Senior Design Engineer
Founded in 2016, Better is a digital-first homeownership company whose services included mortgage, real estate, title, and homeowners insurance. We leverage creative technology and innovation to make the homebuying journey more approachable and understandable. Here are some interesting facts to help you get to know Better:
- From its founding in 2016 through 2020, Better funded $30.9B in home loans and provided over $7B in cumulative coverage through Better Cover and Better Settlement Services, the insurance divisions of Better
- Ranked #1 on LinkedIn’s Top Startups List for 2020 and 2021
- Ranked #2 on Fortune's Best Companies for Millenials 2021
- Fortune Best Workplaces for Women 2021
- People Magazine Companies that Care 2021
- Inc Magazine's Best Workplaces 2021
- Top Women Originators 2021
- Our Founder and CEO was named in Comparably's Top 25 CEOs for Diversity
- Better has raised over $400M in equity capital since inception
Our company is made up of driven, passionate people who bring their unique backgrounds and perspectives to everything we do. We are committed to fostering diversity, multiculturalism, and inclusion. We encourage individual potential rather than years of experience. We see the value in each person’s perspective, and recognize their talents, regardless of what the market says. We believe it’s important to nurture a company culture that encourages curiosity and passion—from employee resource groups and learning opportunities to team outings and community outreach.
Better is a family of companies. Better Mortgage Corporation provides home loans; Better Real Estate, LLC provides real estate services; Better Cover, LLC provides homeowners insurance policies; and Better Settlement Services provides title insurance services.
The Company
Mortgages — and the way people get them — need to be completely rebuilt. For years, the industry has been dominated by large banks and financial institutions relying on technology and solutions that haven’t been rethought in decades. Fax machines, mobile-unfriendly PDFs, hours of waiting to have a simple question answered. We’re changing all of it — from the ground up. With smarter, more efficient technology, getting a mortgage from Better feels different. We’re taking something most people dread and turning it into something that you might call enjoyable. As a result, we’ve become the fastest homeownership company in the country. Our backers and investors include tech and financial giants like Kleiner Perkins, Goldman Sachs, IA Ventures, and Activant Capital. We’re not done yet, though. We won’t be until we reach our goal: helping every person in America get a home smarter, easier, and faster.
The Department
Design plays a massive role in achieving this. Mortgages are complicated and quite frankly, stale. As designers, our job is to take all this complexity, distill it down to its essence, and repackage it into something simple, intuitive, and enjoyable.
That’s why we don’t distinguish between UX, Visual, or Product Designers. Our designers are all of them — part business strategist, part user researcher, and 100% committed to creating an exceptional user experience in a space that sorely needs it.
The Role: Sr Design engineer
As a Design engineer at Better, you will have a direct impact on business and product decisions. You will work on high impact projects leading teams and focus on the customers' experience. You will work on new ideas and untouched territory to pave the way for what's to come. You will work on the core home experience team, playing a critical role in crystalizing project vision and strategy.
As a senior member of the design team at Better, you will also help mentor team members, help grow the team, and lead other members. You will work closely with stakeholders across functions.
What you bring
- 5+ years of experience designing consumer products in both code and design tools
- Proven ability to bring the engineers and designers together to work efficiently
- You can think at a high level about design and code
- Experience solving and identifying complex, ambiguous design problems
- You are obsessed with the design and know that every detail matter at every stage of the product development process
- You can bring work to life by prototyping in code and Figma
- Entrepreneurial, self-starter attitude with no problem adapting or flexing daily
- Experience defining processes that improve the quality of the work
- Extensive experience closely partnering with designers and engineers to uncover solutions
- Extensive experience with prototyping as a means to explore and convey design solutions
What you'll do
- You are a systematic thinker that can scale solutions that are elegant and delightful
- You will raise the bar on design quality across the org
- Break down large ambiguous problems into simple solutions while executing from concept through completion
- Lead a team of Designers and Writers through ideation, concepting, detailed design, prototyping (we don't present here), and final delivery
- Take designs from Figma to code in real time
- Build plugins to optimize efficiency for design and engineering
- Build plugins for engineers to speed up their workflow
- Build plugins for designers to sync their files with engineers
- Build plugins to bring documentation from docs to figma and engineers codebase
- Build plugins to speed up how design, engineering, and product, review work
- Create high fidelity mockups for teams
- Create interactive live designs to sell ideas and test prototypes with real data
- Speed up the engineering process by ensure the FE engineers have all the necessary components ready when needed (by working hand in hand with designers)
- Work closely with engineering teams to build sophisticated prototypes
- Work with user researchers to test new ideas and iterate on feedback
- Build fun, innovative products that impact the direction of the company
- Build pixel-perfect Web UI in: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
- You will wield the latest frameworks and tools in JavaScript, CSS, and web templates.
- This role is designated as ‘Remote Mode,’ and employees are not expected to report into a Better office at any time. Proof of COVID-19 vaccination is not required unless fully remote employees attend an onsite, in-person meeting, office event, or otherwise interface with Better employees and/or customers in person.
Job Req ID: JR101562
#LI-Remote
Better is requiring all US employees to be fully vaccinated in order to go into the office. Our priority is first and foremost the safety of our employees and we require COVID-19 vaccination to help ensure their safety in the workplace. Please note that Better will offer a reasonable accommodation process for employees who are not vaccinated for medical or religious reasons.
The Better mission is rooted in values that drive us.
- We do what’s in the best interest of the consumer, not ourselves
- We have growth mindsets, not fixed ones
- We believe that success lies in execution, not credentials
- We act like owners, not just employees
- We work to find answers on our own, not wait for them to be given to us
- We optimize for mission, not ego
Our mission speaks for itself—we continue to outpace the industry at every turn. We’ve joined forces in partnership with Ally Bank, and our backers have helped build some of the most transformative tech and finance companies in history. Kleiner Perkins, Goldman Sachs, American Express, Citigroup, Activant Capital, Ally Bank, and others have invested in our vision for what homeownership can be.
Better Benefits & Compensation
Our total rewards package consists of base salary, equity, benefits, and opportunity for yearly cash bonus. Some of our benefits include:
- Comprehensive healthcare, retirement, and voluntary benefits. Think medical, dental, vision, savings accounts, 401k, and more.
- Personalized care and tools for realizing your mental health and wellness goals
- Robust wellbeing offerings that allow you unlimited access to virtual fitness, meditation, yoga, cooking classes, homeschooling preparedness, physical therapy, and more.
- Unlimited time off (with manager approval)
- 12 weeks of paid parental leave after 90 days of employment, and 20 weeks after 24 months of service.
- Inclusive fertility benefits for you or your eligible dependents, regardless of participation in a Better medical plan.
Better is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion or religious creed, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, marital status, family or parental status, disability, military or veteran status, or any other basis protected by law. If you require further accommodations or have questions regarding accessibility of our roles, please reach out to [email protected]. All employment decisions at Better are based on a person’s merit, business needs, and role requirements.
California Consumer Privacy Rights Notice for Job Applicants
Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), Better is required to inform California residents who are our job applicants or prospective talent (together "job applicants") about the categories of personal information we collect about you and the purposes for which we will use this information. The notice contains disclosures required by the CCPA and applies only to personal information that is subject to the CCPA.