Staff Product Designer, Autonomous Recruiting

About Handshake Handshake is the career network built for the AI economy. With 20 million knowledge workers, 1,600 educational institutions, 1 million employers—including 100% of the Fortune 50—and every major AI lab trusting Handshake to power career discovery, hiring, and upskilling, we sit at the intersection of talent and opportunity at a pivotal moment in history. From freelance AI training gigs to first internships to full-time careers, Handshake is where professional journeys begin and evolve. That unique position is driving extraordinary growth: in 2025, we tripled our ARR at scale. About the Role We're building a new, AI-native product from the ground up—one that reimagines how recruiters and hiring managers source, engage, and manage talent from a blank slate. This is a rare opportunity to shape a product's foundational experience rather than iterate on an existing one, working closely with an AI recruiting assistant that sits at the center of the workflow. As a Staff Product Designer on this team, you'll help define what it means to design a consumer-grade, craft-forward experience for a complex B2B workflow, with a particular focus on how users move fluidly between conversational AI, agentic automation, and traditional structured tools. Things are moving quickly and the scope of this role will evolve, so we're looking for someone comfortable with ambiguity who can dive deep into complex workflows, simplify them, and bring a strong opinion on how people should collaborate with AI and agents day to day. Your Role

• Partner closely with product, engineering, and data teams to define problems, set goals, and shape product strategy for a new, high-visibility product area.
• Own design end-to-end, from early concept through post-launch iteration: user flows, interaction prototypes, high-fidelity mocks, and collaboration through build.
• Tackle complex and ambiguous human-centered design problems, translating them into clear, simple, consumer-grade solutions.
• Design core interaction patterns for working with AI and agents—particularly around chat, composer, and the movement between conversational and structured parts of the product.
• Rapidly iterate through wireframes and prototypes to gather feedback early and often.
• Obsess over craft, with a strong point of view on visual and interaction design.
• Collaborate closely with designers working on adjacent parts of the broader employer experience to ensure a coherent, unified product.

Your Experience

• 7+ years of product design experience, ideally on enterprise or B2B products involving complex workflows.
• Strong communicator who clearly articulates design decisions, tradeoffs, and the thinking behind them to partners and leadership.
• Deep visual and interaction design expertise, with a proven track record of shipped work and measurable impact.
• Comfortable incorporating generative AI tools into the design process to accelerate ideation, prototyping, and iteration, while maintaining a high bar for product thinking, craft, and user experience.
• Highly collaborative. You value diverse perspectives and incorporate them into the design process to achieve better outcomes.
• Design-led thinker who raises the bar by embedding design thinking into day-to-day work and helping others grow.
• Comfortable with ambiguity and rapid change; excited to build something from scratch rather than optimize an existing system.
• Gritty and hands-on. You're willing to roll up your sleeves and take ownership—nothing is "someone else's problem."
• Curious and always learning, with a growth mindset.

Nice to Have - Experience designing for an AI-native product with real thinking about chat, composer, and agent interaction patterns. We Offer Handshake delivers benefits that help you feel supported and thrive at work and in life. The below benefits are for full-time US employees. Ownership: Equity in a fast-growing company Financial Wellness: 401(k) match, competitive compensation, financial coaching Family Support: Paid parental leave, fertility benefits, parental coaching Wellbeing: Medical, dental, and vision, mental health support, $500 wellness stipend Growth: $2,000 learning stipend, ongoing development Remote & Office: Internet, commuting, and free lunch/gym in our SF office Time Off: Flexible PTO, 15 holidays + 2 flex days Connection: Team outings & referral bonuses Explore our mission, values, and comprehensive US benefits at joinhandshake.com/careers