Staff Design Operations Program Manager

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in California, +2 more states.

📋 Description

• Establish and implement the strategy for Design Ops: Take charge of the strategic direction for Design Ops (including its goals, reasoning, and deliberate exclusions), and drive the execution from roadmap to delivery.

• Lead Design's AI-first perspective: Develop the strategy and decision-making framework for how Design integrates AI tools and transforms its processes, collaborating with Design Leaders and Product Ops. Be prepared to develop the necessary skills, agents, and workflows that designers will utilize daily. Work with Procurement to ensure access to new tools.

• Create scalable systems: Design, develop, and manage the operating system that enables the design organization to scale each year without increasing overhead. Maintain lightweight processes: introduce only what is necessary to enhance quality and provide visibility to the team.

• Develop and implement the design culture strategy: Define the cultural and quality rituals that should be in place (such as all-hands meetings, onsite events, and team rituals) and their desired outcomes, while overseeing execution and collaborating with design managers or cross-functional partners for assistance.

• Formulate and execute Design's external presence strategy: Lead the strategy for how Mercury Design presents itself externally to support recruitment and branding, and manage execution of this strategy, including content creation, events, and award submissions in collaboration with the Comms team.

• Establish and manage onboarding & enablement: Develop the strategy and quality standards for how new designers acclimatize, working alongside EPD Ops, while overseeing the programming.

• Serve as the cross-functional connective tissue: Foster relationships across Product Ops, Research Ops, Eng Ops, and design leadership to position yourself as the first point of contact for ambiguous, cross-functional challenges. Break down silos, navigate competing priorities, and steer multi-stakeholder programs to resolution, including engagement with executive partners.

• Act as a strategic thought partner to the VP of Design and design managers: Provide an independent perspective in discussions on team health, quality, and priorities, translating design leadership's objectives into the strategy and roadmap for Design Ops.

• Establish measurement criteria: Define the success metrics and reporting schedule for design programs across the organization, utilizing these metrics to advocate for future investments, including additional headcount for Design Ops as its responsibilities expand.

⛳️ Requirements

• Proven experience in independently establishing strategy for a horizontal function: articulating the thesis, rather than merely executing a provided project list.

• Exceptional interpersonal, presentation, and communication skills, with a proven ability to build trust and influence senior and executive stakeholders.

• A demonstrated high standard of quality that others recognize as exemplary, along with a history of fostering accountability beyond your individual contributions.

• Established capability to dismantle silos and influence without direct authority across teams, product areas, and platforms, including managing complex or conflicting stakeholder interests.

• Comfort in making decisions and driving them to conclusion without complete consensus, while effectively managing stakeholder expectations.

• A builder's mindset: adept at owning both strategy and execution independently, from concept to delivery.

• Experience representing a function's perspective externally: involvement in community engagement, employer branding, or industry representation.

• Expertise in anticipating and mitigating risks related to people, processes, and tools at a departmental level, with the ability to adapt swiftly as priorities evolve.

🏝️ Benefits

• Base salary

• Equity (stock options)