Experiential Strategist

At Unispace, we are committed to transforming workplaces to meet the diverse needs of today’s dynamic global brands. Our agile, end-to-end approach is delivered seamlessly across borders, fueled by strong client partnerships and supported by insightful workplace intelligence and innovative technology.

We believe that everyone deserves to work in an environment that inspires productivity, fosters peak performance, and promotes overall well-being. Across our 48 global studios, we recognize that positive work environments cultivate open, collaborative, and supportive cultures, enriched by the contributions of independent and motivated individuals from all backgrounds.

While our core business revolves around strategizing, designing, and building workplaces for some of the world's leading brands, we understand that our people are our greatest asset. We prioritize their growth and well-being through a comprehensive Employee Value Proposition program that includes rewards and recognition, career development opportunities, and a strong focus on mental and physical well-being.

To further support our team, we embrace flexible working arrangements, including hybrid working options that empower our employees to balance in-office collaboration with remote work flexibility. This approach not only enhances work-life balance but also allows us to harness the full potential of our diverse and talented workforce.

Experiential Strategist

Reports To: Strategy Principal
Location: Portland, OR

Our Global Studio:
Downstream is an Experience Design firm with offices in Portland, Oregon, New York, NY, and Amsterdam, NE. We are an interdisciplinary team of designers, developers, AV engineers, and technologists who come together to deliver immersive spaces and moments for the world's leading brands. Our work sets new benchmarks. We work with clients to help translate and tell their stories, and to design systems and journeys that solve key business problems, in-situ and at scale. Downstream is part of the Unispace Group.

The Role:
As Senior Experience Strategist, you will help lead the intake and Discovery process that leads and catalyzes Downstream's wider design services. You will work to uncover the heart of every project or prospects' story and translate this into clear, actionable, and emotionally resonant insights and narratives that align stakeholders and provide the "north star" to guide conceptual design. You will work closely with client teams and become Downstream's resident in-house expert on their goals, needs, brand and business. You will work to understand the key audiences and users involved, articulate their needs and desires, and lead our team’s efforts creating journey maps and creative briefs for experiences to help meet them.

You're excited by the fact that there's no exact formula for this work. You love connecting with people, are an active listener, and excellent facilitator. You feel comfortable leading a large group workshop and actively driving the conversation by asking big questions and connecting dots. You love synthesizing those inputs into clear, emotionally resonant outputs that win hearts and minds and set the stage for what's next. You can simplify complexity, and have the ability to express your ideas with sharp, clear prose and simple, smart diagrams. You're at home working in ambiguity and strive to create clarity for teams through the creation of grounding narratives, creative principles, and UX frameworks complemented by proactive and ongoing communication, with client teams and internally.

In this role, you will work closely with the Strategy Principal, Creative Directors and design leads, account leads, and project management to play a key role in on-going client engagements, from Discovery through DD and Production. Strategists are often key to our business development efforts, helping position and articulate our value proposition to each client, based on primary research, awareness of industry verticals and competitive landscapes. As such, you have an intuitive understanding of the problem space and Downstream's core value propositions and differentiators.

Responsibilities:

• Apply your 5+ years of experience to amazing interdisciplinary experiences within meaningfully branded, physical environments.
• Work with clients and project teams to provide clear, inspiring, and actionable strategic thinking and frameworks that help tell clients’ stories, solve their business problems, and facilitate new ideas, insights, and opportunities.
• Use prose, diagrams, and other tools (eg. deck building, visual media, agenda creation, workshop design) to convey our unique POV, organize information, simplify complexity, solicit and synthesize ideas from multiple inputs and viewpoints, and bring these together to develop ideas that work.
• Design and facilitate collaborative workshops internally and externally to help realize clients’ visions by researching, writing, conceiving, sketching, diagramming and communicating creative concepts.
• Lead the Discovery phase process and deliverable through articulation of core project vision, key insights, project goals, and the development of personas, user journeys, and opportunity areas.
• Draft and deliver compelling and clear presentations via in-person and virtual meetings.
• Ability to help craft pitches and proposals to win new business.
• Devise and/or leverage existing methods/tools to specify, source, organize, curate, and track content throughout the life of a project.
• Collaborate with diverse experts, internally and externally, and advocate for the user within the context of complex projects.
• Help facilitate business processes for the design team, including defining deliverables for each stage of design, including but not limited to: Discovery workshops, concept design, design development, project tracking, and timeline management and ensure that those processes are maintained.
• Skillfully navigate complex and ambiguous project landscapes, using strong facilitation skills and creative problem solving to help “make a way”, bringing people and ideas together and continually defining success.
• Identify design problems and devise elegant solutions.
• Take a human-centered design approach and work solo or with other to prototype ideas and rapidly test and iterate them.
• Expect to travel up to 5-20% of the year for client engagements.

Requirements/Qualifications:

• 5+ years in experience design, consulting, agency and/or in-house.
• Strong people skills, EQ, and ability to facilitate interactive group workshops.
• Experience with interdisciplinary projects and teams — both digital and physical design.
• Expertise in Adobe CC, Microsoft Office, and Google Workspace. Experience interpreting architectural documentation and/or basic web development knowledge is a plus.
• Ability to work with clients to understand detailed requirements and design complete experiences that meet client needs and vision.
• Experience crafting and articulating user journeys.
• An iterative and collaborative mindset with clients and teammates.
• Clearly and effectively communicates processes, ideas, and solutions to teams and clients.
• Help teammates blur the edges between design disciplines.
• Ability to balance multiple concurrent projects.
• Open to receiving feedback and constructive criticism including but not limited to an annual performance review lead by department head(s) and that includes peer feedback.
• An attitude of constant learning and growth, seeing your work as a process and practice that is continually evolving and growing, versus a product or formula to be repeated.

Short and Mid-Term Goals:

This position would play a key role in helping Downstream advance short-term and mid-term business goals, including:

• Contribute to the development of strategy team best practices and new engagement models.
• Build trusted key account relationships for long-term client engagement.
• Help build and deploy new pre-design consultancy services.

Invitation to apply:

If working with the best in an exciting and rewarding team environment appeals to you, then we want to hear from you. Please apply with your Cover Letter detailing why you want to work for Downstream and why this role is a relevant fit for you. 

The statements in this job description are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by the person(s) assigned to this job. This job description is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all responsibilities and duties required.

We encourage applicants of all backgrounds to apply, and we are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities, allowing them to perform essential job functions as determined on a case-by-case basis.

Inclusion and Diversity Commitment:

At Unispace, we are committed to fostering an inclusive and diverse workplace. We proudly embrace equal opportunity hiring and will evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, religion, color, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, ancestry, marital status, medical condition (as defined by state law), physical or mental disability, military service, veteran status, pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

We are proud that our leadership reflects this commitment, with persons of color, women, neurodiverse and LGBTQ+ individuals playing pivotal roles in shaping the future of our organization. Their unique perspectives and experiences drive innovation and help us create a truly inclusive culture. We are dedicated to ensuring that every voice is heard and that our workplace is a space where diversity is not only celebrated but is integral to our success.