Comfort with ambiguity and ability to “embrace the chaos,” a core Siberia value.
• Active interest and understanding of emerging technologies, design trends, and cultural forces.
• Tenacity for gathering information and framing business problems in service of best-in-class design.
• Passion for the emotive and creative side of digital design.
• Flair for storytelling and creating narratives that make complex solutions easy to understand.
• Time spent inside a small, design-driven agency along with links to live work created during this time.
• Someone with a level head who enjoys working with smart people and thinks all of this sounds like fun.
• Obligatory bonus points for AI-driven tooling and processes.
• Someone who lives near or doesn’t mind frequent travel to NY.