Principal UX Designer

The Principal UX Designer – Design Operations plays a key role in optimizing and scaling product operations across Relias’ product portfolio. This role enhances efficiency, improves data-driven decision-making, and ensures seamless collaboration between UX, Product Managers, Engineering, and other stakeholders.   The Principal UX Designer - Design Operations also leads process innovation, implements strategic initiatives, and proactively drives operational excellence across the product organization primarily focused on User Experience Design.

WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING:  

• Owning and standardizing UX processes, templates, and operating models to enable consistent, efficient execution at scale.
• Scaling and operationalizing UX practices across the product development lifecycle, ensuring UX is consistently integrated into discovery, planning, and delivery workflows.
• Identifying and removing process bottlenecks to enhance team productivity.
• Enabling and supporting research, including coordination of research activities, artifact standardization, and improved insight reuse.
• Utilizing data-driven methodologies to evaluate user experience design success, identify improvement areas, and provide actionable recommendations.
• Driving strong cross-functional alignment across UX, Product, and Engineering, ensuring UX work is effectively integrated into product planning and execution.
• Ensuring data accessibility and transparency for decision-making by collaborating with User Experience, Product Management, and Engineering teams.
• Owning the definition, tracking, and reporting of key performance indicators across product and product operations initiatives.
• Leading the adoption and optimization of product tools, dashboards, and documentation to drive efficiency and alignment, primarily focused on User Experience Design (i.e. Figma).
• Owning the User Experience Design System and Design Patterns and scale best practices to designers and product managers.
• Executing vendor and budget coordination for User Experience, including tools and external partners, in alignment with Product Operations leadership
• Embedding AI into core workflows in ways that measurably improve speed and decision quality by partnering with Product and UX.
• Serving as a subject matter expert in accessibility, ensuring UX practices, processes, and deliverables align with accessibility standards and are consistently applied across teams.

YOU'VE GOT WHAT IT TAKES IF YOU HAVE:

• 10+ years of experience in user experience design, product operations, or operational roles supporting product and engineering teams with primary experience in design.
• Extensive experience working cross-functionally with user experience, product, engineering, and customer teams to drive operational improvements.
• Advanced knowledge of modern user experience design methodologies.
• Advanced knowledge of accessibility in modern products.
• Strong operational and analytical skills, with experience improving complex workflows.
• Proven ability to drive efficiency improvements and implement scalable processes.
• Experience with OKRs, KPI tracking, and strategic planning in a product-led environment.
• Strong stakeholder management and ability to influence cross-functional teams.
• Excellent problem-solving, organization, and communication skills.
• Applied AI literacy: ability to identify where AI can improve product workflows, define guardrails, and scale usage responsibly without centralizing creativity.
• Wireframing: Proficient in using wireframes to solve complex design challenges and communicate intricate design ideas, such as wireframing complex user journeys
• Prototyping Tools: Proficiency in design and prototyping tools such as Sketch, Figma, Adobe XD, or similar.
• Design Principles: Strong understanding of user-centered design principles and methodologies.
• Systemic Thinking: The ability to understand and analyze the interconnectedness and interdependencies within a whole system, recognizing how individual components and their interactions impact the entire system.
• Collaboration: The ability to work effectively and harmoniously with others towards a common goal or objective utilizing the skills and attitudes necessary to engage, communicate, and cooperate with individuals or groups, fostering an inclusive and productive work environment.
• Change Management: The ability to effectively plan, implement, and navigate organizational or individual transitions and changes.
• Data Literacy: The ability to read, write and communicate data in context, including an understanding of data sources and constructs, analytical methods and techniques, and the ability to describe the use case, application and resulting value.
• The role owns KPI definition, reporting, operational metrics, and UX effectiveness measures, requiring the ability to translate data into meaningful business and product insights
• Innovation: The ability to generate, champion, and implement creative ideas, approaches, and solutions that improve processes, enhance outcomes, and drive organizational effectiveness. Innovation includes continuously reevaluating existing practices, encouraging experimentation, and identifying opportunities for improvement.
• UX Operations & Design Systems: The ability to establish, govern, and scale UX operational practices, design systems, research operations, standards, tools, and workflows to ensure consistency, efficiency, accessibility, and high-quality user experiences across the product portfolio.
• Bachelor's Degree

IN OFFICE REQUIREMENT:

Relias values collaboration and wants to ensure that our team members have opportuniites to work with their managers regularly for professional development opportunities.  This role requires that you live in the state of North Carolina, within a commutable distance to our office.  You would be expected to work in our Morrisville, NC Headquarters approximately 30 days/quarter.

Relias is an Equal Opportunity Employer and a Drug-Free workplace. Relias welcomes and encourages applications from people with disabilities and is happy to make reasonable accommodations in all aspects of the selection process.  If you are an individual with a disability and require reasonable accommodation to complete any part of the job application process, please visit our career page for instructions. 

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Disclosure requirements pertaining to the collection of your personal data:

Responsible for processing the information provided in your application is the company specified in the job advertisement, with its registered office as indicated. The company processes your data for the purpose of establishing an employment relationship on the basis of Art. 6 (1) b GDPR / Section 26 (1) sentence 1 BDSG.

The retention period for your data is determined by the statutory time limits applicable in the respective country, beginning upon completion of the recruitment process. You can find these here.

You can contact the company’s Data Protection Officer at the above-mentioned postal address.

Further information on data protection and your rights can be found here.

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