UX/UI Design Leader - Mercado Pago

📍 Job Overview

Job Title: UX/UI Design Leader - Mercado Pago

Company: Mercado Libre

Location: Governador Valadares, Minas Gerais, Brazil (Hybrid)

Job Type: Full-time

Category: Design Leadership / Product Design

Date Posted: March 12, 2026

Experience Level: 5-10 Years (Mid-Senior to Lead)

Remote Status: Hybrid

🚀 Role Summary

• Lead innovative and secure system design for Mercado Pago's acquisition and onboarding processes, impacting millions across Latin America.

• Drive conversion rate optimization and reduce friction in critical user flows such as registration, verification, and initial activation.

• Evolve the user's first-value journey to ensure rapid understanding of service benefits and autonomous completion of key actions.

• Define and prioritize country-specific growth roadmaps, scaling efficient patterns while adapting to local market nuances.

• Collaborate closely with Product, Technology, and Data teams on discovery, hypothesis generation, experimentation, and continuous iteration.

• Elevate the technical quality of the design team by instilling rigor in growth-oriented design and fostering a culture of rapid execution and learning.

📝 Enhancement Note: While the role is titled "UX/UI Design Leader," the responsibilities heavily emphasize growth, conversion, and data-driven experimentation, aligning it closely with a "Growth Design Leader" or "Product Design Lead" with a strong GTM (Go-To-Market) operations focus. The emphasis on scaling across countries and integrating with data teams suggests a significant operational component to this design leadership role.

📈 Primary Responsibilities

• Spearhead the end-to-end strategy and execution for Mercado Pago's Acquisition and Onboarding funnels, from initial user touchpoints (landing pages, campaigns) through to successful registration, verification, and first activation.

• Implement strategies to demonstrably increase conversion rates and minimize user drop-offs within critical flows, including but not limited to user registration, identity validation, permission management, and initial feature adoption.

• Design and iterate on the "first value" user journey to ensure new users quickly grasp the core benefits of Mercado Pago services and can independently perform essential actions, thereby driving early engagement and retention.

• Develop, define, and prioritize growth roadmaps for each target country, identifying scalable design patterns and ensuring localized adaptations are made to effectively address regional market specificities and regulatory requirements.

• Foster deep, integrated collaboration with Product Management, Engineering, and Data Science teams, actively participating in discovery phases, formulating data-backed hypotheses, designing and executing experiments (including A/B tests), instrumenting user flows for tracking, and driving continuous iterative improvements based on performance metrics.

• Enhance the technical proficiency and design quality of the design team by championing rigorous, growth-focused design principles and cultivating a team culture that prioritizes rapid execution, data-informed decision-making, and a continuous learning mindset.

📝 Enhancement Note: The responsibilities highlight a strong focus on business outcomes (conversion, activation, growth) and operational processes (experimentation, data analysis, roadmap scaling) within a design leadership context. This suggests the ideal candidate will not only be a strong designer but also adept at operationalizing design strategies for maximum business impact.

🎓 Skills & Qualifications

Education:

Experience:

• 5-10 years of progressive experience in digital product design, with a significant portion dedicated to leadership or coordination roles.

• Proven track record of successfully designing and launching complex digital products, with a specific emphasis on acquisition, onboarding, conversion optimization, and user activation strategies.

Required Skills:

• UX/UI Design Mastery: Deep understanding and practical application of UX principles, UI design best practices, information architecture, and user-centered design methodologies across web and mobile platforms.

• Growth-Oriented Design: Proven ability to design for growth, focusing on user acquisition, conversion funnels, onboarding flows, and driving key activation metrics.

• Data-Driven Design & Experimentation: Extensive experience with the full experimentation lifecycle, including hypothesis generation, A/B testing design and analysis, cohort analysis, funnel optimization, and leveraging data analytics to inform design decisions.

• Design Leadership & Team Management: Demonstrated experience in leading, mentoring, and guiding design teams, fostering a collaborative and high-performing environment, and elevating the overall quality of design output.

