The Foundation
We are the largest nonprofit fighting poverty, disease, and inequity around the world. Founded on a simple premise: people everywhere, regardless of identity or circumstances, should have the chance to live healthy, productive lives. We believe our employees should reflect the rich diversity of the global populations we aim to serve. We provide an exceptional benefits package to employees and their families which include comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with no premiums, generous paid time off, paid family leave, foundation-paid retirement contribution, regional holidays, and opportunities to engage in several employee communities. As a workplace, we’re committed to creating an environment for you to thrive both personally and professionally.
The Team
Positioned within the foundation’s IT organization, our Human Centered Design team’s mission is to empower all foundation staff with easy and intuitive access to the tools and information they need to help make change in the world. We partner widely with foundation operations, program teams, and other stakeholders to understand their needs and provide innovative solutions. We enable collaboration, reduce friction, improve grantmaking and management, decrease time to insight, and foster innovation. We thrive amidst constraints, working on a mix of custom and off-the-shelf software, as well as multi-channel experiences, process design, and enterprise behavior change.
* Application deadline: Thursday, October 31 (11:59 PM PDT)
* Please include your UX portfolio as a link or PDF attachment with your application.
Your Role
Do you believe that all lives have equal value? Are you passionate about understanding user needs and improving employee experiences? Are you interested in applying your expertise to amplify the work being done at the Gates Foundation? If so, you might be a great fit for this exciting role!
As a Senior Experience Designer, you will develop a deep understanding of the Foundation's user needs and help us take our internal tools and services to the next level. You will leverage your experience across the full spectrum of user research, information design, interaction design, usability, and service design to bring clarity and simplicity to complex problems. You will champion HCD principles and design thinking across IT and throughout the foundation.
As a collaborative problem solver, you will have the unique opportunity to work with a variety of stakeholders on internal projects, all while learning about our programs across the world and how we collaborate. Since we don't always get to build our own software, we're looking for a creative, strategic, service design-oriented individual who can work within the constraints of enterprise technologies – often designing through configuration, business process, and training.
What You’ll Do
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Plan, conduct, and synthesize user and stakeholder research, learning how employees engage and collaborate across a variety of business areas and technical systems
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Select optimal research methods to meet project needs, balancing qualitative and quantitative approaches alongside business realities – common methods include contextual interviews, job shadows, surveys, card sorts, and usability studies
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Create research reports, service blueprints, journey maps, personas, process flows, ecosystem maps, concept models, or other artifacts required to bring your research to life and build shared understanding across multiple disciplines
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Drive clarity and alignment on needs, opportunities, and success criteria with business owners, analysts, and technologists
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Contribute to project plans and agile backlogs, recommending appropriate deliverables and realistic timelines to support team objectives
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Facilitate design thinking activities, working sessions, and workshops for cross-functional groups to generate ideas and build consensus
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Work with technical team members to evaluate technology options against user needs, business requirements, and usability best practices
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Create wireframes, prototypes, high-fidelity mockups, user flows, information architecture diagrams, and other artifacts as needed to communicate design concepts within cross-functional teams
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Work with team members and end-users to define how best to organize the user experience – including navigation patterns, categorization, labeling, and transitions across platforms
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Leverage modern user interface and service design patterns and exemplars, articulating their design logic, benefits, and tradeoffs – serving as a champion for design standards and best practices
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Contribute to organizational literacy, use, and evolution of human centered design and design thinking to solve challenges encountered by the foundation
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Partner with other members of the Human Centered Design team to build service maturity, regularly evaluating and updating elements of the team’s design and research operations
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Build longitudinal knowledge of foundation staff needs and ways of working, “connecting the dots” across projects with an eye toward continuously improving the holistic user experience via people, process, and technology levers
Your Experience
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7+ years of professional experience as documented in a strong UX portfolio that demonstrates a depth of human centered design process, documentation, and outcomes – experience across a variety of industries is preferred
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Bachelor’s degree or higher, preferably in Human-Computer Interaction, Design, Psychology, Library & Information Sciences, or other relevant fields
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Experience leading the end-to-end UX process on digital applications – mix of B2C & B2B experience preferred
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Solid understanding of product design and development lifecycle, and experience researching and designing on both agile and waterfall projects
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Experience with both generative and evaluative research, and qualitative and quantitative methods
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Experience evaluating existing products in terms of their usability, usefulness, learnability, and customizability
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Experience with prototyping, future visioning, and strategy development
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Experience in a business/client-facing role and navigating organizational dynamics
Other desired attributes include...
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Experienced interviewer and active listener who enjoys using great questions to help your participants drive the conversation
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Intellectually curious and a quick study, easily picking up on jargon and concepts, filtering signal from noise, and helping translate across stakeholders to drive clarity and alignment on a team
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Balances analytical, action-oriented problem solving with emotional intelligence and ability to “read the room”
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Strong, confident, and compelling presenter, writer, and facilitator – able to communicate insights, concepts, and design rationales to a variety of audiences
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Effectively works with diverse stakeholders, especially those who are experts in other fields but may not be familiar with design disciplines – knows when to listen, when to contribute, and when to evangelize
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Consultative mindset with the ability to discern when and where to make the most valuable contribution to a project – comfort adapting chosen process and methods to address the needs of specific projects, without significant guidance
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Effectively switches between tactical, detail-oriented design work and strategic, big-picture thinking
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Track record of continual learning / self-education in the field of human centered design
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Must be able to legally work in the country where this position is located without visa sponsorship.
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The salary range for this role is $137,500 to $206,200 USD. We recognize high-wage market differences in Seattle and Washington D.C., where our offices are located. The range for this role in these locations is $149,800 to $224,600 USD. As a mission-driven organization, we strive to balance competitive pay with our mission. New hires salaries are typically between the range minimum and the salary range midpoint. Actual placement in the range will depend on a candidate’s job-related skills, experience, and expertise, as evaluated during the interview process.
Hiring Requirements
As part of our standard hiring process for new employees, employment will be contingent upon successful completion of a background check.
Candidate Accommodations
If you require assistance due to a disability in the application or recruitment process, please submit a request here.
Inclusion Statement
We are dedicated to the belief that all lives have equal value. We strive for a global and cultural workplace that supports ever greater diversity, equity, and inclusion — of voices, ideas, and approaches — and we support this diversity through all our employment practices.
All applicants and employees who are drawn to serve our mission will enjoy equality of opportunity and fair treatment without regard to race, color, age, religion, pregnancy, sex, sexual orientation, disability, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, genetic information, veteran status, marital status, and prior protected activity.
What We Do
We are optimists on a mission to create a world where every person has the chance to live a healthy, productive life.
In developing countries, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation focuses on improving people’s health and giving them the chance to lift themselves out of hunger and extreme poverty. In the United States, it seeks to ensure that all people—especially those with the fewest resources—have access to the opportunities they need to succeed in school and life.
