VP of Design

Design is a full-time job. It’s the way you look at politics, funny papers, listen to music, raise children, or build the future of banking. Charles Eames could have said that.

At Mercury, we believe that thoughtful design can change the industry afflicted by indifference—that excellent customer experience can be a differentiator.

We are looking for a leader who can grow our design team of 40 people further, set Mercury’s vision for how to build excellent banking* experiences, and help turn that vision into reality.

*Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group, Column N.A., and Evolve Bank & Trust, Members FDIC.

In this role, you’ll balance your time across:

Leadership & Strategy

• Set and maintain a vision for how the company approaches quality
• Set standards and processes to ensure high-quality design outcomes
• Set vision and staff work on systems that help teams build a coherent product experience (e.g. design systems, brand guidelines, content design systems)
• Develop and execute a cohesive design strategy that aligns with and drives Mercury’s overall business objectives
• Collaborate with executive leadership to integrate design thinking into strategic planning and decision-making processes

Product Design

• Be eager to understand the details of the product we are building and help teams shape the approach to solving product problems
• Establish and refine design processes, methodologies, and best practices for product development
• Create structures that support systems thinking and help set the longer-term vision for customer-facing experiences
• Partner with Product Management and Engineering leaders to shape the product groups’ structure and processes that support product vision

Brand Design

• Oversee the evolution and consistent application of the company's brand across marketing materials, communications, and other brand experiences
• Ensure brand guidelines are developed, maintained, and effectively communicated throughout the organization

Team Management

• Build, grow, mentor, and lead a high-performing team of design leaders across brand and product disciplines, as well as other design functions such as user research, content design, and design operations
• Foster a culture of ownership, active thinking, helpfulness, and appreciating quality
• Manage talent, budgeting, and hiring for the design department

Cross-functional Collaboration

• Partner with Marketing, Sales, and Customer Success teams to ensure design supports go-to-market strategies and customer needs
• Work closely and build alignment with Engineering and Product Management to balance design vision with technical feasibility and business requirements
• Collaborate with the People Team to think and execute strategically on talent strategy
• Work closely with other departments to apply design thinking to internal processes and employee experience

There are many paths that could lead you to a role like this. Some relevant skills and past experiences that will help:

• You have deep care and understanding around what makes a product excellent.
• You can tell when and why something’s excellent and articulate clearly (and kindly) when it’s not.
• You’ve led, shaped, and grown design organizations of over 50 people that includes product design, brand design, user research, and other critical functions
• You have experience driving strategy at the executive level, aligning stakeholders on a vision, and evangelizing the work that your teams do to the broader company.
• You can tell when you’ve hit on the right amount of process/structure without it feeling stifling or unnecessary.
• You’ve led design leaders, coached them, and helped them grow in their skills and abilities.
• You keep up on design trends and like to stay in practice, even if it’s been a while since you were an individual contributor.
• You can drive design team processes such as design critiques, and are able to guide the team to ask the right questions to elevate the quality of the user experience.

The total rewards package at Mercury includes base salary, equity (stock options), and benefits.

Our salary and equity ranges are highly competitive within the SaaS and fintech industry and are updated regularly using the most reliable compensation survey data for our industry. New hire offers are made based on a candidate’s experience, expertise, geographic location, and internal pay equity relative to peers.

Our target new hire base salary ranges for this role are the following:

• US employees (any location): $304,000 - $380,000
• Canadian employees (any location): CAD 276,600 - 345,800

We use Covey as part of our hiring and / or promotional process for jobs in NYC and certain features may qualify it as an AEDT. As part of the evaluation process we provide Covey with job requirements and candidate submitted applications. We began using Covey Scout for Inbound on January 22, 2024. Please see the independent bias audit report covering our use of Covey here.

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