Design Director

📍 Job Overview

Job Title: Design Director

Company: Good Maven (ai71)

Location: Abu Dhabi, UAE

Job Type: Full-time

Category: Product Design Leadership / GTM Operations

Date Posted: 2026-08-24

Experience Level: 10+ years

Remote Status: On-site

🚀 Role Summary

• Lead and mentor a growing design team, fostering a culture of high craft and continuous improvement in product design.

• Drive the end-to-end design process for the company's AI platform, "Ask," ensuring exceptional user experiences and robust design systems.

• Champion the integration of AI tools into the design workflow, pushing the boundaries of what's possible in AI-driven product development.

• Oversee the company's visual identity and brand presence, ensuring a cohesive and compelling look across all external touchpoints.

• Act as a player-coach, contributing directly to design work while providing strategic direction and structural improvements for the design function.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role is positioned as a "player-coach," emphasizing a hands-on approach to design leadership. The focus on AI integration and enterprise/regulated environments suggests a need for designers who can translate complex technical requirements into intuitive and secure user experiences, which is a critical aspect of GTM operations for AI products.

📈 Primary Responsibilities

• Design and own significant surfaces of the "Ask" AI platform weekly, setting a high bar for design craft and execution.

• Conduct design critiques (crits) that elevate the team's work and foster a culture of constructive feedback and continuous learning.

• Develop and maintain a robust design system that accelerates development across multiple product squads.

• Lead the exploration of new design directions and solutions by leveraging AI coding agents and other advanced design tools.

• Coach and develop senior designers, focusing on their growth and retention within a hands-on, individual contributor track.

• Collaborate with Product Management, Engineering, Product Marketing, and Demand Generation teams to ensure alignment on product vision and go-to-market strategy.

• Manage and potentially hire a brand designer, ensuring brand consistency across product, website, and marketing collateral.

• Design for complex environments, including on-premise, air-gapped deployments, sovereign clouds, and multi-lingual/RTL interfaces.

• Contribute to the strategic evolution of the design function, defining ways of working, ownership structures, and career paths.

• Partner with leadership to articulate the company's value proposition and visual identity to enterprise and regulated buyers.

📝 Enhancement Note: The responsibilities highlight a dual focus on hands-on design execution and strategic leadership. The emphasis on "designing for environments most designers never see" (on-prem, air-gapped, sovereign clouds) is a key differentiator for roles in this sector and requires a deep understanding of enterprise sales cycles and customer deployment realities, bridging product design with GTM considerations.

🎓 Skills & Qualifications

Education: While no specific degree is mandated, a strong foundation in design principles, user experience, and visual communication is expected, often demonstrated through a Bachelor's degree in Design, HCI, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

Experience: 10+ years of progressive experience in product design, with a significant portion spent in leadership roles at strong product companies. Proven track record of building and stewarding design systems that accelerate product development. Experience designing for enterprise software, regulated industries, or AI-powered products is highly valued.

Required Skills:

• Product Design Excellence: Deep expertise in crafting intuitive, user-centered interfaces and workflows.

• Design Systems: Proven ability to build, maintain, and evangelize design systems that drive efficiency and consistency.

• AI Tool Proficiency: Demonstrated hands-on experience with AI coding agents, image generation models, and other AI design tools, with artifacts to prove their impact on the design process.

• Team Leadership & Mentorship: Experience leading design teams, coaching senior designers, and fostering a high-performance culture.

• Brand Design & Strategy: Ability to define and manage brand identity across product and marketing touchpoints.

• Prototyping: Strong skills in creating high-fidelity prototypes, ideally including working-code prototypes.

• Cross-functional Collaboration: Proven ability to partner effectively with Product, Engineering, Marketing, and Sales teams.

• Problem-Solving: Capacity to tackle complex design challenges in regulated and enterprise environments.

• Communication: Excellent verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to articulate design decisions and strategy clearly.

Preferred Skills:

• Experience with Arabic language support and Right-to-Left (RTL) interfaces.

• Background in designing agentic AI products or complex AI platforms.

