Job Description
About the Job:
LaunchDarkly has evolved from a feature management tool into a broader platform serving developers and technical teams across experimentation, regression detection and observability, AI configuration, and beyond.
As our product surface expands, the complexity of our user experience increases.
As complexity increases, so does the need for cohesive, high-quality UX leadership.
We are looking for a Senior Director of UX who has built and scaled design in DevTools environments: someone who understands technical users, can lead ICs and managers, and can strengthen design’s strategic influence in a fast-moving and fast-evolving organization.
This is not a brand role.
This is not a visual design role.
This is not a consumer UX role.
This is a systems, platform, and leadership role inside a developer-facing company. Your job is to raise the bar, scale the system, and increase impact.
Responsibilities:
- Leading on a High-Bar DevTools UX Organization
Lead a group of product designers across multiple product lines.
Establish clear expectations and accountability.
Raise the quality and consistency of UX design across multiple product lines.
Develop senior ICs into stronger designers that work in modern ways.
Hire designers with demonstrated DevTools or technically complex product experience.
2. Ensure Design’s Cross-Functional Credibility
Build deep trust and partner directly with Engineering and Product Directors+.
Operate comfortably in highly technical discussions.
Clarify decision-making boundaries between UX, PM, and Engineering. Have an opinion where UX should lead versus support.
Ensure UX is engaged early in product strategy conversations, not just execution.
Model constructive conflict and high-trust collaboration.
3. DevTools-Native Product Judgment
Drive experience improvements in technically complex workflows.
Improve cross-product cohesion across the product suite.
Reduce UX debt without slowing the business. Advocate for this work to get prioritized and completed. Consistently communicate the value that this brings to peers and leaders.
Ensure LaunchDarkly’s products feel intentional, not assembled.
4. Delivering Business Impact
Connect UX projects and improvements to activation, adoption, and expansion.
Prioritize work based on measurable impact. Advocate for reducing debt that costs us.
Operate with urgency and bias toward execution.
About You:
You’ve led design for products used by developers, SREs, data engineers, data scientists, or other technical audiences.
You understand platform complexity and cross-product workflows, and you know how to optimize those because you’ve done it before.
You have increased design’s influence in product strategy discussions.
Engineers respect you and the teams you’ve built.
PMs see you as a strategic partner.
Designers describe you as clear, steady, and demanding in a productive way.
Qualifications:
10+ years in UX, with 5+ years leading managers.
Significant experience designing and leading UX in DevTools or developer-facing products.
Experience scaling design in a growth-stage B2B SaaS company.
Proven track record of building and improving cross-functional trust in technical organizations.
Comfort engaging in technical conversations with engineers.
Pay:
Target pay ranges based on Geographic Zones* for Level M5:
- Zone 1: San Francisco/Bay Area or NYC Metropolitan Area, Boston, Seattle - $ 301,800 - $414,920**
- Zone 2: Irvine, LA, Monterey, Santa Barbara, Santa Rosa, Austin, Portland, Philadelphia, Chicago - $271,600 - $373,450**
- Zone 3: All other US locations - $ 256,500 - $352,660**
- Inclusive of 15% Bonus
LaunchDarkly operates from a place of high trust and transparency; we are happy to state the pay range for our open roles to best align with your needs. Exact compensation may vary based on skills, experience, and location.
*Within the United States, our geographic pay zones are defined by counties surrounding major metropolitan areas.
**Restricted Stock Units (RSUs), health, vision, and dental insurance, and mental health benefits in addition to salary.
About LaunchDarkly:
Modern software delivery was supposed to be the foundation for a thriving digital business but reality has proven otherwise. Slow, inefficient development cycles, costly outages, and fragmented customer experiences are preventing developers from building their best software. The LaunchDarkly platform helps developers innovate on new features faster while protecting them with a safety valve to instantly rewind when things go wrong. Developers can target product experiences to any customer segment and maximize the business impact of every feature. And by gradually rolling out new application components, they escape nightmare “big-bang” technology migrations.
The LaunchDarkly platform was built to guide engineers to the next frontier of DevOps by:
- Improving the velocity and stability of software releases, without the fear of end customer outages
- Delivering targeted experiences by easily personalizing features to customer cohorts
- Maximizing the business impact of every feature through the ability to experiment and optimize
- Coordinating the release and optimization of software to provide consistent experiences across mobile platforms and device types
- Improving the effectiveness and productivity of engineering teams, by providing insights into engineering cadence and stability
At LaunchDarkly, we believe in the power of teams. We’re building a team that is humble, open, collaborative, respectful and kind. We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. LD invites any applicant to review our written Affirmative Action Plan. To do so, contact People Ops at [email protected].
Do you need a disability accommodation?
Fill out this accommodations request form and someone from our People Operations team will contact you for assistance.