• Cross-functional Collaboration: Excellent ability to partner effectively with Product Managers, Engineers, Data Scientists, and Marketing teams, translating business objectives into impactful design solutions.

• Information Architecture & User Flow Optimization: Expertise in structuring complex information and designing intuitive, efficient user flows that minimize cognitive load and maximize task completion.

• AI Application in Design: Experience or strong understanding of how Artificial Intelligence can be leveraged in design research, ideation, prototyping, and technical analysis to enhance design outcomes and efficiency.

Preferred Skills:

• Financial Services/FinTech Experience: Prior experience designing for financial products, services, or platforms, with an understanding of regulatory compliance and security considerations.

• Localization & Internationalization: Experience in adapting design strategies and user experiences for diverse international markets.

• Prototyping Tools Proficiency: Advanced skills in industry-standard prototyping tools (e.g., Figma, Sketch, Adobe XD, InVision) for creating high-fidelity mockups and interactive prototypes.

• Agile/Scrum Methodologies: Familiarity with agile development processes and participation in Scrum ceremonies.

• User Research Methodologies: Proficiency in conducting various user research methods (usability testing, interviews, surveys) to gather insights and validate design solutions.

📝 Enhancement Note: The requirements emphasize a blend of core design expertise with a strong operational and business-oriented mindset, particularly around growth metrics and data-driven decision-making. The mention of AI application indicates a forward-thinking approach to design processes.

📊 Process & Systems Portfolio Requirements

Portfolio Essentials:

• Growth Case Studies: Showcase at least 2-3 detailed case studies demonstrating your impact on acquisition, onboarding, or conversion metrics for complex digital products. Clearly articulate the problem, your role, the design process, the solution, and the measurable business outcomes (e.g., % increase in conversion, % reduction in drop-off, % increase in activation rate).

• Experimentation Lifecycle: Include examples of how you've designed, run, and iterated on A/B tests or other experiments, detailing hypothesis formulation, test design, data analysis, and subsequent design iterations.

• User Journey Mapping: Present examples of user journey maps or flow diagrams you've created to identify friction points and opportunities for improvement in acquisition and onboarding processes.

• Systemic Design Thinking: Demonstrate an understanding of how to design for scalability and consistency across multiple products or markets, perhaps by showcasing design system components or cross-product feature integrations.

Process Documentation:

• Workflow Design & Optimization: Your portfolio should illustrate how you approach designing and optimizing user workflows, with specific examples of how you've simplified complex processes for users.

• Data Integration & Analysis: Provide evidence of how you integrate user data and analytics into your design process, showing how metrics informed your decisions and led to measurable improvements.

• Cross-functional Process Collaboration: Highlight instances where you've collaborated with Product, Engineering, and Data teams, detailing the processes used for hypothesis generation, experiment design, and iterative development.

• Risk Mitigation in Design: Showcase how you've considered and addressed potential risks, such as regulatory compliance or security concerns, within your design solutions for financial products.

📝 Enhancement Note: The portfolio requirements are heavily geared towards demonstrating quantifiable impact and operational proficiency in growth-related design. Candidates should focus on showcasing their ability to drive business results through design and their systematic approach to experimentation and user journey optimization.

💵 Compensation & Benefits

Salary Range:

Benefits:

• Health & Wellness: Comprehensive health insurance, dental and vision coverage, potentially including wellness programs or gym memberships.

• Financial: Competitive base salary, potential for performance-based bonuses, stock options or participation in employee share purchase plans, and a retirement savings plan (e.g., Previdência Privada).

• Work-Life Balance: Paid time off (vacation, holidays), potential for flexible work arrangements (hybrid model), and parental leave policies.

• Professional Development: Opportunities for continuous learning through internal training, workshops, conferences, and access to online learning platforms.

• Other Perks: Meal vouchers (Vale Refeição/Alimentação), transportation assistance (Vale Transporte or similar), and potential employee discounts on Mercado Libre products and services.

Working Hours:

• Standard full-time commitment, typically around 40 hours per week. The hybrid work model allows for flexibility, with a portion of the week spent in the office and the remainder remote. Specific in-office days will be determined by team needs and management.