• Familiarity with on-premise, air-gapped, or sovereign cloud deployment models.

• Experience designing for buyers in highly regulated industries (e.g., finance, government).

• Side projects that demonstrate sustained passion and innovation in design.

📝 Enhancement Note: The emphasis on AI tools and enterprise/regulated environments suggests a need for candidates who can not only design beautiful interfaces but also understand the operational complexities of deploying and scaling AI solutions in secure, compliant, and specific market contexts. This blend of design craft and operational awareness is crucial for GTM success.

📊 Process & Systems Portfolio Requirements

Portfolio Essentials:

• Demonstrate Design Craft: Showcase detailed work with a strong focus on pixel-perfect execution and user experience problem-solving.

• Design System Stewardship: Include examples of how you have built, managed, or significantly contributed to a design system, highlighting its impact on team velocity and product consistency.

• AI Tool Integration: Present case studies or examples of how AI tools have been used to explore design directions, prototype solutions, or accelerate the design process.

• Enterprise/Regulated Design: Highlight projects that involved designing for complex enterprise environments, strict regulatory requirements, or specific deployment constraints (e.g., on-premise, air-gapped).

• Leadership & Coaching: Provide evidence of team leadership, mentorship, and driving design initiatives, possibly through project ownership or team structure improvements.

Process Documentation:

• Workflow Design: Illustrate how you establish and refine design workflows within squads, emphasizing collaboration with engineering and product.

• AI-Enhanced Design Process: Document how AI tools are integrated into your team's workflow, from ideation and prototyping to iteration and final delivery.

• Design System Governance: Outline processes for maintaining, updating, and governing the design system to ensure its continued relevance and adoption.

• Cross-functional Handoffs: Detail your approach to seamless handoffs and collaboration with engineering, product management, and marketing teams to ensure successful product implementation.

📝 Enhancement Note: A portfolio for this role must go beyond standard product design showcases. It needs to demonstrate an understanding of how design integrates with engineering, product strategy, and critically, the operational realities of deploying advanced AI in enterprise and regulated sectors. Demonstrating the practical application of AI in the design process itself is paramount.

💵 Compensation & Benefits

Salary Range: Given the senior leadership role (10+ years experience), location in Abu Dhabi, and the specialized nature of AI/enterprise design, a competitive salary is expected. Based on industry benchmarks for Design Directors in major tech hubs and adjusted for the UAE market, a range of AED 450,000 - AED 700,000 per annum (approximately USD 122,500 - USD 190,500) is a reasonable estimate. This range accounts for base salary, potential bonuses, and stock options common in high-growth tech companies.

Benefits:

• Relocation Support: Comprehensive package to facilitate relocation to Abu Dhabi.

• Health Insurance: Premium health, dental, and vision coverage for employees and dependents.

• Paid Time Off: Generous vacation policy, public holidays, and sick leave.

• Professional Development: Budget for conferences, training, and certifications, with a focus on AI and design trends.

• Equity/Stock Options: Potential for stock options or equity grants, reflecting the company's growth trajectory.

• Retirement/Pension Plan: Contributions to a local or international retirement plan.

• Employee Assistance Program (EAP): Confidential support services for personal and professional well-being.

Working Hours: Standard full-time hours are expected, likely around 40 hours per week. However, given the dynamic nature of a high-growth AI startup and the player-coach role, flexibility may be required to meet project deadlines and team needs.

📝 Enhancement Note: Salary estimation is based on data from global tech hubs for similar senior design leadership roles and adjusted for Abu Dhabi's cost of living and compensation trends. The benefits package is standard for a company of this nature and location, with specific mention of relocation being a key draw.

🎯 Team & Company Context

🏢 Company Culture

Industry: Artificial Intelligence (AI), Enterprise Software, SaaS. ai71 operates at the intersection of cutting-edge AI development and the critical needs of established, regulated industries. Their focus on "enterprise-grade AI for the real economy" positions them as a key player in applying advanced AI to sectors like government, finance, and large enterprises.

