Director, Innovation (Digital Early Incubation, Product Design, UX/UI)

How you will make an impact:

This is an exciting opportunity to join a team identifying unmet patient needs and boldly designing a new category of digital products for Edwards Lifesciences. Edwards’ Advanced Innovation & Technology team is deeply dedicated to solving the complex challenges in the broader structural heart field in order to transform treatment and significantly improve patients’ lives around the world.

Edwards Lifesciences Advanced Innovation & Technology (AI&T) division has a unique opportunity for a Director, Innovation (Digital Early Incubation, Product Design UX/UI) to join our growing team, to be part of the team driving a new digital innovation portfolio for the future of Edwards Lifesciences. Be part of the team to build and implement the strategy for needs driven innovation within the AI&T incubator driving a multidisciplinary project team to identify opportunities. This highly collaborative role will partner with multiple teams that compete on numerous projects based on value proposition and feasibility of new products.

We’re seeking a Director, Innovation (Digital Early Incubation, Product Design UX/UI) who blends strong UX research capabilities with hands-on UX/UI design. This strategic role will own end-to-end discovery and delivery – from framing the clinical problem, conducting research, and synthesizing insights to designing UX/UI and validating solutions to drive a new and evolving digital innovation portfolio for the future of the organization.

Key Responsibilities:

• Deeply understand clinical management paradigms, anatomy, and pathophysiology to define clinical unmet needs for various patient segments along the care pathway

• Actively contribute to generation of new digital product concepts, prioritization/screening of concepts, and de-risking through data-driven methods

• Robustly characterize minimum viable product, define strategies for demonstrating clinical proof-of-concept for software prototypes, and understand market adoption criteria

• Develop, plan and prioritize impactful projects and activities based on value proposition, clinical needs driven innovation, and feasibility of new digital products, with accountability for successful completion of all project deliverables

• Partner with internal technology and business leaders to identify, develop and execute new whitespace product opportunities

• Oversee the end-to-end user experience for digital products in the AI&T incubator, building a strong design culture within the organization

• Lead generative UX research studies to complement voice-of-customer (VOC) market research in collaboration with the product manager

• Lead UX design for developing and implementing intuitive high-fidelity user interface (UI) prototypes and iterations, to be ultimately used in the clinic/hospital setting

• Collaborate with product manager (PM), technical program manager (TPM), and software engineers (SWE) on requirements, roadmaps, and execution of project deliverables

• Understand and define clinical workflow and user (clinician and/or patient) interaction with the digital product, rapidly creating wireframes to outline the experience

• Optimize user workflows for scalability and adaptability

• Lead and execute rapid user/usability testing, synthesizing feedback into actionable design improvements for digital prototypes

What you'll need (Required):

• Bachelor's Degree or Equivalent in Engineering, Science or Business Administration with 12 years of relevant experience -OR- Master's Degree or equivalent with 10 years of relevant experience -OR- Ph.D. or equivalent with 8 years of relevant experience (Degree in Industrial Design or Computer Science strongly preferred)

• Strong track record of UX/UI design for new early-stage software/digital product development initiatives in the medtech domain, working in a cross-functional team environment

• Experience in design strategy and design thinking

• Experience designing for digital products/services spanning multiple hardware platforms (e.g. desktop, tablet, phone)

• Strong interaction and visual design skills, experience using common prototyping tools (e.g. Figma, Adobe XD, Sketch, etc.)

• Experience in structuring, conducting, and synthesizing UX research (qualitative and quantitative methods)

• Familiarity with implantable medical devices

• Experience in roles requiring knowledge of a domain of human anatomy and physiology (ideally cardiovascular)

• Excellent communication, leadership, and stakeholder management skills

• Strong presentation skills, adaptable to various audiences ranging from design reviews to executive-level forums

What else we look for (Preferred):

• Experience working with remote software engineering teams (i.e. international)

• Ability to quickly evaluate solution viability, courage to fail fast and learn from mistakes

• Experience with MedTech/healthcare workflows, EHR integration, clinical environments, or FDA/IEC usability standards strongly preferred

• Basic understanding of front-end development (HTML/CSS) for effective collaboration

• Strong and inspirational presentation skills, adaptable to various audiences ranging from design reviews to executive-level forums

• Experience with data visualization

• Experience with product use cases involving medical imaging (e.g. CT, MRI, echo/ultrasound) or image processing

• Practical knowledge of clinical and biostatistics

• Excellent documentation and communication skills and interpersonal relationship skills including negotiating and relationship management skills with ability to drive achievement of objectives

• Data-driven but ability to make decisions based on imperfect information

• Understanding of business strategy, competitive landscape, regulatory environment, and clinical data

• Familiar with regulatory, compliance, and related requirements for medical device development (or SaMD)

• Demonstrated ability to develop relationships to drive alignment of objectives

• Proven successful organizational and project management skills

• Strict attention to detail

• Ability to interact professionally with all organizational levels and proactively escalate issues to appropriate levels of management in the organization

• Ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-paced environment

• Ability to represent leadership on projects within multiple areas, interfacing with project managers, team and middle to senior management

• Ability to consult in a project setting within multiple areas, interfacing with low to middle management

• Adhere to all EHS rules and requirements and take adequate control measures in preventing injuries to themselves and others as well as to the protection of environment and prevention of pollution under their span of influence/control

• Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite

Aligning our overall business objectives with performance, we offer competitive salaries, performance-based incentives, and a wide variety of benefits programs to address the diverse individual needs of our employees and their families.

For California (CA), the base pay range for this position is $170,000 to $241,000 (highly experienced).

The pay for the successful candidate will depend on various factors (e.g., qualifications, education, prior experience). Applications will be accepted while this position is posted on our Careers website.

Edwards is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer including protected Veterans and individuals with disabilities.

COVID Vaccination Requirement

Edwards is committed to protecting our vulnerable patients and the healthcare providers who are treating them. As such, all patient-facing and in-hospital positions require COVID-19 vaccination. If hired into a covered role, as a condition of employment, you will be required to submit proof that you have been vaccinated for COVID-19, unless you request and are granted a medical or religious accommodation for exemption from the vaccination requirement. This vaccination requirement does not apply in locations where it is prohibited by law to impose vaccination.