Head of Product Design, Dublin Pike

THE ROLE This is a newly created position, reporting to the CIO, within our Data and Technology team. You will be responsible for leading the group-wide design practice across all digital products, ensuring experiences are grounded in user insight, aligned with business goals, and delivered through close collaboration with product, engineering, data, PMO, editorial and commercial teams.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Contribute to the development of the Data and Technology vision for The Irish Times Group as a key technical leader, positioning UX and Design overall as key differentiators.

Lead the co‑creation of a vision for (human) user‑centric design across the group’s digital products and services, accommodating the needs of different titles, platforms and user types across the organisation.

Promote the development of a user‑centric culture across the entire Group, delivering design that promotes and strengthens our brand. Leverage design principles to promote experimentation, prototyping and wider innovation (i.e. invention + execution) and user‑centred thinking across the Group.

Act as a strategic advocate for the user, representing the third voice alongside commercial and content considerations.

Partner with industry bodies and other publishers to identify best practice and collaboration opportunities and help establish the Group as an emerging leader in personalised news and information content.

Manage and guide the Design team, both internal and contract resources. Construct an organisation development plan to grow internally, hire and partner for the capabilities and capacity needed.

Ensure good design practice, introducing necessary standards to ensure consistency across products and brands. Work closely with the Marketing team to ensure alignment with branding guidelines and standards.

Deliver design that enables digital storytelling, building personal connections and relevance with users in an increasingly automated and AI‑driven world.

Make User Experience a differentiator for group digital products measured against defined satisfaction, desirability, feasibility, and viability criteria.

Champion user‑led innovation through embedded practices such as design sprints, hack days, and other structured initiatives — working across engineering, product, research and wider teams to organise and enable meaningful collaboration that delivers.

As the hands‑on leader of the design profession deliver product design, graphic design, and user related design services to the product teams and across the Group to progressively deliver on goal of human‑centred design excellence as a differentiator.

Design a programme of integrated and continuous usability and product testing, implemented in collaboration with the Research team, that complements existing research and acts as standardised continuous feedback into design and development in support of our defined user experience metrics.

Promote a deeper understanding of user needs and behaviours across the group, leveraging design thinking frameworks and methods to represent the individuals behind the data.

SKILLS, EXPERIENCE&QUALIFICATIONS

Honours degree in a Design related discipline.

At least 10 years’ hands‑on design experience – including UX and user interfaces across websites and especially mobile apps.

Proven success in establishing Design as a differentiator for user facing digital products.

At least 5 years’ experience managing a Design function in a digital product environment from developing a vision to building the team.

Strong knowledge of Agile Development methodologies, having led processes such as design sprints and ideation sessions.

Previous experience working closely and successfully with other functions across the product development lifecycle– Product Management, Engineering, PMO, Data Science and Analytics.

Publishing or media industry experience.

Experience of designing information or media‑based apps.

The Irish Times Group operate a Hybrid working policy.

Our benefits include: Health Insurance contribution, Pension Contribution, Sick Leave Cover, Maternity and Paternity Leave, Irish Times&Irish Examiner Premium Digital Subscription, Income Protection Policy, Corporate Gym Membership discounts, Free Digital GP and Life Assurance Policy.

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