Company Size: The description indicates a growing company. The engineering team is around 60, with 5 PMs and 4 designers, suggesting a total team size likely in the range of 70-100+ employees. This size offers the agility of a startup with the emerging structure of a scale-up.

Founded: The founding date is not explicitly stated, but the company's focus on deploying AI in regulated environments and the mention of hiring from top-tier tech and strategy firms suggests a relatively recent but well-funded and strategically positioned entity. The company's product, "Ask," is described as "today it's deployed," implying a mature product offering.

Team Structure:

• Product & Design Reporting: The Design Director reports to the Head of Product.

• Squad Model: Product development is organized into autonomous "squads," each comprising a PM, 3-4 engineers, and a designer. This fosters ownership and end-to-end responsibility.

• Cross-functional Collaboration: The Design Director will work daily with Product, Engineering, Product Marketing, Demand Generation, and Deployments teams. This highlights a highly integrated approach to product development and go-to-market.

• Design Team: Currently consists of two full-time designers and two contractors, with the Design Director expected to lead and grow this team.

Methodology:

• AI-First Product Development: AI agents are central to the "Ask" platform, and AI tools are expected to be integral to the design process itself.

• Data-Driven & Iterative: The culture emphasizes "low ego, high curiosity," "best ideas win," and learning fast. This suggests an iterative approach to product development and design, driven by data and user feedback.

• Open Communication: Decisions and discussions happen in shared channels rather than DMs, promoting transparency and collective learning.

• Craftsmanship & Detail: A strong emphasis is placed on design craft and attention to detail, with the expectation that the best work will be defended.

Company Website: https://goodmaven.com/ (Note: The provided URL is for Good Maven, which seems to be the hiring platform/entity. The product company is ai71, with their website at https://ai71.ai)

📝 Enhancement Note: The company context reveals a sophisticated AI product company targeting critical, high-stakes industries. The "squad" model and emphasis on cross-functional collaboration are key operational aspects. The "low ego, high curiosity" culture is crucial for understanding how decisions are made and how teams interact, which is vital for any GTM or operations professional aiming to integrate effectively.

📈 Career & Growth Analysis

Operations Career Level: This role represents a senior leadership position within the product development lifecycle, specifically focused on design. It's a critical juncture for an operations professional aiming to influence product strategy and user experience at a strategic level. As a Design Director, the individual is responsible for setting the vision, standards, and processes for design, impacting product adoption and market perception – key GTM metrics.

Reporting Structure: The Design Director reports to the Head of Product, placing them directly within the product leadership team. This direct line ensures influence over product strategy and roadmap. They will also manage a team of designers, fostering their growth and performance.

Operations Impact: The Design Director's impact extends beyond aesthetics. By leading design for "Ask," they directly influence:

• Product Adoption: Intuitive and effective design is critical for enterprise adoption, especially in regulated sectors.

• Customer Satisfaction: A well-designed product reduces friction and enhances user experience, leading to higher satisfaction.

• Brand Perception: The visual and functional quality of the product shapes how customers perceive ai71's capabilities and reliability.

• Sales Enablement: A strong product design can be a powerful differentiator in sales conversations, supported by clear marketing collateral.

• Efficiency: A well-governed design system and efficient design processes directly contribute to faster product development cycles, impacting GTM speed.

Growth Opportunities:

• Team Expansion: Opportunity to build and scale the design team as the company grows, potentially hiring for specialized roles (e.g., Brand Designer, UX Researcher).

• Strategic Influence: Deeper involvement in product strategy, roadmap planning, and company-wide GTM initiatives.

• Leadership Development: Transition into a VP-level role or broader product leadership responsibilities, potentially overseeing multiple product domains.

• AI Design Specialization: Become a recognized expert in designing for advanced AI applications in enterprise and regulated markets.

• Mentorship & Coaching: Develop strong coaching skills, becoming a sought-after leader for other designers.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role offers significant growth potential not just in design but also in influencing GTM strategy through product excellence. The emphasis on AI and regulated markets provides a niche specialization that is highly valuable. Understanding how design leadership impacts sales cycles and customer onboarding is key for operations professionals.