📝 Enhancement Note: Salary estimates are based on industry benchmarks for senior design leadership roles in major Brazilian tech markets, considering the company's scale and the role's strategic impact. Benefits are typical for large, established tech companies in Brazil.

🎯 Team & Company Context

🏢 Company Culture

Industry: E-commerce, Financial Technology (FinTech), Technology Services. Mercado Libre operates as a leading e-commerce platform and a significant player in digital payments and financial services through Mercado Pago, aiming to democratize commerce and finance in Latin America.

Company Size: Large (10,000+ employees globally). This scale implies robust processes, significant resources, and opportunities for impact across a vast user base.

Founded: 1999. With over two decades of operation, Mercado Libre has a mature organizational structure, a strong market presence, and a history of innovation and adaptation.

Team Structure:

• Design Team: Likely organized around product verticals or key initiatives, with specialized roles (UX Researchers, UI Designers, Product Designers, Design Leads). This role would lead a specific sub-team or functional area within Mercado Pago's design organization.

• Reporting: The UX/UI Design Leader will likely report to a Head of Design, Director of Product, or a VP of Product/Design within Mercado Pago.

• Cross-functional Collaboration: Integral to the role. Daily interaction with Product Managers, Engineering Leads, Data Scientists, Marketing, and Legal/Compliance teams is expected to drive product strategy and execution.

Methodology:

• Data-Driven Decision Making: Strong emphasis on using data analytics, A/B testing, and user research to inform design choices and measure impact.

• Agile & Iterative Development: Processes are likely based on agile methodologies, promoting rapid prototyping, continuous feedback loops, and iterative development cycles.

• Growth Hacking Mindset: A culture that encourages experimentation, learning from failures, and optimizing user funnels for acquisition, engagement, and conversion.

• User-Centricity: While data-driven, the core focus remains on solving real user problems and delivering exceptional experiences.

Company Website: https://www.mercadolibre.com/ and https://www.mercadopago.com/

📝 Enhancement Note: Mercado Libre's culture is known for its fast-paced environment, focus on innovation, and strong emphasis on data and results. For a design leader, this means being comfortable with ambiguity, driving change, and demonstrating tangible business impact.

📈 Career & Growth Analysis

Operations Career Level: This role represents a senior leadership position within the design function, specifically focused on a critical growth area (Acquisition & Onboarding). It's a step beyond individual contributor or team lead, requiring strategic vision, team management, and significant business impact.

Reporting Structure: The UX/UI Design Leader will report to a higher-level design or product executive, with likely direct reports (UX/UI Designers, Growth Designers). This position serves as a key link between strategic objectives and design execution for Mercado Pago.

Operations Impact: The role's direct impact is on user acquisition, conversion rates, and the initial user experience, which are foundational to Mercado Pago's growth and revenue generation. Success in this role directly contributes to expanding the user base and increasing transaction volume, a key operational metric for any financial service.

Growth Opportunities:

• Leadership Advancement: Potential to grow into higher leadership roles such as Head of Product Design, Director of UX, or VP of Design for larger product areas or regional segments within Mercado Libre.

• Strategic Influence: Opportunity to shape the long-term design strategy for Mercado Pago's core growth functions and influence product direction at a company-wide level.

• Cross-Functional Expertise: Deepen understanding and experience in product management, data science, and business strategy by working closely with these functions.

• Mentorship & Team Building: Develop strong team leadership and mentorship skills by building and scaling a high-performing design team.

• Industry Recognition: Contribute to a leading FinTech/E-commerce platform, offering opportunities for speaking engagements, publications, and industry recognition.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role is positioned for individuals looking to move into strategic design leadership, influencing business outcomes through design excellence and operational efficiency in growth initiatives.

🌐 Work Environment

Office Type: Hybrid work model. Employees are expected to work from a physical office location for a portion of the week and remotely for the remainder. This promotes a balance between in-person collaboration and individual focus.

