Staff Product Designer, Mobile

Role Overview

As a Staff Product Designer (Mobile) at NPR, you will lead the product design process from strategic concept development through pixel-level inspection prior to launch. You’ll drive cross-functional design initiatives across interaction design, product strategy, design systems, and prototyping, partnering closely with researchers, product managers, and software engineers.

Responsibilities

• Design Strategy & Mission Alignment: Translate audience insights into scalable digital experiences aligned with NPR’s public service mission.
• Mobile Product Discovery (End-to-End): Lead experience design for NPR’s next-generation mobile platform—from opportunity framing and audience research to prototyping, validation, systems design, and launch.
• Personalization & Audience Engagement: Own UX strategy for the personalization engine overhaul to create adaptive, habit-forming experiences that improve engagement, retention, and trust.
• Evidence-Driven Design Culture: Use rapid experimentation and audience feedback to validate ideas early and ground decisions in measurable outcomes.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner with Product, Software Engineering, Research, Data, and Newsroom/Editorial teams (plus external UX consultants) to align strategy and refine implementations.
• Design Systems & Scalability: Build, scale, and maintain accessible design systems across web, native mobile, and connected audio.
• Inclusive Design & Accessibility: Apply inclusive design and WCAG standards across digital products.
• Design Mentorship & Craft Excellence: Provide critiques and mentorship to support growth and uphold visual/functional quality.
• Workshop Facilitation & Co-Creation: Facilitate design thinking workshops, discovery sprints, and co-creation sessions with product and editorial stakeholders.

Requirements

• Strong leadership across end-to-end mobile product discovery and experience design.
• Expertise spanning interaction design, product strategy, design systems, and prototyping.
• Ability to partner effectively with product, engineering, research, and editorial teams.
• Commitment to evidence-driven design and measurable outcomes.
• Demonstrated knowledge of inclusive design and accessibility (WCAG).
• Experience mentoring other designers and strengthening design craft across initiatives.

Nice-to-Haves

• Experience working on personalization systems or personalization-driven user experiences.
• Experience collaborating with external UX consultants.

Application Notes

• Cover letter not required but encouraged.
• Portfolio is required, including a link and any access password needed.