Join our companies in their quest to drive powerful, positive, change that endures.

Product Design Group Lead - Collaboration

Canva

Canva

Product, Design
Auckland, New Zealand
Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2023
Join the team redefining how the world experiences design.
Hey, g'day, mabuhay, kia ora,你好, hallo, vítejte!
Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming and you're probably keen to find out what's on offer, so we'll get straight to the point.
Where and how you can work
Our flagship campus is in Sydney, Australia but in Aotearoa, we have a hub in Auckland that we call home to our local operations. And with that, you have choice in how and where you work. That means if you want to do your thing at our Auckland hub (if you're nearby) or at home or a bit of both, it's up to you.
What you’d be doing in this role
As Canva scales change continues to be part of our DNA. But we like to think that's all part of the fun. So this will give you the flavour of the type of things you'll be working on when you start, but this will likely evolve.
Even though this role is remote, you would need to be located in New Zealand OR willing to relocate to New Zealand.
About the Supergroup you’ll be joining
At Canva a Supergroup is a group of groups. The Teams & Education supergroup is on a mission to power up design to enable learning, creativity, collaboration, and productivity. Canva’s subscription products including Pro, Teams, Education and Nonprofits are all product led from within the Teams & Education supergroup as well as all core teams experiences such as content management and collaboration. The Teams & Education supergroup want to make Canva the tool that every team - big and small - wants to use to collaborate and communicate in everyday - from the classroom to the workplace.
About the Group you’ll be joining
The Collaboration group is on a mission to power creativity, work and learning with collaborative design. In 2023, the Collaboration group is doubling down on a number of critical initiatives to help us achieve our company-level strategy of driving teams and collaboration in Canva. So far we’ve launched a range of communication, real-time, sharing & publishing capabilities but this is just the beginning of our journey. As the Product Design Lead for the Collaboration Group, you will help us drive towards making Canva a household name in every team.
About your role
We’re searching for an experienced Product Design Leader to lead design direction and UX strategy for our core collaboration experiences in Canva, you will also be coaching (at Canva coaching is people leadership) a team of designers to define and deliver end-to-end experiences that empower our users to move work forward through collaboration with their teams. This role will require you to thrive in a collaborative fast-paced environment, working with Product, Engineering, Design, Marketing, Sales and everyone else in between. You have experience coaching and leading product designers and your communication skills empower you to inspire your teams to dream and achieve crazy big goals.
Your product surface area ownership includes:
Real-time collaboration. Creating delightful and performant experiences that communicate the presence of two to hundreds of people working together inside the same document at the same time.
Team communication. How users communicate with one another through commenting, giving feedback, chat & more.
Document sharing and publishing. Continuing to push to how we can grow the number of people sharing and publishing documents online.
User notifications and to-dos. How users are informed of important updates and their team's activity, as well as managing their tasks.

What you’ll do

  • Coaching and leadership. At Canva, we approach management differently than other companies. We call managers “coaches” because this reflects the type of relationship we’d like you to have with your direct reports (“coachees.”). As a product design coach, you’ll work with several product designers, supporting them through 1:1 coaching, shaping design projects, providing constructive feedback, setting career goals, and formal impact reviews. Additionally, our managers are “player-coaches.” This means that you won’t solely be managing product designers. You’ll keep one foot in the craft – this could mean jumping into designing end to end flows; conducting user research; or even leading a project from beginning to end. Building and managing a high-performing team of 3-4 product designers.
  • Vision and strategy. Clearly defining the design vision, strategy and roadmap for the Collaboration group and senior stakeholders, creating clarity through your communication by simplifying complex things.
  • Scaling the Product Design team. Planning for future design resourcing needs within your group.
  • Prioritisation. Taking broad, conceptual ideas and collaborating with Product Managers and Engineering Leads to ensure that the team prioritises the most valuable features.
  • Research. Deeply understanding competitors, trends, patterns, best practices, UX design inspiration, and user and business insights.
  • Shaping and establishing design processes. By driving design best practices, you'll enable more significant impact and efficiency across the team.
  • Building relationships. Collaborating and building relationships with your triad as well as teams both within and outside the Collaboration group.
  • End-to-end product design. Work closely with your team developing Canva’s collaboration experiences – and ensure that they work well with future teams and collaboration features/experiences.
  • Setting a high-quality bar for design. You strongly advocate for ensuring clean, elegant, and usable design. You can provide guidance and feedback to continually raise our bar for quality.

Your goals in the first 6-12 months

  • Understand Canva’s business - how we build product, grow, our levers and metrics.
  • Build domain knowledge into Canva and the collaboration product surface area. Understand the Canva product, our core collaboration experiences, Teams offerings and our 2023 strategy.
  • Understand our target audiences. Understand the different types of teams using Canva today, how we acquire them, how they form, what they value, and why they stay. Also, understand the different verticals Canva is targeting and their needs.
  • Build competency in Canva’s design system. Familiarise yourself with Canva’s design system Easel, building knowledge into existing design patterns and systems.
  • Define design team foundations. Work with the designers in the Collaboration group to define ways of working and culture. This includes understanding how the group is currently working and identifying key opportunties for where to improve.
  • Develop strong triad and team relationships. Align on roles and responsibilities within your triad and team. Also align on expected ways of working including how you want to communicate and collaborate together.
  • Build your Canva network. Understand who your key stakeholders are, get to know them and work out best ways of collaborating.
  • Paint a picture of the future of collaboration in Canva. Work closely with Collaboration group teams to envision the future of collaboration in Canva. So far we’ve been busy building table stake features and are now looking at defining where to next! How might we help Canva truly innovate in the teams and collaboration space?
  • Contribute to maturing the design specialty within the Teams & Education. Bring your ideas and initiative to level up our collective craft and impact within the Teams & Education supergroup.

Experience you'll have

  • Experience coaching multiple Product Designers working on multiple features . You've led a team of Product Designers and you're passionate about the development and growth of others, empowering them to achieve crazy big goals.
  • You'll have multiple years of experience of end-to-end product design. In order for you to coach product designers and raise the quality bar of their craft, you'll have a track record of tackling complex problems and delivering simple, elegant solutions. You've designed and shipped multiple products or features across various platforms. Ideally, you have experience designing team and collaboration experiences in collaboration tools.
  • Effective communication skills. You have experience communicating future design directions with senior stakeholders, including founders, and inspiring positive action within your team to bring the vision to life.
  • Exceptional visual communication skills. You have experience communicating ideas and information that visually inspire, influence and tell a compelling story.
  • A collaborative approach. You have experience working closely with other Designers, Engineers and Product Managers. You value feedback and brainstorming ideas.
  • Data Fluency. You have experience using data to evaluate user problems, inform your design solutions and measure success. You have a deep understanding of how to uncover user needs through research and user empathy.
  • Inclusivity. You have experience fostering an inclusive, open, and engaged design team culture. And you have a strong sense of design ethics - understanding that the design decisions we make at Canva impact millions of lives, every day.
  • Flexibility. Our growth means there are constantly new things to work on every day, so you have experience dealing with change and navigating complexity. This means working across multiple projects and effectively managing emergent asks.
  • Growth Mindset. You have a track record of learning and developing your skills as a designer as well as a leader.
  • Experience unpacking engineering feasibility. You have extensive experience working with engineers unpacking feasibility and making trade-offs where required.
What's in it for you?
Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard - and we do - but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a stack of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work.
Here's a taste of what's on offer:
• Equity packages - we want our success to be yours too
• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers
• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more
• Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally
Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info.
Other stuff to know
We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.
Please note that interviews are conducted virtually.