🌐 Work Environment

Office Type: The role is explicitly stated as "onsite" in Abu Dhabi, UAE. This indicates a traditional office-based work environment where collaboration and team interaction are prioritized. The company supports relocation, suggesting an investment in bringing talent to their physical workspace.

Office Location(s): Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. This location is a significant hub for technology and innovation in the region, particularly for AI development and government-backed initiatives.

Workspace Context:

• Collaborative Hub: The onsite requirement points to a workspace designed for collaboration, with opportunities for spontaneous interactions, team crits, and direct engagement with Product, Engineering, and other GTM functions.

• Tools & Technology: While not explicitly detailed, the company's focus on AI and enterprise software implies access to modern design tools, robust development environments, and potentially internal AI tools for design assistance.

• Cross-functional Proximity: Being onsite means designers will be in close proximity to PMs, engineers, and marketing teams, facilitating rapid communication and problem-solving essential for agile development and GTM execution.

• Focus on Craft: The emphasis on design detail and a "live portfolio" suggests an environment that values deep work and craftsmanship, supported by the necessary infrastructure.

Work Schedule: Standard full-time hours (approx. 40 hours/week) are expected, but the dynamic startup environment and player-coach role may necessitate flexibility. The onsite nature encourages a structured workday, but the nature of AI development and global client demands might lead to periods of intense work.

📝 Enhancement Note: The onsite requirement in Abu Dhabi is a significant factor, indicating a commitment to in-person collaboration and team cohesion. For operations professionals, this means understanding the company's investment in its physical workspace and its implications for team dynamics, communication flow, and the ability to integrate new hires into the company culture effectively.

📄 Application & Portfolio Review Process

Interview Process:

• Initial Screening: Likely involves a recruiter or HR representative to assess basic qualifications, cultural fit, and alignment with the role's core requirements.

• Portfolio Review & Design Exercises: A critical stage where candidates present their portfolio, discussing their process, impact, and leadership approach. This may include a design challenge tailored to ai71's product and challenges (e.g., designing a complex workflow for an AI agent, or improving a specific interface in "Ask").

• Team & Leadership Interviews: Conversations with the Head of Product, peer Design Directors (if any), senior engineers, and PMs to assess collaboration skills, strategic thinking, and team leadership capabilities.

• Founder/Senior Leadership Interview: A final discussion to gauge overall fit, vision alignment, and long-term potential within the company.

Portfolio Review Tips:

• Highlight Impact: Focus on quantifiable results and the business impact of your design work (e.g., improved conversion rates, reduced user errors, faster task completion, increased adoption).

• Showcase AI Integration: Clearly demonstrate how you've leveraged AI tools in your design process, including specific examples of AI-assisted prototyping or workflow optimization.

• Detail Your Process: Walk through your problem-solving approach, from initial research and ideation to iteration and final implementation, emphasizing your role and contributions.

• Defend Your Pixels: Be prepared to articulate the rationale behind every design decision, showing deep understanding of user needs, business goals, and technical constraints.

• Demonstrate Leadership: Include examples of how you've mentored designers, improved team processes, or led cross-functional initiatives.

• Tailor to ai71: Research ai71's product ("Ask"), their target market (enterprise, regulated industries), and their AI-first approach. Frame your portfolio examples to resonate with these specific needs.

Challenge Preparation:

• Understand the Product: Gain a deep understanding of ai71's "Ask" platform, its capabilities, and its target user base.

• AI Design Thinking: Prepare to discuss how AI changes design paradigms and how you would approach designing for agentic AI systems.

• Enterprise Constraints: Be ready to address design challenges common in enterprise software, such as security, scalability, compliance, and complex workflows.

• System Thinking: Anticipate questions about design systems, scalability, and how to maintain consistency across a growing product suite and team.

• Leadership Scenarios: Prepare for behavioral questions about team management, conflict resolution, stakeholder management, and coaching.

