AI Conversation Designer (9-12 month contract)

Our Direct-to-Consumer platform, UK Personal Investor (UKPI) aims to be the trusted partner for everyday investors across the UK by delivering lifelong value. To do that, we must deliver our two engines of value, products and advice, with a seamless, world-class client experience. As the UK’s fastest growing investment platform and one of the world’s largest asset managers, we are uniquely well placed to deliver value to our investors.

In this contract opportunity, you will play a crucial role in shaping the interactions between our users and our conversational AI tools like Genesys.

This role’s primary focus is AI conversational design, but you'll also contribute to content design and support user-centred design across the team. We're looking for a collaborative, T-shaped designer - comfortable flexing across disciplines to help create thoughtful, helpful user experiences.

Help Experience

• Take ownership of our conversational help initiatives—designing journeys that help users self-serve, reduce calls to support, and feel confident in using our products.

• Monitor how users engage with help content and conversational tools, and use insight to continually improve the experience.
• Collaborate with developers and product teams to integrate conversational AI into our help and support experiences across channels.

Conversational Design

• Dialogue Design: Design natural, intuitive dialogue flows across chat, voice, and other platforms. Ensure every interaction feels human, helpful, and purposeful—supporting users in navigating complex tasks with ease.
• Natural Language Technologies: Deep familiarity with NLP and NLU techniques, including tokenization, lemmatization, stemming, named entity recognition (NER), sentiment analysis, intent recognition, and entity extraction. You know how to use these tools to inform and optimise conversation flows.
• Large Language Models & Prompt Design: Experience shaping conversational experiences with LLMs like GPT-4. You understand how context, tone, and structured inputs influence AI behaviour—and how to design prompts that drive useful, safe, and brand-aligned outputs.
• AI & Machine Learning Fundamentals: Familiarity with supervised and unsupervised learning, reinforcement learning, and core machine learning concepts. You understand how conversational AI and ML systems work under the hood and can collaborate confidently with technical teams.
• Language & Communication: Strong grasp of grammar, syntax, and semantics, paired with an understanding of how people communicate in real-life contexts. You can write clear, concise, and emotionally intelligent copy that aligns with our brand voice and speaks directly to user needs.
• Creativity & Innovation: Comfortable experimenting with tone, structure, and conversation patterns. You actively look for new ways to engage users and improve outcomes through thoughtful, creative design.

Content Design

• Translate complex financial and investment topics into plain, accessible English.
• Follow content best practices (including gov.uk guidance) to make experiences inclusive and easy to use.
• Contribute to the full content lifecycle—from ideation and prototyping through to stakeholder sign-off (including legal and compliance).
• Support research efforts by contributing to discussion guides, prototypes, and insight synthesis.

User-Centred Design

• Apply user insight, personas, and behavioural data to design conversations that feel intuitive and purposeful.
• Work closely with UX designers and researchers to ensure every conversation is grounded in real user needs.
• Stay curious about how users interact with our tools, and be proactive in suggesting improvements.

What you’ll be doing day-to-day:

• Work across multiple projects in a lean, collaborative team environment.
• Flex your skills across content, interaction, and conversation design, depending on the needs of the project.
• Run design conversations from concept through to delivery—leading workshops, collaborating with SMEs, and connecting with user insight.
• Own your work, manage your time effectively, and jump in where help is needed.
• Use Figma as your primary workspace for all design deliverables.
• Participate in show-and-tell sessions, design critiques, and content craft discussions to continuously improve team practice.

We’re looking for someone who:

• Has deep skills in conversational design, with the ability to shape user-friendly dialogue using AI, NLP/NLU, and language models.
• Writes with clarity and empathy—able to deliver accessible, brand-aligned content that meets real user needs.
• Brings a T-shaped mindset, with expertise in conversation design and the flexibility to contribute across content and UX.
• Understands the Double Diamond model, works well in Agile teams, and is comfortable working with hypotheses and problem statements.
• Is proactive, thoughtful, and driven to make things better—someone who builds trust through open collaboration and curiosity.
• Thinks strategically about the user experience and its wider business impact.
• Is comfortable working in a multidisciplinary pod with developers, PMs, designers, and researchers.
• Can balance autonomy with collaboration—working independently while keeping others informed and involved.

Preferred Experience:

• Experience in the field of Conversation and Content Design: minimum 4 years
• Experience with AI chatbots: minimum 2 years.
• Experience in Financial Services: Familiarity with the financial industry and investment platforms. Experience in a regulated environment.
• Project Management: Ability to manage multiple projects and meet deadlines.
• Analytical Skills: Proficiency in analysing user data and performance metrics to optimise conversational designs.

How We Work

Vanguard has implemented a hybrid working model for the majority of our crew members, designed to capture the benefits of enhanced flexibility while enabling in-person learning, collaboration, and connection. We believe our mission-driven and highly collaborative culture is a critical enabler to support long-term client outcomes and enrich the employee experience.