Visual Design Lead - Design Systems (12-month contract)

Job Description

About Visual Design at RBC

Our goal is to be our industry’s leader in exceptional digital experiences. To get there, we’re putting strategy, research, design principles, and technical innovation at the centre of everything we do.

But we need exceptional digital professionals to bring our process to life. Maybe you’re that sort of person.

As a member of our team, you’ll work with a close-knit and collaborative group of designers, researchers, and strategists, moving easily between big ideas and the little details that make them real.

You’ll find yourself in a culture where designers feel included, valued, and heard; in a supportive environment surrounded by peers who exceed in their area of expertise.

What will you do?

We want every point of contact with our RBC clients to feel important to them. That’s where you come in.

You can instinctively weave iconography, typography, colour, space and texture together to simplify and improve how our customers navigate our products and services. You’ll use your expertise to delight users with designs that inspire, engage and excite.

As a member of our team you’ll be comfortable within agile team environments and an iterative process, you’ll be collaborating with interdisciplinary team members and stakeholders as you analyze, design and convey your mobile and responsive design vision. A natural problem solver, communicator and facilitator, you’ll be involved in every step of the process from idea generation to implementation.

How you would contribute to RBC’s Design System

• Work with Visual design practice leads to refine and lead RBC’s visual design language. Manage, refine and extend the tools found within the design kit
• Design UI components using the visual language style guides and follow design kit construction guidelines for creating components within Figma
• Provide insights on how UI component interactions, functionality and layouts are influenced by colour, spacing, typography, borders, depth, shadow and animation
• Provide leadership on how to systematically apply our visual style to our user interface. Design Systems thinking, design tokens, and theming
• Communicate throughout the practise of visual design the vision and value for how a design system will help achieve goals and drive consistency
• Research and discover new ways for designers to improve their workflow and processes

What you would work on

Visual Design Strategy

• Provide thought leadership and coaching to team members with advice and expertise that improves their capabilities and brings about growth and development
• Direct design peers on visual design elements, ensuring visual components support business goals and objectives and are efficient and consistent
• Facilitate ideation sessions, and evaluates ideas against business goals and objectives.
• Act as a trusted advisor to stakeholders, providing strategic advice and recommendations on visual design strategy
• Understand complex visual-spatial displays, and uses that understanding to improve user comprehension, and improve task performance
• Create delight by using the principles of design in a manner that engages with the user, and adds value to the digital experience
• Lead complex projects, managing design, planning and delivery. Plan and coordinate group tasks, potentially across multiple workstreams
• Provide expert advice and influences product strategy
• Accurately estimate and plans complex projects

Visual Design Creation

• Direct development of complex artifacts for digital media (web or native app) to exchange information, elicit emotion and facilitate interaction. Coordinate multiple artifacts for varying disciplines in complex situations.
• Create highly complex low-fidelity sketches, hi-fidelity mock-ups and prototypes to communicate intent, or delivery specifications for development
• Create highly complex user flows and experience for inter-related complex flows
• Manage design tasks and delivery and ensures visual displays, components, colour and type meet the specified accessibility requirements.

Research and Testing

• Lead user research and testing discussions and provide insights and recommendations
• Research visual design and communication strategies in the financial services sector and performs competitive audits pertinent to specific design or business goals
• Perform visual design audits where appropriate

Leadership:

• Provide thought leadership and coaching to team members.
• Facilitate complex design critique, evaluate visual designs for inclusivity and provides depth and breadth of expert advice and guidance to cross-functional teams
• Act as a trusted advisor and seasoned subject-matter expert for the product design team
• Advocate for the Visual Design practice within the larger design team and organization
• Provide leadership and direction to the larger design team on RBC’s visual communication standards, tools, channels, and processes

Required qualifications

• BA/BS degree in Design (e.g. interaction, graphic, visual communications, product, industrial), HCI, CS, or a related field or equivalent experience
• A high level of expertise in working with designs systems and experience creating a design system (preferably multi-brand)
• A portfolio of creative initiatives that show the breadth and depth of visual artistry.
• Expert knowledge of Figma and Sketch. Curiosity about new tools and technology.
• Strong understanding of user interface design/human computer interaction patterns
• A propensity for pragmatic and technical design, with a strong understanding of underlying web technologies (HTML / CSS / Localization)

Preferred qualifications

• Experience leading a project
• Experience launching a digital product
• Knowledge of front-end development languages (HTML, CSS, and JavaScript), and how to work collaboratively with developers
• High fidelity prototyping skills (Sketch, Principle, Framer, Figma, etc.)
• Proven ability to communicate conceptual ideas and design rationale, all within a user-centered design process
• Able to prioritize and manage workload and meet critical project milestones and deadlines
• Excellent problem-solving skills
• Ability to manage complex relationships with stakeholders and peers to gain buy-in, and solve problems collaboratively

JOB SUMMARY
City: Toronto
Address: 88 Queens Quay West
Work Hours/Week: 37.5
Work Environment: Office
Employment Type: Contract
Career Level: Experienced Hire/Professional
Pay Type: Hourly
Position Level: PL07
Required Travel(%): 0
Exempt/Non-Exempt: N/A
People Manager: No
Application Deadline: 12/15/2019
Req ID: 201796