📝 Enhancement Note: The interview process emphasizes a combination of hands-on design validation and strategic leadership assessment. For operations professionals, understanding how the design team's output directly impacts GTM metrics like product adoption and sales enablement is crucial for framing their contributions and interview responses.

🛠 Tools & Technology Stack

Primary Tools:

• Design & Prototyping: Figma (highly probable given industry standards), Sketch, Adobe Creative Suite.

• AI Design Agents: Proficiency with tools like GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT (for ideation/scripting), Midjourney/DALL-E (for asset generation/mood boards), and any emerging AI tools for UX research analysis or workflow automation.

• Design System Management: Tools for documenting, versioning, and disseminating design system components (e.g., Zeroheight, Storybook integration).

Analytics & Reporting:

• Product Analytics: Tools like Amplitude, Mixpanel, or Pendo to track user behavior, feature adoption, and identify areas for design improvement.

• User Feedback Platforms: Tools for collecting and analyzing user feedback (e.g., SurveyMonkey, Typeform, in-app feedback widgets).

CRM & Automation: While not directly managed by Design, understanding the CRM (likely Salesforce or similar) and marketing automation platforms used by GTM teams (e.g., HubSpot, Marketo) is beneficial for context on how the product is positioned and sold.

Collaboration & Project Management:

• Communication: Slack, Microsoft Teams.

• Project Management: Jira, Asana, Trello for managing design tasks and sprint cycles.

• Documentation: Confluence, Notion for knowledge sharing and process documentation.

📝 Enhancement Note: The tech stack emphasizes a modern, AI-integrated design workflow. For operations roles, understanding how design tools integrate with development (Jira), analytics (Amplitude), and GTM platforms (CRM, Marketing Automation) is key to appreciating the end-to-end product lifecycle and how design efforts contribute to business outcomes.

👥 Team Culture & Values

Operations Values:

• Craftsmanship & Detail: A deep commitment to quality, precision, and excellence in every aspect of design, from pixels to user flows.

• Low Ego, High Curiosity: An environment where ideas are debated openly, humility is valued, and continuous learning is paramount. This fosters psychological safety for innovation.

• Builder Mentality: A bias towards action, creating tangible outputs, and a willingness to iterate and improve based on feedback and new possibilities.

• Collaboration & Transparency: Open communication channels and a preference for working in the open, ensuring shared understanding and collective problem-solving.

• AI-Forward Thinking: A proactive embrace of AI's potential to transform design processes and product capabilities, encouraging experimentation and adoption of new tools.

Collaboration Style:

• Squad-Based Autonomy: Teams operate with a high degree of ownership, fostering close collaboration within squads (PM, Eng, Design).

• Cross-functional Integration: Design is not siloed; it's deeply integrated with Product, Engineering, Marketing, and Deployments, requiring proactive communication and partnership.

• Open Feedback Loops: Regular design crits and open channels encourage continuous feedback, aiming to improve work collectively rather than through formal review gates.

• Shared Learning: Decisions and discussions are made visible to the broader team, promoting knowledge sharing and collective growth.

📝 Enhancement Note: The culture emphasizes a blend of high-performance craft, collaborative innovation, and AI-driven evolution. For operations professionals, understanding these values is crucial for effective cross-functional collaboration and for appreciating how the design team contributes to the company's overall GTM strategy and product success.

⚡ Challenges & Growth Opportunities

Challenges:

• Pioneering AI Design: Designing for agentic AI in regulated environments is a nascent field, requiring innovative approaches and the ability to navigate ambiguity.

• Balancing Craft and Speed: The player-coach role requires managing personal design output alongside team leadership, demanding exceptional time management and prioritization skills.

• Scaling a Design System: Ensuring the design system remains robust, scalable, and adopted across multiple squads as the product and team grow.

• Onboarding & Mentoring Senior Talent: Leading experienced designers who may have their own strong opinions requires a coaching approach that empowers rather than dictates.

• Global Market Nuances: Designing for diverse markets, including those with specific regulatory, linguistic (Arabic/RTL), and deployment constraints.

