Principal Product Designer, Design Systems

📍 Job Overview

Job Title: Principal Product Designer, Design Systems

Company: Kin Insurance

Location: United States

Job Type: FULL_TIME

Category: Design Systems / Product Design

Date Posted: June 25, 2026

Experience Level: Principal (7+ Years)

Remote Status: Fully Remote

🚀 Role Summary

• Lead the development and evolution of Kin's design system to ensure cohesive, multi-product experiences for homeowners.

• Own and drive Kin's token architecture (color, typography, spacing, motion) as the single source of truth for design and code, leveraging AI tools for efficiency.

• Establish and maintain Figma-to-code parity, partnering with engineering to streamline the pipeline from design tokens to implemented components.

• Define and implement a robust contribution model and governance structure for the design system, ensuring scalability and controlled growth across new product domains.

• Advocate for and embed accessibility standards within the design system, utilizing automated testing and AI-assisted audits to ensure compliance.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role is a Principal-level Individual Contributor (IC) position focused on Design Systems. The emphasis on AI tools like Claude Code and Cursor, along with the explicit mention of "influence without authority" and operating in "0-to-1 spaces," indicates a strategic leadership role within the design organization, requiring strong technical design skills and significant stakeholder management capabilities.

📈 Primary Responsibilities

• Conduct comprehensive audits of existing component libraries and product experiences using AI tools to identify gaps, drift, and inconsistencies, informing a data-backed plan for system unification.

• Architect and manage Kin's token layer, encompassing primitive, semantic, and component tokens, serving as the definitive source of truth for both design and development teams.

• Design and implement scalable token systems that can flex across various contexts, including internal tools, customer-facing applications, and potentially multi-brand surfaces, without introducing fragmentation.

• Collaborate closely with engineering teams to establish and maintain Figma-to-code parity, ensuring a seamless workflow from design token definition to the implementation and documentation of reusable components.

• Strategically introduce new components and patterns as Kin expands into new product domains, ensuring the design system evolves with intention and avoids uncontrolled sprawl.

• Define, document, and implement the design system's contribution model and governance framework, including versioning strategies, changelogs, intake processes, and quality assurance standards.

• Develop automated guardrails and processes that empower teams to extend the design system effectively while maintaining consistency and preventing fragmentation.

• Act as the central authority for Kin's design patterns, consolidating disparate tools into a single, canonical reference for all design and development efforts.

• Champion accessibility best practices within the design system, ensuring components are inherently accessible and proactively identifying compliance gaps through automated testing and AI-assisted audits.

• Foster strong partnerships across Product, Engineering, and embedded domain designers to ensure the design system becomes the most efficient path to achieving a cohesive, on-brand user experience across all Kin products.

📝 Enhancement Note: The responsibilities highlight a deep dive into architectural design (token layer), process definition (governance, contribution model), and cross-functional collaboration, characteristic of a Principal Designer role tasked with establishing foundational