Product Design hiring in 2025
Digital Product Design focused. Updated from 3 months ago.
There’s such as juxtaposition in the design hiring market at the moment. There is a lot of designers looking for work but many companies struggling to hire. Why?
Table of contents of this article:
Different requirements on designers
Getting an interview
The rise of “super” senior ICs
The need for hands-on Design Directors
Design community dissolving
Smaller teams and higher standards
Different requirement of designers
Many companies feel they need strong generalist designers, who have an eye for visual design and taste. The kind of taste you can’t train easily.
We’re in the era of seeing “craft” as a focus on many JDs, but what they mean by craft is pixels, creativity, product sense, taste and eye for the smallest details in all areas of your work.
Designers in demand are ones who understand business + product, have high empathy for customers, can handle ambiguity, strong critical thinking ability, can lead through the work, can work with Eng to ship work, have impeccable visual skills and demonstrate first principle thinking.
Is that too much to ask for?!
In all seriousness, the reason there’s a juxtaposition in the market is because it’s hard to find designers who can do all this at the quality companies expect.
The other area I am seeing rise more and more in interviews with designers is an understanding of AI, and how it’s changing design processes. This is important, according to the State of AI in Design report 89% of designers said AI improved their workflows.
I believe many companies want to hire designers who can help them integrate AI into their process as a lot of designers are learning on their own but a lot of companies haven’t fully nailed it yet.
Getting an interview
Designers: if you want to work for the best companies, you have to show your best work. It's simple.
Top-tier companies are selective, they will not just hire any designer, they are looking for the right designer. Someone who can demonstrate highly crafted work, attention to detail and results. Your portfolio is proof you can do that.
I’d personally rather just see one Figma file of your best work than 3-4 old portfolio case studies. Products are moving so quick, there is a chance what you did 2-3 years ago is not relevant now for certain companies.
If you're going to put a portfolio together, treat it as a product in itself.
You have 10-20 seconds to grab the attention of someone looking at your work to make it through the screening.
The rise of “Super” senior IC
I see the rise in hiring Senior Staff and Principal for a few reasons:
Flatter design orgs, less “leadership” opportunities and a desire for many to get closer to the work.
Ever changing problems to solve companies can’t afford to hire juniors and spend time training them when they can hire a ready made senior to do the work.
Harder problems to solve so they need more senior practitioners
With that comes a discussion around compensation:
Companies who are serious about landing high-craft designers are doing whatever it takes. It’s not helped by AI/Crypto companies blowing many out of the water with huge packages. I’m talking 220-300k GBP packages in Europe.
Coupled with salaries there is a lot more flexibility for people to be remote and come to the office when it makes sense. If you’re not one of the elite AI companies you need to be open to offering a more flexible agreement if you want to attract the designers you want to hire.
Location based strategies for certain roles will hinder your search and narrow the talent you can attract.
Hands-on Design Directors
Gone are the days where companies can afford hands-off design managers who don’t contribute to the product.
Companies need Design Directors who:
Stay hands-on in the work.
Leaders who can demonstrate high accountability leadership.
Able to push a high-performing team and turn ideas and visions into execution that drives the product forward. Pragmatic leaders who can solve problems from experience, not just rigid frameworks.
Leaders who are incredible designers, who happen to lead teams. As one leader said to me recently the Design Director needs to be the best designer on the team when they need to.
Can obsess over the details
Can hold their own in a product/technical discussion with a PM or Eng partner. You’re seeing as a product leader, not purely design.
With how fast companies are moving and evolving they can’t afford leaders who are reliant on rigid frameworks, who isn’t on the pulse of modern software design and can’t drive the product forward.
Design community dissolving
Traditional design communities are dissolving with more of a focus shifting to pure output over culture. We still need a place for designers to meet externally and get inspiration.
A big issue with design communities I’ve noticed is that many communities lose their intimacy as they scale. Growth often kills the closeness that makes a community work. The second problem is that a lot of platforms that claim to build connection are actually just marketing tools. They may look like communities on the surface, but their main focus isn’t about helping people connect deeply.
Then there’s the question of sustainability. Many communities are run by individuals or teams doing it for free, and if they lose interest or get busy, the community falls apart. It’s rare to find long-lasting spaces that remain valuable as they grow.
Here’s one “Super” Senior IC community I like the look of - https://www.super-ic.co/
Here’s a LinkedIn thread on this.
Small teams and higher standards
A lot of companies don’t need large design teams.
The push towards quality over quantity is now. Long gone are the days of 2021 when SO many teams were bloated. With the possibility AI will replace many junior/mid level design tasks in the next 2-3 years there is a big push to hiring people who can bring creativity, high taste, critical thinking and some unique to the team.
Less junior-mid roles: Many companies are left wondering if they can replace junior-mid level design work with AI leading to a reduction of junior hires. Instead what’s more in-demand is senior+ talent who can raise the bar significantly. Every hire needs to raise the bar.
Quality over quantity: Companies are hiring small teams of highly skilled individuals rather than hiring to fill a quota.
Communication efficiency: Smaller teams facilitate better communication and collaboration, allowing for faster iteration and decision-making.
The playing field has been levelled: It feels everything is up for grabs again, founders are frantic and can’t tolerate anyone who isn’t contributing to the success of the product almost immediately. By focusing on building a high-quality product with a smaller team, companies are able to stay very product centric and focus on what matters.
Kaari from Linear sums up their approach perfectly below:
That’s an updated brain dump. Until next time!
What are some other design communities for designers disconnected from the corporate design world?
Thanks for this, Super clear!!!