Our mission is to change the way developers build software.
The Role
Lead design for Retool's platform systems, focusing on AI integration and user experience while collaborating with product and engineering teams.
Summary Generated by Built In
ABOUT RETOOL
Nearly every company in the world runs on custom software for critical operations like tracking performance metrics, handling customer support workflows, building admin dashboards, and countless other processes you might not have even thought of. But most companies don't have adequate resources to properly invest in these tools, leading to a lot of old and clunky internal software or, even worse, users still stuck in manual and spreadsheet flows.
At Retool, we’re building the first enterprise AppGen platform: software that transforms natural language into production-ready code, integrates directly with business data, and meets the highest standards of security and governance. AI is redefining what it means to build software—and who gets to build it. The definition of “developer” now includes analysts, operators, and domain experts creating solutions directly. As the pool of builders widens, so does the complexity of what they need to build. The opportunity is enormous, but so is the challenge of enabling this larger community to build production-grade software safely. That means AI that understands real business data, enforces enterprise policies automatically, and empowers teams to create once and reuse everywhere with shared, trusted components.
Over 100 million hours of work has been automated by developers and domain experts using our platform, freeing them to focus on creative problem-solving and strategic initiatives that drive real business value. The people closest to knowing what needs to be built can now safely create custom solutions within enterprise guardrails. And that's a mission worth striving for.
Let's build the future together!
WHY WE’RE LOOKING FOR YOUWe’re looking for a Product Designer to lead design for some of Retool’s most foundational platform systems—while helping define how AI flows through the product in ways that feel powerful, dependable, and secure.
This role sits at the intersection of platform design, systems thinking, and applied AI. You’ll design the primitives and abstractions that enable companies to adopt, scale, and rely on Retool across their entire organization—now with AI woven directly into how builders connect data, scale systems, and ship mission-critical applications faster. You’ll work on complex systems, and foundational product areas like data connectivity, governance features, and AI.
At Retool, designers at this level operate with significant autonomy and influence. You’ll help set product direction, shape long-term platform strategy, and raise the bar for both design craft and systems quality. We’re constantly navigating the tension between convention and configuration, between technical expressiveness and conceptual simplicity—and now, between automation and control. You’ll join an experienced, collaborative design team that values research, rigor, critique, and iteration, and a company that treats design as a strategic partner in how the product evolves.
IN THIS ROLE, YOU’LL
- Lead design for core platform systems that support large, complex customers and long-term product scale
- Define and evolve product abstractions that make technically complex capabilities—including AI-powered workflows—intuitive, composable, and durable
- Design end-to-end experiences for connecting, configuring, and managing data sources, permissions, authentication, and infrastructure, with AI thoughtfully embedded where it adds real leverage
- Apply systems thinking to ensure AI experiences integrate cohesively across product surfaces, rather than living as isolated features
- Partner closely with product and engineering to shape roadmap direction, technical tradeoffs, and long-term platform and AI strategy
- Produce high-quality design artifacts—from early exploration through detailed execution—to bring platform and AI concepts into production
- Influence design quality beyond your immediate scope through critique, mentorship, and design reviews
- Contribute to and evolve Retool’s design system, ensuring it supports scalable patterns
- Help define design processes and standards that enable teams to build cohesive, high-quality platform and AI experiences at scale
- A strong portfolio demonstrating senior or staff-level impact, with 6+ years of experience owning complex, systems-heavy product areas
- Proven ability to think in platforms and systems—designing primitives, frameworks, and abstractions that scale across teams and use cases
- Excitement about designing AI native products, developer-centric tools, enterprise software, or platforms that power other products
- Deep comfort working on technically complex problems and collaborating closely with engineering
- A track record of navigating ambiguity, identifying high-leverage problems, and driving work forward independently
- Strong product judgment and an ability to reason through tradeoffs involving usability, performance, security, extensibility, and trust
- Excellent communication skills, including clear writing and the ability to align diverse stakeholders around complex ideas
- A customer-obsessed mindset and curiosity about how builders think, learn, and work with increasingly intelligent systems
- A desire to rethink how software is built—and to design platforms where humans and AI build better things together
For candidates based in the United States, the pay range(s) for this role is listed below and represents base salary range for non-commissionable roles or on-target earnings (OTE) for commissionable roles. This salary range may be inclusive of several career levels at Retool and will be narrowed during the interview process based on a number of factors such as (but not limited to), scope and responsibilities, the candidate’s experience and qualifications, and location.
Additional compensation in the form(s) of equity and/or commission are dependent on the position offered. Retool provides a comprehensive benefit plan, including medical, dental, vision, and 401(k). Pay and benefits are subject to change at any time, consistent with the terms of any applicable compensation or benefit plans.
The base pay range for this role is $187,300 – $318,800 per year.
Retool offers generous benefits to all employees and hybrid work location. For more information, please visit the benefits and perks section of our careers page!
Retool is currently set up to employ all roles in the US and specific roles in the UK. To find roles that can be employed in the UK, please refer to our careers page and review the indicated locations.
Top Skills
AI
Design Systems
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The Company
What We Do
Retool is a development platform for building business software. Users can visually design apps that interface with any database or API, and switch to code to customize how their apps look and work. With Retool, developers ship more apps and move their business forward—all in less time. Thousands of teams at companies like Amazon, DoorDash, Peloton, and Brex collaborate around custom-built Retool apps to solve internal workflows. We're just getting started and growing quickly—join us!
Why Work With Us
Retools are solution drivers—whether fixing a button misalignment or enabling customers to build with the newest AI technologies, we wear many hats and act like owners. Our small teams work on big problems, pushing hard and moving quickly to create outsized impact. We hold each other accountable and celebrate together when we get it right. Join us!
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