Learning & Development Opportunities:

• Cutting-Edge AI Design: Direct involvement in shaping the future of AI-powered enterprise software design.

• Leadership Skill Enhancement: Opportunities to refine coaching, strategic planning, and team-building skills within a high-growth tech environment.

• Industry Exposure: Potential to attend leading AI and design conferences, and engage with a network of top-tier talent from leading tech companies.

• Specialized Domain Expertise: Deepen knowledge in enterprise software, regulated industries, and sovereign cloud deployments.

• Influence GTM Strategy: Contribute to how product design directly impacts sales enablement, customer adoption, and market positioning.

📝 Enhancement Note: The challenges highlight the cutting-edge nature of the role, offering significant opportunities for professional growth in a rapidly evolving field. For operations professionals, understanding these challenges helps in anticipating needs and supporting the design team's efforts to achieve GTM objectives.

💡 Interview Preparation

Strategy Questions:

• "Describe a time you significantly influenced product strategy through design. What was the outcome?" (Focus on demonstrating strategic thinking and impact on business goals).

• "How would you approach designing an AI agent's 'personality' and interaction model for a government client with strict compliance requirements?" (Assess understanding of AI design, enterprise context, and regulatory considerations).

• "Walk us through how you've used AI tools to accelerate your design process or explore novel design solutions. What were the results?" (Prepare to showcase practical application of AI in design).

• "How do you balance hands-on design work with the responsibilities of leading and coaching a team?" (Prepare to discuss time management, prioritization, and your player-coach philosophy). Company & Culture Questions:

• "What excites you about ai71's mission and the 'Ask' platform?" (Research the company's mission, product, and target market thoroughly).

• "How do you foster a culture of 'low ego, high curiosity' within a design team?" (Discuss your approach to feedback, collaboration, and psychological safety).

• "How would you integrate the design team with our Product Marketing and Demand Generation teams to ensure a cohesive brand message and go-to-market strategy?" (Demonstrate understanding of GTM operations and cross-functional alignment).

• "What are your thoughts on building and maintaining a design system for an AI-first product in a regulated environment?" (Showcase knowledge of design systems and their strategic importance). Portfolio Presentation Strategy:

• Narrative Arc: Structure your portfolio presentation around clear problem statements, your process, your specific contributions, and quantifiable results.

• AI Integration Focus: For relevant projects, clearly articulate how AI tools were used and the benefits derived.

• Leadership Examples: Weave in examples of your leadership, mentorship, and cross-functional collaboration within project discussions.

• Tailored Case Studies: Prioritize case studies that demonstrate experience relevant to enterprise, regulated industries, or AI products.

• Interactive Elements: Be prepared to answer in-depth questions about specific design decisions and to discuss potential alternative solutions.

📝 Enhancement Note: Interview preparation should focus on demonstrating not only design excellence but also strategic thinking, leadership acumen, and a deep understanding of how design contributes to the company's overall GTM success, particularly in the complex AI and enterprise space.

📌 Application Steps

To apply for this Design Director position:

• Submit your application through the provided Ashby portal link.

• Curate Your Portfolio: Select 3-5 of your strongest projects that best showcase your leadership, design craft, AI tool proficiency, and experience with enterprise/regulated environments. Ensure each project clearly outlines the problem, your role, your process, and the measurable impact.

• Tailor Your Resume: Highlight your 10+ years of experience, leadership roles, design system experience, and any specific work with AI, enterprise software, or regulated industries. Use keywords from the job description naturally.

• Prepare Your Narrative: Practice articulating your design philosophy, leadership style, and how you envision evolving the design function at ai71. Be ready to discuss your player-coach approach and your experience with AI design tools.

• Research ai71: Deeply understand their product ("Ask"), their mission, their target market, and their unique value proposition in the AI space. Familiarize yourself with their company culture and values.

⚠️ Important Notice: This enhanced job description includes AI-generated insights and operations industry-standard assumptions. All details should be verified directly with the hiring organization before making application decisions.

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