Staff Creative Director (Sand Table)

The Sand Table team at Anduril develops our revolutionary platform for visualizing future defense scenarios. We transform massive amounts of data into an intuitive, interactive 3D command center, serving as the visual interface for mission simulations, a key business development tool, and a powerful demonstration of our advanced capabilities to government and military leaders. We take ambitious ideas from concept to completion, building the core with high-performance C++ and enabling rapid feature expansion through modern scripting and plugin frameworks. The Sand Table team manages the complex logistics for delivering flawless augmented reality demonstrations in headset to critical stakeholders. As a cross-functional group of builders, strategists, and operators, we combine the creative energy of a top game studio with the rigorous discipline of national security to shape how the future of defense is visualized and understood.

As Creative Director for the Sand Table team, you will define and champion the creative vision for next-generation military wargaming and briefing experiences in XR environments. You will lead a talented team of artists, systems design, and scenario design while personally driving hands-on work to shape intuitive, compelling experiences that enable military stakeholders to interact with complex simulations and briefing tools. This role requires balancing strategic creative leadership with direct execution—owning the user experience and core gameplay features that make our XR platform essential for mission-critical operations.

• Develop and communicate the overarching design for Sand Table's wargaming and briefing experiences, ensuring alignment with customer needs and business objectives
• Establish design principles, quality standards, and design frameworks that drive consistency and excellence across all experiences
• Lead the evolution of design team structure, processes, and best practices to scale with program growth
• Foster a culture of design excellence, trust, open communication, user focus, and continuous improvement
• Build, mentor, and manage a multidisciplinary design team including artists, systems designers, and scenario designers
• Partner with engineering, production, and art leadership to align vision with technical execution
• Act as a key stakeholder in release processes, representing user experience quality and approving final builds

• Personally design and iterate on core experience features to create compelling scenario concepts and mission designs that demonstrate product capabilities for business development and customer engagements
• Own end-to-end experience design from concept through production and post-launch iteration, ensuring user-centric outcomes
• Develop design workflows and documentation using standardized frameworks that enhance scalability and production efficiency
• Conduct design reviews, set clear priorities and expectations, translating stakeholder needs into actionable scope of work for your team
• Prototype and validate design concepts directly in game engine environments
• Conduct regular build reviews and provide feedback to ensure high-quality user experience throughout development

• Collaborate with product managers and military customers to understand operational requirements and translate them into intuitive, mission-effective experiences
• Present and communicate design roadmaps and creative directions to stakeholders, ensuring alignment with customer expectations
• Collaborate with business lines to scope design deliverables for contract budgets and proposals
• Develop and maintain effective working relationships with stakeholders to ensure designs support successful mission outcomes from prototyping through production phases
• Engage with users through testing sessions and feedback loops to validate design decisions

• 10+ years of professional experience in game design, experience design, or interactive simulation development
• 5+ years of leadership experience managing multidisciplinary design teams
• Proven track record delivering AAA game experiences or complex interactive systems from concept to launch, with direct accountability for player experiences
• Expertise in player systems, gameplay loops, and campaign design for strategy or simulation games
• Experience designing for 3D environments, real-time visualization systems, or XR platforms
• Strong portfolio demonstrating end-to-end ownership of design experiences in shipped products
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with experience presenting creative vision to executive, partner, and customer audiences
• User-centric design philosophy with demonstrated use of analytics, feedback, and user research to inform decisions
• Experience working in cross-functional environments, collaborating with engineering, art, UX, and production disciplines
• Ability to balance creative innovation with production reality, business constraints, and customer requirements
• Comfortable setting and achieving design goals in ambiguous environments with competing priorities
• Proven track record of being self-driven and relentlessly proactive in solving design challenges without waiting for direction
• Eligible to obtain and maintain an active U.S. Secret security clearance
• Ability to travel up to 15% of the time to support customer meetings, user testing sessions, and field evaluations

• Experience with AAA strategy, RTS, or simulation game development with shipped titles
• Background in both art and design disciplines with understanding of production pipelines
• Experience continuous content delivery models
• Prior experience with defense applications, military simulations, or government customers
• Understanding of Scrum/Agile methodologies and experience implementing team structures
• Knowledge of spatial UI design principles and ergonomics for XR environments
• Experience with Custom Game Engines, Unity or Unreal Engine