Lead Product Designer
Job description
About the role
Design shapes how products look and feel while defining user flows, wireframes, and prototypes. Designers test concepts with users and iterate based on feedback across research, interaction, and visual domains. Daily collaboration with product and engineering teams guides decisions judged by usability, conversion, and customer satisfaction, supported by a living design system.
Designers shape how products look and feel. Designers create user flows, wireframes, prototypes, and polished visuals. They test ideas with users and iterate on feedback. Design work spans research, interaction design, and visual design. Collaboration with product and engineering happens daily. Design decisions are judged by outcomes such as usability, conversion, and customer satisfaction. Most design teams keep a living design system to keep products consistent.
Key facts
What you'll do
Designers create flows, wireframes, and polished visuals that move products from concept to production. Teams validate ideas with users and iterate to improve outcomes such as usability and conversion. Designers own decisions semi-autonomously within a sequencing platform, ensuring consistency through a living design system. Work spans discovery, delivery, and close collaboration with bioinformaticians and engineers to simplify technical complexity. Designers energize learning without a required science background while navigating rapid domain ramping. Portfolios communicate constraints, tradeoffs, and iteration to demonstrate impact in genomics contexts.
Requirements
A bachelor's degree is required, and the specific field must be confirmed Portfolio evidence must show shipped products reaching production and showcase design for genomics or related domains. Candidates must operate semi-autonomously, as in senior IC, founding designer, or design lead roles where decisions are owned and lived with. Rapid technical learning occurs while working with bioinformaticians and engineers, even without a science background.
Practical notes
This role is full_time based in San Francisco. Typical interviews include portfolio review, a design exercise, and team conversation, where communication matters as much as visual output. Typical interview steps
Design interviews usually include a portfolio review, a design exercise, and a team conversation. Candidates present past work and explain their process and decisions. Some loops include a live design challenge. Communication matters as much as the visual output. Portfolios are strongest when they show the problem, the constraints, and the iteration, not just the final screens. Interviewers also watch how you take feedback.
Nice to have
Work spans discovery, design, and delivery inside a fast-paced biotech environment. Common tools include design systems, data visualization libraries, and collaboration with engineering and science teams. Designers who own problems beyond assigned tasks drive greater impact for researchers.
Good to know
Senior designers influence product strategy while using tools such as design systems and data visualization libraries. Building strong user research habits supports long-term success.
Questions to ask
Useful questions for the interview: what a typical week looks like, how work is assigned, what tools the team uses, and how feedback works. Asking how the role has changed recently and what the team wishes it had known when joining is also reasonable. Questions about the manager's priorities are especially valued.
Career growth
Design careers grow from junior to senior, staff, and principal levels. Some designers move into design management or design operations. Specializations include UX research, interaction design, and brand design. Cross-functional influence grows with seniority. Senior designers are expected to influence product strategy, not just execute visuals. Building a habit of user research strengthens any design career.
About the company
Plasmidsaurus is on a mission to accelerate new cures and promote a healthier planet by unlocking a new level of productivity for scientists. Our sequencing services are used daily by thousands of innovators, including Nobel laureates, Fortune 100 pharma, and over 70,000 scientists.