Xero is a beautiful, easy-to-use platform that helps small businesses and their accounting and bookkeeping advisors grow and thrive.
At Xero, our purpose is to make life better for people in small business, their advisors, and communities around the world. This purpose sits at the centre of everything we do. We support our people to do the best work of their lives so that they can help small businesses succeed through better tools, information and connections. Because when they succeed they make a difference, and when millions of small businesses are making a difference, the world is a more beautiful place.
About the design practice here at Xero
Xero is incredibly user centric, which means design is at the heart of all our product development. The Product Design team is a vital part of Xero’s success and our product makes a meaningful difference in the lives and businesses of millions people around the world. We have some really awesome humans in our design practice, working across Xero’s products internationally.
Where does this role fit in?
Within the product design space, we are organised by portfolios (of Xero products). Within each portfolio, we have a GM, Design Directors and Principals. The broader portfolio team consists of Product Design Leads and senior and associate designers. This role will lead teams across two integral product areas. The first, “Accountants & Bookkeepers,” provides a suite of tools to help accountants and bookkeepers partner with Xero for more efficient workflows and collaboration. The second, “Connected Workplaces,” helps empower people in small businesses to create thriving workplaces through a suite of employer & employee tools.
About the role
Our teams are working on a global scale, so you’ll get to work on meaty and complex problems. In many ways, we still have that start-up feel - customer-centric mentality, a culture of innovation, outside the box thinking and heaps of variety in our work. We’re a design-driven company and place a high value on making sure our products make a meaningful difference in the lives and businesses of millions of people around the world - this is where you come in!
The GM of Design shapes and drives the design vision, strategy, and innovation processes to help the business unit / portfolio create exceptional product experiences that deliver customer and business outcomes.
What does that look like day to day?
You’ll work closely with our EGM-Design and the other Design GMs on key strategic issues. Your direct reports will be your portfolios Design Directors and Principal Designers. You will be responsible for their professional development and performance. Part of your role will also naturally include managing the team’s budget and driving operational effectiveness.
You’ll help scale the impact of design throughout the organisation, advocating for data-driven product and design decisions through continuous experimentation. You’ll define the design vision and strategy, and contribute to the short and long term product strategy for your business unit. You’ll define critical KPIs, metrics, and business outcomes that deliver an ROI to the organisation and be able to communicate them effectively across the business. You’ll do this by partnering with EGMs of key portfolios and C-suite executives as well as internal cross-disciplinary teams. This includes partnering with Product EGMs and GMs to establish a design-led process for creating product vision and roadmap.
As a GM, you’ll be a senior voice of design, both inside and outside of Xero, sharing its work, evangelising its success, and articulating its vision. Growing brand presence and profile of design at Xero through public communication channels, events, thought-leadership.
Experience needed for this role
- Significant experience leading multidisciplinary design teams working on complex software and or B2B customer experiences
- Demonstrable success in creating, launching, scaling, and maintaining digital products
- Design skills - You'll have a strong background in Product Design. A career based on understanding of the design process and best practices, with a proven ability to define and improve a team’s design practices
- You'll need to have a track record of developing & hiring diverse talent and leading with positivity and inspiration
- Xero is constantly changing - You need the ability to navigate ambiguity, create clarity, and drive design excellence throughout the organisation
- Excellent collaboration skills and ability to create long-lasting trusted partnerships that enable teams to make better products and experiences
- You're advocating and representing design - Strong presentation, verbal and written skills as well as proven ability to develop well-positioned and thoughtful documents and presentations are a must for this role. The ability to influence and speak the language of business and design simultaneously and to mixed audiences.
Xero is an NZ Immigration Accredited Employer and Rainbow Tick certified too.
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