Why join frog?
Joining frog means you’ll be joining the “pond,” a global network of studios, each with a thriving in-person and vibrant virtual culture. frogs are curious, collaborative, and courageous, united by our passion for improving the human experience through design, while each bringing our unique and diverse skills and experiences to the table. We draw on our global reach and local knowledge to solve complex problems and design innovative, sustainable solutions that touch hearts and move markets. frogs prize humour, positivity, and community just as highly as performance and outcomes. Our culture is open, flexible, inclusive, and engaging. Working at frog means being empowered to Make Your Mark on every project, in your studio, your community—and the world at large.
Design Director
What will you be doing?
This is a leadership role at frog. You are expected to help frog grow its reputation, business and people through Project Leadership, Design Leadership & Management, and Business/Account Development.
Project Leadership:
The Design Director, Client Collaborative will be responsible for building an outsourced design capability for clients infused with frog quality design expertise and strategic guidance. You will oversee 2-3 projects at a time, or act as a day-to-day engagement leader, (sometimes with Executive Director oversight on key strategic accounts) and guide teams of designers across multiple design disciplines as part of the design collaborative.
The Design Director, Client Collaborative will be responsible for the delivery of design services for the North American market. As part of an immediate need, you will focus on providing strategic guidance to our existing clients. You will be working closely with our Talent Acquisition Business team to ensure best in class talent is delivered, building relationships with internal teams and clients, advising frog team members, and ensuring frog quality design is delivered at various client design studios in the US. Also, you will be guiding our clients in how to increase the impact of the design work within their organizations.
There is an expectation that the design collaborative activities will create opportunities to also provide project related work. In that sense, you will work across every stage of the project lifecycle to ensure that the concepts and design decisions are sensitive to both the needs of users and our clients’ businesses. You will chart a path forward together with your frog team, even when information is ambiguous and the project challenging. You should be eager to involve clients in the design process, highly responsive to feedback, and excited to present your team’s ideas in front of executives. As a Design Director, you may also participate in other strategic projects on top of Client Collaborative services.
Design Director Responsibilities:
- Lead or oversee multiple project teams to achieve the highest level of performance without compromising timelines and team harmony
- Set craft quality standards, with a deep understanding of the client’s goals, business requirements and constraints, for qualitative foundational & evaluative research, insight articulation, experience model development (e.g. customer journeys, behavioural archetypes, service blueprints, etc.), design and testing.
- The Design Director will have in-depth understanding of core and upcoming design disciplines and understand the role these design disciplines in light of agile ways of working
- The Design Director will understand how digitalisation and digitisation impact design disciplines and apply this information to create thought leadership with clients
- You have strong working knowledge of all aspects of DesignOps
- Lead teams to develop insights, define and prioritise opportunity areas, and envision concepts
- Create meaningful customer/user feedback loops through build test & learn cycles. prioritise MVP features, build a backlog, and create strategic product roadmaps
Design Director Experience:
- 7+ years of professional human centred design ‘thinking & doing’ consulting experience with specific experience in one or more areas of the product development lifecycle, as a Visual Designer, IXD, Service Designer, Product Designer, Design Strategist or Experience Designer
- Proficiency with contemporary research, design and prototyping tools and methods
- Affinity with frog’s values, and a passion for creating products that meet peoples functional and emotional needs
- An outstanding track record as a design leader for experience strategies, design systems, products, services, and customer experiences that delight customers/users and achieve business results
It would be a bonus if you had:
- A university degree in a relevant design, business, technology, or social science discipline
- Experience working in a variety of organisations (start-up, corporate, agency/consultancy)
- Academic, professional, or life experience from outside the design field that enriches your perspective as a designer
- Published thought leadership, with a track record of presenting and teaching in public forums and a social media presence
- A second language (and every additional language is a plus!)
Equal Opportunities at frog
frog is an Equal Opportunity Employer encouraging diversity in the workplace. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, national origin, gender identity/expression, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation, genetics, veteran status, marital status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
frog is a global business with teams working across the world. To help us process your application, please ensure that your application documents (CV, cover letter, portfolio, etc.) are all in English.