Office Location(s): The primary office locations mentioned are Osasco - SP (São Paulo) and Rio de Janeiro - RJ. Candidates are expected to be able to work from one of these locations.

Workspace Context:

• Collaborative Environment: Offices are designed to foster collaboration, with open spaces, meeting rooms, and areas for team interaction. The hybrid model requires effective virtual collaboration tools and practices.

• Technology & Tools: Access to modern design software, hardware, and collaboration platforms is standard. The role requires proficiency with tools used for design, prototyping, testing, and data analysis.

• Team Interaction: Regular team meetings, design critiques, and cross-functional syncs are part of the daily routine, facilitated both in-person and virtually.

Work Schedule:

• The hybrid arrangement offers flexibility. While a standard 40-hour work week is expected, the ability to balance office and remote work can accommodate focused work sessions, team collaboration needs, and personal commitments. This flexibility is critical for managing iterative design processes and experimentation cycles effectively.

📝 Enhancement Note: The hybrid nature of the role is a key aspect of the work environment, requiring adaptability and strong communication skills for both remote and in-office collaboration. Candidates should be prepared for a dynamic work setting within a major tech hub.

📄 Application & Portfolio Review Process

Interview Process:

• Initial Screening: A recruiter or hiring manager will review your application and resume, focusing on alignment with key requirements and experience.

• Portfolio Presentation & Discussion: Expect to present a curated selection of your work, focusing on 2-3 key growth-focused case studies. This will involve discussing your process, decision-making, and measurable impact. Be prepared to elaborate on your role in acquisition, onboarding, and conversion optimization.

• Technical & Behavioral Interviews: Interviews with peers (other designers, product managers, engineers) and leadership. These will assess your design skills, problem-solving abilities, understanding of data-driven design, AI application in design, and leadership potential. Behavioral questions will gauge your cultural fit and how you handle common workplace scenarios.

• Case Study/Design Challenge: You may be given a design challenge or a take-home exercise to assess your approach to a specific problem relevant to Mercado Pago's challenges in acquisition or onboarding.

• Final Round: Typically involves meeting with senior leadership to discuss strategic alignment and overall fit.

Portfolio Review Tips:

• Quantify Everything: For each case study, clearly state the business problem, your specific contributions, the design solutions, and most importantly, the quantifiable results (e.g., "Increased onboarding completion rate by 15%," "Reduced time-to-first-payment by 20%").

• Show, Don't Just Tell: Use visuals (mockups, wireframes, flow diagrams, data charts) to illustrate your points. Explain why you made certain design decisions, linking them back to user needs, business goals, and data insights.

• Highlight Experimentation: Detail your process for hypothesis generation, A/B testing, and iteration. Show how you used data to learn and improve designs.

• Demonstrate Leadership: If applicable, show examples of how you've mentored junior designers, influenced team direction, or led cross-functional initiatives.

• Tailor to Mercado Pago: Research Mercado Pago and its current challenges. Frame your experience and case studies to show how you can address their specific needs in acquisition and onboarding.

Challenge Preparation:

• Understand the Context: For any design challenge, ensure you fully understand the problem statement, target users, and business objectives. Ask clarifying questions.

• Structure Your Approach: Outline your process clearly: problem definition, user research (even if simulated), ideation, solution design, and how you'd measure success.

• Focus on Growth Metrics: Since the role is growth-oriented, think about how your proposed solution would impact key metrics like conversion, activation, or retention.

• Consider Technical & Regulatory Constraints: For Mercado Pago, understanding basic financial regulations and technical feasibility is crucial.

📝 Enhancement Note: The interview process emphasizes practical application of design skills to drive business growth, with a strong focus on data and measurable outcomes. Candidates should prepare to articulate their thought process and demonstrate quantifiable impact.

🛠 Tools & Technology Stack

Primary Tools:

• Design & Prototyping: Figma (highly probable as industry standard), Sketch, Adobe XD. Proficiency in creating interactive prototypes and design systems is essential.

• Collaboration & Project Management: Jira, Confluence, Asana, Trello. Experience in agile workflows and using these tools for task tracking and documentation.

