Staff Product Designer

About the role

Join the Network team to shape the initial and ongoing experiences for millions of users on Handshake. You will design how people discover the platform, build professional connections, and remain engaged throughout their careers. This role is central to Handshake's growth, focusing on user acquisition, onboarding, activation, and network expansion.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Collaborate with product, engineering, marketing, data science, and content teams to define problems and develop product strategy.
• Manage the entire design process from initial concepts to post-launch improvements, including user flows, prototypes, and high-fidelity designs.
• Create experiences for user acquisition, onboarding, activation, referrals, and network growth that provide immediate value and foster long-term engagement.
• Solve complex design challenges by translating user needs and behavioral insights into clear, intuitive experiences.
• Develop and test wireframes, prototypes, and experiments to improve conversion, engagement, and retention.
• Work with various teams to refine growth experiments across landing pages, onboarding, referral programs, and conversion points.
• Maintain high standards for visual design, interaction design, and system thinking, always prioritizing user outcomes.

Requirements

• 7+ years of product design experience, preferably with large-scale consumer products.
• Experience designing products used by millions, particularly in social, marketplace, network-driven, or consumer growth contexts.
• Ability to clearly explain design choices, tradeoffs, and user insights to colleagues and leadership.
• Strong expertise in visual and interaction design, with a history of delivering impactful consumer experiences.
• Experience designing for growth, including user acquisition, onboarding, activation, engagement, or referrals.
• Comfortable using generative AI tools to speed up design, prototyping, and iteration, while maintaining high standards for product thinking and user experience.
• Capable of using both qualitative and quantitative data to guide design decisions, evaluate experiments, and iterate quickly.
• Values diverse perspectives and collaborates effectively with engineering, product, data science, marketing, and brand teams.
• Champions design thinking within product development and helps others improve their design skills.
• Focuses on impact, prioritizing work that yields the most significant results.
• Proactive and takes ownership of tasks, addressing challenges directly.
• Motivated by Handshake's mission to help people build careers in the AI economy.
• Possesses a curious and growth-oriented mindset.

Nice to have

• Experience designing growth features such as onboarding, referrals, social sharing, viral loops, SEO/content, or registration optimization.
• Familiarity with product-led growth, network effects, marketplaces, or multi-sided platforms.
• Interest in early-career professionals, the future of work, or the intersection of AI and human potential.

Skills & tools

• Product design
• Interaction design
• Visual design
• Systems thinking
• Prototyping
• User research
• Data analysis
• Generative AI tools

Practical notes

Benefits for full-time US employees include equity, 401(k) match, paid parental leave, fertility benefits, medical, dental, vision, mental health support, a $500 wellness stipend, a $2,000 learning stipend, flexible PTO, 15 holidays plus 2 flex days, internet and commuting stipends, free lunch and gym access in the SF office, team outings, and referral bonuses.