Vice President, Head of User Experience

Job Summary

Workiva delivers the world’s leading cloud platform for regulatory, financial and environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) reporting. Workiva provides more than 6,000 organizations in 170 countries (e.g. Google, T-Mobile, NY Life, Amgen, Slack) with SaaS solutions to help solve some of the most complex reporting and disclosure challenges. People all over the world use our connected, cloud-native platform to seamlessly enable collaboration and deep integration into existing work streams to simplify their most complex challenges at scale.

The Vice President, Head of User Experience, is a leader of leaders who is experienced managing global design teams to produce world class applications. The VP of UX will lead a 50+ team of designers, researchers, and content designers who work in partnership with product and technology teams. At Workiva, UX is centralized and supports all our product lines -- thus, UX is responsible for ensuring a consistent, coherent experience for our customers. The VP of UX sets the strategic vision and goals for the UX Directors and Managers, translating business context and goals into a UX action plan. We are looking for strong people management, operations experience, high business acumen, and strong execution abilities.

What You’ll Do

• Translate company strategy into operational goals and metrics for the team that serve to align and motivate employee performance

• Align with other teams and departments to analyze, monitor, forecast, and prioritize initiatives in accordance with organizational priorities and strategic plan

• Build a strong, sustainable organization with high levels of employee engagement by attracting and developing superior talent and rewarding superior performance of teams and individuals. Create 1-3 year scaling strategy that ensures sufficient resources and staffing levels to support business needs

• Provides leaders with coaching on their design decisions, people management, and communication skills. Give feedback in a constructive and effective way. Provide developmental opportunities, including leadership development, to enhance their skills, motivation, and performance

• Workiva is committed to executives that embody and model “Servant Leadership” qualities. We expect executives to create an atmosphere of respect, mutual support, flexibility, continuous learning, good humor, and commitment to business goals and customer needs to fulfill the company vision

• Establish and maintain relationships and effectively communicate with customers, business unit leaders and senior management to raise visibility of UX and ensure collaboration with appropriate key stakeholders

• Work with design leaders on a strategy to establish guidelines, principles, and standards to ensure design alignment across teams for a consistent user experience

• Work with the Research Director to establish a comprehensive research strategy, including an evaluation of methodologies and processes for ensuring that insights are usable and communicated to impact design decisions. Ensure alignment in approach and effective communication across product teams

What You’ll Need

Minimum qualifications

• 15+ years of progressive relevant experience in user experience, with strong case studies demonstrating measurable impacts, preferably in B2B software development or other related technology areas

• At least 10 years of leadership experience in design management

• A B.A. or B.S. degree in human-computer interaction, psychology, computer science or software engineering preferred. Advanced degrees such as MA, PhD, or MBA are desirable but not required.

Preferred qualifications

• Experience in the ability to be able to conceive and conceptualize a compelling vision, backed by appropriate strategy and strong execution

• Deep understanding of user-centered design principles, frameworks and methodologies, and experience applying them to real-world problems rooted in user insights and feedback throughout the product lifecycle

• Demonstrates a solid understanding of user experience principles and B2B research methodologies

• Building and scaling design organizations beyond 50+ individuals

• Strong communication, presentation, and interpersonal skills, with the ability to influence and build relationships with stakeholders at all levels

• Experience working in an Agile development environment

• Strong analytical skills, with the ability to use collected data and analytics to inform design decisions

• Experience with a wide range of design and prototyping tools, such as Sketch, Figma, InVision, and Adobe Creative Suite

• Ability to effectively recruit, retain, and nurture a culture of excellence, depth and healthy team relationships

• Strong customer orientation, ability to dive deep, and strong problem solving skills

Working Conditions & Travel Requirements

• Availability for 25-30% travel. Travel is required to meet with teams in other offices, customers, vendors, and/or suppliers, attend trade shows, etc.

• Reliable internet access for any period of time working remotely, not in a Workiva office

How You’ll Be Rewarded

✅ A discretionary bonus typically paid annually

✅ Restricted Stock Units granted at time of hire

✅ 401(k) match and comprehensive employee benefits package

The salary range represents the low and high end of the salary range for this job in the US. Minimums and maximums may vary based on location. The actual salary offer will carefully consider a wide range of factors, including your skills, qualifications, experience and other relevant factors.

Workiva is an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer. We believe that great minds think differently. We value diversity of backgrounds, beliefs, and interests, and we recognize diversity as an important source of intellectual thought, varied perspective, and innovation. Employment decisions are made without regard to age, race, creed, color, religion, sex, national origin, ancestry, disability status, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression genetic information, marital status, citizenship status or any other protected characteristic. We strongly encourage and welcome people from historically marginalized groups to apply.

Workiva is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities. To request assistance with the application process, please email [email protected].

Workiva employees are required to undergo comprehensive security and privacy training tailored to their roles, ensuring adherence to company policies and regulatory standards.

Workiva supports employees in working where they work best - either from an office or remotely from any location within their country of employment.