Principal Product Designer

Job Description

Communication has changed for people. It’s changed for businesses, too.

Intercom is the only suite of customer messaging products that drives growth at every stage of the customer lifecycle—across acquisition, engagement, and support. Today more than 30,000 businesses use Intercom to connect with a billion people worldwide.

Join the company helping businesses grow revenue through live chat, and so much more.

What's the opportunity? 🤔

The opportunity is to work directly on Intercom’s most high-priority projects, lead other designers and teams in solving challenging and stimulating design problems, and uplevel and evolve our culture and processes in an environment that deeply values and understands good design.

Intercom is at a hugely exciting point in its history: we’re one of the fastest-growing and most-admired startups for design in the world today. This is our most senior I.C. design position in the company. You will work on challenging, rewarding problems. You will stretch, learn, grow, and have fun doing it.

This role will involve working as a key member of a world-class Product Design team (currently consisting of 5 Product Designers in our San Francisco office, as well as another 15 Product Designers in Dublin and London). You will lead the design strategy and execution on projects that are top company priorities. You will impact the product and business by delivering design solutions of the highest quality, and impact how we design across the company by sharing your knowledge and experience. You will drive the design of important, core technologies like our Messenger (which is the face of Intercom ) that are based in San Francisco. Our Purchase, Onboarding, & Activation teams are also based here, conveniently co-located with the majority of our go-to-market teams.

You will report to and partner closely with our Head of Design in SF , and together you will be responsible for upleveling the team and delivering world-class product design work. This is a leadership role on the Individual Contributor track, meaning you will not line manage people directly but will be expected to act as a mentor and example who will help all designers in the org to learn and grow. You will partner with designers from the Intercom Brand Studio to create a stronger link between our brand and product. You will be a member of our R&D Leadership group and influence the direction and strategy of how we evolve and improve our broader team. You will also work with other design leaders across other offices to help build an exceptional global design team.

This is a rare chance for an experienced, exceptional, and ambitious designer to grow, learn, and have impact at a unique, breakout, design-centric technology company.

We strive to create a genuinely great environment for Product people to do the best work of their lives. Two of our co-founders were previously designers, as was our VP of Product, so design has always taken a central role in the company. We blog, podcast, and speak publicly about design and product. We’re serious and proud of our focus on solving real customer problems and executing to a high standard. We have vast ambitions and fully intend to achieve them , but we also care deeply about creating a happy, sustainable, enabling, fun work environment along the way.

If you’re passionate about the craft and process of building world-class product, helping other Product Designers teams to grow and learn, and solving real problems for engaged customers, you’ll fit right in.

What will I be doing? 🚀

• Leading the design effort on projects that are top-level priority within Intercom.
• Contributing design work directly yourself. This can range from defining high-level solutions to getting involved in delivering high-fidelity designs.
• Bringing an exceptional ability in product, interaction, and visual design to bear on the work that we produce.
• Guiding the work of other designers on your projects. Providing feedback to other designers on their work. Ensuring that the overall team is delivering high-quality work that meets user and business needs.
• Pushing the boundaries of what we deliver in terms of design quality. We care deeply about both product strategy and execution, and you will be involved in raising the standard for both.
• Helping other designers to grow by serving as an example, guiding their work directly on projects that you are involved in, and mentoring as they grow and improve.
• Partnering with the San Francisco Head of Design in scaling the San Francisco design team through multiple phases of growth. Building a world-class design team by identifying ways in which we should evolve and improve our team. Initiating and driving specific Design Ops initiatives.
• Collaborating closely with other Design leaders (across Product and Brand design in Dublin and London) to evolve the global Product Design function, our culture, structure, processes, and beliefs.
• Working with leaders of other functions (e.g. PM, Eng, Research, Analytics, Marketing) to ensure that teams are collaborating effectively to execute on company strategy.
• Defining vision and strategy for products in exciting areas of design (e.g. conversational design, messengers, machine learning).
• Representing Intercom Product Design publicly in whatever form feels natural to you: writing, speaking, tweeting, community outreach, etc.

What skills do I need? 📖

• Experience working on broad, sophisticated design projects in a fast-growing environment.
• Exceptional skills in the craft and execution of product design work, from high level strategic direction down to UI design details. A highly-attuned product sensibility.
• Strong systems and conceptual thinker, ability to understand complex systems.
• Ability to communicate (written and verbally) with precision, clarity, honesty, and respect.
• Ability to effect change. There are many things that we still need to evolve and improve about how we work, and this role will be a key part in driving that change.
• A growth mindset. Willingness to own problems. Comfort with ambiguity. A passion for building product. A desire to make things better. A sense of optimism.

Benefits 😍

We are a well-treated bunch, with awesome benefits! If there’s something important to you that’s not on this list, talk to us! :)

• Competitive salary and meaningful equity
• Catered lunch every weekday, plus a variety of snack foods and a fully stocked kitchen
• Fully funded comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage
• Open vacation policy and 10 corporate holidays
• Paid Parental Leave Program
• Commuter benefits + 401k plan
• In-office bicycle storage
• Fun events for Intercomrades, friends, and family!

*Proof of eligibility to work in the United States is required.

Intercom values diversity and is committed to a policy of Equal Employment Opportunity. Intercom will not discriminate against an applicant or employee on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, national origin, ancestry, sex, gender, age, physical or mental disability, veteran or military status, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, or any other legally recognized protected basis under federal, state, or local law.