Design at Stripe
There are far too many barriers to doing business online. Stripe was founded to overcome them, and we think that such an achievement will be rooted not just in finance, but in creativity of code and design.
Our substantive goal is to craft economic change. We’re designing infrastructure, products, surfaces, literature—all to help our users start, run, and grow an online business from anywhere in the world. We’re looking for a diverse group of people to join us.
Design is involved in almost everything Stripe does—from our events and brand voice, to our web and mobile products, and even printed publications like Stripe Press. Stripe’s main audience is other people who build products; on their behalf we agonize over the details. We want our user experiences to become second nature.
About The Web Presence & Platform Teams
There are two teams under the banner of Web Presence & Platform (WPP) at Stripe: Experiences, and Content Platform. All told, it’s a tightly... coupled group of interactive designers, front-end specialists, web strategists, platform engineers, and every skill set in-between. The Experiences team focuses on the craft of pages on stripe.com—UX design, frontend code, information architecture. The Content Platform team supports them and other partners around Stripe by ensuring there’s a fast, efficient platform on which to build and run these pages.
Together we design and build stripe.com and other sites that amount to what is, for many, their first impression of Stripe. We want to make every pixel count, we want it to be enthralling, and we want to help other Stripes seamlessly benefit from our systematic work.
About The Role
If you’re currently a Senior Creative Director, ECD, Creative Technology Director, or web-native Design Manager—this role will feel perfectly familiar. As a Creative Lead for Experiences, you’ll lead a mid-sized but nimble team of designers and design engineers crafting stripe.com.
You will set the strategic vision for Stripe’s design on the web, including stripe.com but also across our other surfaces such as Stripe Press and Increment. You’ll foster the individuals on your team, providing support to their work and acceleration to their growth. You’ll partner with WPP’s leadership to devise and deliver on quarterly and yearly roadmaps focused on the strategic experiences we bring to our users. You’ll develop and empower a collaborative team that is excited to meet you. And not least, you’ll partner with other design leaders across Stripe to help all our various teams sing from the same song sheet.
We’re Looking For Someone With
- A passion for the web as a storytelling medium, demonstrable through a portfolio of design systems, engaging microsites, Sketch libraries, WebGL experiments, CSS art, or anything else—you tell us
- At least 3 years of creative direction and management experience, and 7+ years of relevant experience strategy, information architecture, web design and creative technology experience at digital native agencies, and/or tech-forward, product-driven companies
- Expert understanding of the formal elements of design, not just limited to the web but including typography, layout, balance, and proportion
- Leadership in driving strategic thinking for impactful digital experiences
- A demonstrable ability to communicate your front-end or information architecture designs using documentation and crisp visualization
- Experience running teams which build public facing websites that work elegantly across commonly used browsers
- Sufficient advanced knowledge of modern HTML and CSS to empathize with and lead the designers and design engineers crafting our web presence
- A tenacity for moving quickly on new, green-field projects while steadfastly delivering on long-term roadmaps
- Accountability and a high bar when working with production systems
- Intuition and empathy to gather consensus amongst different stakeholders and subject matter experts
You Will
- Work closely with the team to help develop and expand our design systems, devise of generative art directions, propose web animations, and distill interaction-heavy product launch materials on stripe.com.
- Craft novel moments of storytelling and delight for Stripe.com
- Work with other design specialists and managers on team-wide initiatives, like recruiting and developing content standards
- Help the team influence strategic decisions across all the corners of our web presence
- Partner with product marketing teams to define information architecture and tell the right stories
- Often work on very broadly defined, loose concepts, and sometimes on narrowly defined, tactical deliverables
- Be passionate about the technical possibilities offered by the web as your medium
- Be able to reduce complex problems down into pithy stories, delivered through interaction or animation
- Have experience designing for marketing websites, or developer-focused online experiences
- Keep pushing your work until every detail is covered
- Are skilled in explaining your work, process, and decisions to cross-functional stakeholders and crave feedback to help you produce your best work
- Are an expert in either UI, UX, or visual design
- Think in systems and are able to extrapolate and extend shared patterns and behaviors
- Have experience applying those systems to CMS-driven websites—and moreover, know how to balance maintainability with adaptability
- Love working with other designers to help them learn and grow—and have them help you learn and grow
- [If a remote candidate] Have prior experience as a remote leader of a distributed team
We Will
- Help you focus on what you do best—whether that’s sketches, wireframes, prototypes, designs, or code—and give you the opportunities to sharpen the skills you’re looking to develop
- Provide an environment in which you can thrive both as an individual, and as a member of a diverse community
- Give you the agency in your work to shape outcomes you can proudly own
- Help you partner closely with our user research team and support ongoing research projects
Please Include These In Your Application
- An online portfolio or compendium of example web projects you’ve lead
- Your resume and/or LinkedIn profile
- A 1-2 paragraph summary of your favorite project from any of your work or personal experiences
- A short paragraph on why you’ll flourish at Stripe
