About the company
Our client is a fast-growing software company.
The role
Raydar is recruiting for this role on behalf of our client. Serve as the first designer at an early-stage software company, shaping the user experience of complex professional tools from research through delivery. Blend user insight, usage analytics and quick AI-assisted prototyping to guide design choices. Work side by side with product and engineering leaders, who handle the build.
What you'll do
- Own the experience across all user-facing surfaces, from daily operational workspaces to management dashboards.
- Prioritize clear interaction and flow design over visual styling.
- Lead user research and product instrumentation, drawing on behavioral data, usage patterns, discovery conversations and direct observation of users to choose where to invest.
- Collaborate with product and engineering partners to translate user needs into well-defined flows and deliver specifications that engineers implement.
- Design how users interact with AI-driven automation, so they can review actions taken, the reasoning behind them and any uncertainty, and then approve or intervene.
- Guide an early, rough interface toward a polished, enterprise-ready product, carrying each initiative from discovery to launch.
- Establish the design system and guiding design principles from the ground up.
- Prototype daily with AI tools and check whether design changes reduce effort for users.
Requirements
What we're looking for
- 5 to 8 years of product design experience, with ownership of UX flows from start to finish.
- A portfolio featuring dense, technical software used by professionals for many hours a day.
- Design experience at an early-stage startup; being a first hire or founding designer is a strong plus.
- Skill at simplifying intricate processes into streamlined, evidence-based experiences that reach production.
- A UX-first approach grounded in usage analytics and user research.
- Ability to build prototypes with AI coding tools; front-end engineering skills are not expected.
- Comfort working independently in a fast-paced startup with no existing design team.
- Ability to work on-site five days a week.
Bonus points
- Background at software companies with a reputation for excellent user experience.
- Experience in compliance-heavy operational fields.
- Experience designing AI and human-in-the-loop experiences.
- Prior experience as the first hire in a function.
- U.S. work authorization.
Benefits
Compensation and benefits
- Base salary: USD 170,000 to 220,000 per year
- Equity
- Medical and dental coverage
- Meals provided
Location and work model
- New York, NY, United States
- On-site, 5 days a week
- Full-time
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