Director, Product Design

Elevate Design Into a Strategic, High-Impact Function Define the long-term design vision and translate it into a clear, actionable strategy and roadmap. Build a culture where Product Design is a strategic partner across Product, Engineering, Data, and Industry teams. Reset expectations around experience quality, process, and user-centered design. Lead Design Strategy Across the Product Portfolio Partner with Product leadership to influence roadmap decisions using user insights, experience principles, and holistic design thinking. Own the end-to-end experience strategy across GS1 Canada’s digital platforms, ensuring coherence, clarity, and usability. Establish design principles and patterns that scale across complex workflows and data ecosystems. Hands-On Design Execution Personally design UX flows, wireframes, prototypes, and high-fidelity UI for major initiatives. Collaborate closely with Product and Engineering to iterate quickly and ensure experience quality. Champion accessibility, simplicity, and a consistent design system. Build a Modern Design Process \u0026amp; Operating System Introduce design rituals that elevate collaboration and design outcomes. Mature and expand our design system and reusable component library. Implement workflows that balance velocity with quality. Own User Research \u0026amp; Insights Lead a practical, actionable research approach that informs product decisions. Identify research priorities and synthesize insights into clear recommendations. Build lightweight measurement frameworks to track UX improvements. Own Design Tools \u0026amp; Data-Driven Decision Making Own and optimize design tools (e.g., Figma). Develop strategies for leveraging behavioral data and insights to improve usability. Ensure design decisions are grounded in evidence, not assumptions. Integrate AI Thoughtfully Into the Experience Identify opportunities to incorporate AI into workflows, automation, and decision support. Partner with Product \u0026amp; Engineering to design intuitive and trustworthy AI-enabled experiences. Bring awareness of emerging AI UX patterns into GS1 Canada’s product strategy. Lead and Mentor the Design Team Manage and develop designers, providing clear direction and coaching. Foster a creative, high-performance culture. Shape future team structure and hiring as the function grows.

8+ years in UX/UI or Product Design (B2B SaaS or data-driven platforms required) with leadership experience. Proven track record of leading design teams in fast-paced, agile environments. A player-coach who excels in both strategy and hands-on design execution. Experience elevating a nascent design function into a strategic, influential capability. Portfolio showcasing strong UX thinking, UI craft, and complex workflow design. Strong systems thinker with experience building design systems. Skilled in user research, usability testing, analytics, and insight synthesis. Familiarity with AI UX patterns and designing AI-enhanced experiences. Proven ability to influence cross-functional partners and raise the quality bar. Hands-on proficiency with modern design tools (Figma required). Entrepreneurial experience and mindset are not required but are considered an asset.