Product Design Hiring in 2025
Quarterly update.
We are transitioning into a new era of design.
How we think about shaping design teams is changing. Roles are merging, AI is forcing companies to re-think about who they need to hire, how they hire and if indeed they need to make so many hires.
As the saying goes a “great relearning in design” is underway. It’s fascinating to see.
In this article I’m diving deeper into certain points I’ve touched on a few months ago and some additional ones to what I am seeing or thinking in the design recruiting world at the moment.
Table of contents:
Different requirements of designers
Getting a job is harder
Interviews are more practical
The rise of super senior IC
Hands-on Design Directors
Roles are merging
Be prepared
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 a job is harder + it’s harder to hire
The expectations of hiring designers is quite frankly high. It most likely feels like companies want a lot now days.
When companies say they are hiring a Product Designer, I feel they are looking for a very specific type of designer—someone who is not only deeply fluent in complex systems and product architecture, but also brings a high level of visual and interaction craft.
What most companies are looking for in an interview from Product Designers is:
To be a generalist in most cases - polished UI, but also someone who can play a foundational role in shaping the product however that looks.
Taste - Someone who has a high level of discernment to make decisions. Someone who understands what good looks like. Something you can’t really teach.
Tell a great story - This is not new. Someone who has clear communication and can hold the room during a presentation i.e talking through why did you do this, who did it, what was the business problem and user problem, how did you go from that to a solution and the impact you made, how did you know you had the right solution, how did the product get built, and if you'd do anything differently next time. The usual stuff. The key thing here is no fluff, how you hold the room and get people from different disciplines excited to work with you.
AI fluency - Companies are excited by designers who are evolving with the role rethinking tooling, ways of working and embracing what it now means to be a modern product designer. Designers who have a natural curiosity to learn, ship and iterate. Designers who are learning how to implement tools like V0, Lovable, Cursor. Ones who are getting used to “vibe-coding” to get outputs.
Ones who understand how the design process is shifting for example
Anticipate how AI changes workflows, user expectations, and team dynamics.
Systems thinking - Designers who can thinking in systems and pixels and can zoom and understand how product works to a high level and not be left behind in product and engineering discussions. Can think in both systems and pixels.
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.
Interviews are more practical
In a world where it’s about output, interviews need to change.
Less of fluffy “tell me about yourself” conversations and into the trenches. Many companies are skipping vague take home tasks and asking designers to critique a current feature in their product conducting a timeboxed task or run a collaboration session on a particular problem coming upp
Majority of companies are providing candidates with an old workflow or scenario so they can assess candidates in the context of how they work. It’s easy to bluff an interview, less so when you’re working in the company context.
The default in companies is to deal with high levels of ambiguity, so it makes sense the interviews include working under a fixed time and see how you think and work under some level of pressure.
The rise of “Super” senior IC
In the last few months this topic has only got more popular.
From my post with Garron Engstrom:
The expectation of designers at this level is that they drive large, ambiguous initiatives, define vision and strategy across multiple teams or product lines, and influence executive decision-making. They mentor more junior designers, set the bar for design excellence, and ensure that design systems, processes, and frameworks scale across the org.
The 5 main skills or behaviors that separate the senior IC from the Super IC:
High business acumen: They are exceptional at product thinking (can go toe-to-toe with any PM) and can balance user needs and business goals. They often develop frameworks to help think through complex problems.
High emotional intelligence: This helps them read a room, influence without authority and build strong cross-functional relationships. They know when to empathize and support and when to push and provide tough feedback.
Quick learner: They can build domain expertise unbelievably fast and be productive in a new space in no time. This allows them to be a fixer: to airdrop into a team or problem space and unblock or catalyze the team.
Vision: They pair prototyping and storytelling to paint a picture of the future and build consensus amongst the product team. Their vision is so compelling that engineers can’t wait to start building.
Fast: They can produce the same volume, quality and impact of work as several other designers combined (this is the idea of the 10x designers).
Also, the more senior you get the more likely you are to start falling into a bucket, or “archetype”. Each archetype represents a unique grouping of skillsets and ways in which Super ICs operate and have impact within their organization. It’s non-exhaustive, but the main archetypes include:
The Visionary: Paints a picture of the future and aligns people to it.
The Craftsperson: Sets the bar for excellence and teaches others to reach it.
The Systems Thinker: Builds frameworks that scale product & team output.
The PM Hybrid: Owns ambiguous 0→1 spaces and drives delivery.
The 10x Designer: A force-multiplier in speed, quantity and impact of work.
Hands-on Design Directors
Gone are the days where companies can afford hands-off design managers who don’t contribute to the product.
The most desirable Directors in my opinion are the ones who can get into the weeds, but also have product/engineering level discussions and can influence at all levels.
Designers want to see how you can influence through the work as well as leadership to get things done.
As one leader said to me when hiring a Director “We want someone in the craft, someone who is the best designer on the team who happens to lead a team”
Summary of in-demand Design Directors:
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.
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.
Roles are merging
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 where people can do more with less and push the boundaries technically companies are able to stay very product centric and focus on what matters.
AI does not care about your job title. Let’s internalise that.
Recent hiring trends I’ve seen in the design world:
Specialist roles like Information Architect hardly exist anymore.
More companies moving from UX to Product Design or Experience. Check out this video from Mig at Duolingo on this.
More JDs are looking for people who can design and code and/or understand technical aspects of building products.
More and more designers are getting closer to engineering with tools such as V0, Cursor etc. Watch this video from Emmet Connolly (VP of Design at Intercom) on “How to design stand out products in an AI world” this is brilliant and gives a ton of context for designers looking to level-up in designing products in the AI era.
Hiring designers who can PM their own work. More in start-up/scale-ups.
Hiring conversation designers.
Despite the fear-mongering with people saying junior roles are dead the data from TrueUp says otherwise. I can tell from experience looking through roles for the junior level it’s hard as titles are all over the place so it may be a case of digging deeper in a search or finding a new way to approach. For example
Be prepared when reaching out to designers
Many elite designers are keeping low profiles and some are not even on LinkedIn.
AI companies are changing the game salary wise.
The talent pool for designers is getting smaller and more competitive. US companies are hiring in Europe with strong salaries, because it’s still cheaper for them, but for Europe it’s an incredible salary for someone.
If you’re looking for great talent the chances are these are the companies you are going up against so you need to be prepared when reaching out:
Ensuring you competitive comp bandings.
Compelling JD, offer packs, hiring materials.
Show the WORK! Check out sites from the Intercom design team. This is what people want to see, the work, the stories, the people behind the great design.
Things are looking good for designers
No one knows what the future holds of course. All I know is the playing field has been levelled. AI does not care about your title. Things are merging. A great relearning is needed/
What could the next 5 years look like?
In my humble opinion, I believe it’s a great time to be in design.
The demand for quality design has never been higher. In my conversations with leaders and companies, they are eager to hire incredible talent who can level-up the product.
According to a report by WEF Product Designers are very much in demand for the next 5 years. I believe as it’s easier than ever to build software the final details of the design will be a true USP in crowded markets.
Until next time!
Best read of the month. Thanks !
lol
> era of seeing “craft” as a focus on many JDs
is not a new thing of this era