• User Research Platforms: UserTesting.com, Hotjar, Maze, Google Analytics. Familiarity with tools for user feedback, heatmaps, session recordings, and quantitative user behavior analysis.

Analytics & Reporting:

• Web/App Analytics: Google Analytics, Amplitude, Mixpanel. Ability to delve into user data, track funnels, segment users, and extract actionable insights.

• Data Visualization: Tableau, Power BI, Looker. While not a pure analyst role, understanding how to interpret dashboards and potentially contribute to their creation is beneficial.

CRM & Automation:

• CRM: While not directly managing a CRM for sales, understanding how user data flows from acquisition/onboarding into CRM-like systems (e.g., Salesforce, HubSpot) for marketing or customer success is relevant.

• Marketing Automation: Familiarity with platforms like HubSpot, Marketo, or internal tools for triggering user journeys based on onboarding completion or initial actions.

• Integration Tools: Understanding the principles of how design systems or user data integrate across different platforms and services.

📝 Enhancement Note: Proficiency in modern design tools like Figma is almost certainly a prerequisite. A strong understanding of analytics platforms and how to leverage data for design decisions is critical, reflecting the role's growth and experimentation focus.

👥 Team Culture & Values

Operations Values:

• Data-Driven Excellence: Decisions are firmly rooted in data, user research, and experimentation. A culture of continuous learning and iteration based on performance metrics.

• User-Centricity & Impact: A deep commitment to solving real user problems and delivering tangible value that democratizes financial services and e-commerce.

• Innovation & Agility: Encouraging creative solutions, embracing new technologies (like AI), and maintaining the ability to adapt quickly to market changes and user needs.

• Collaboration & Transparency: Open communication, cross-functional teamwork, and sharing insights and learnings across departments to achieve collective goals.

• Ownership & Accountability: Taking responsibility for outcomes, driving projects to completion, and demonstrating a proactive approach to problem-solving and growth initiatives.

Collaboration Style:

• Integrated Teams: Design is not a silo; it's embedded within product squads, working hand-in-hand with product managers, engineers, and data scientists.

• Feedback-Rich Environment: Regular design critiques, sprint reviews, and open forums for sharing work and receiving constructive feedback.

• Shared Goals: A strong emphasis on aligning individual and team efforts towards common business objectives, particularly around user acquisition, activation, and retention.

• Knowledge Sharing: Encouraging the sharing of best practices, learnings from experiments, and new design techniques to foster collective growth within the design organization.

📝 Enhancement Note: The culture values a blend of analytical rigor, user empathy, and a results-oriented mindset. Collaboration is key, with design deeply integrated into product development teams.

⚡ Challenges & Growth Opportunities

Challenges:

• Scaling Across Diverse Markets: Balancing the need for standardized, efficient acquisition and onboarding processes with the requirement to adapt to unique local regulations, user behaviors, and market conditions across multiple Latin American countries.

• Balancing Growth with Compliance: Designing user-friendly experiences for financial services that meet stringent regulatory requirements (KYC, AML, data privacy) without creating excessive friction for users.

• Driving Adoption of New Features/Services: Educating users on the benefits of Mercado Pago and encouraging them to adopt new financial tools and services through well-designed onboarding and activation flows.

• Measuring Impact in Complex Funnels: Accurately attributing design improvements to specific metrics within multi-step, complex acquisition and onboarding funnels.

• Leading and Mentoring a High-Performing Team: Effectively guiding and developing a team of talented designers in a fast-paced, demanding environment, ensuring high-quality output and continuous skill development.

Learning & Development Opportunities:

• Deep Dive into FinTech & E-commerce: Gain extensive experience in the rapidly evolving FinTech and e-commerce landscapes of Latin America.

• AI in Design Specialization: Opportunity to become a leader in applying AI tools and methodologies to design processes, potentially leading to specialized expertise.

• Advanced Growth Strategy: Develop sophisticated skills in growth hacking, experimentation, and data analysis for user acquisition and activation at scale.

• Cross-functional Leadership: Enhance leadership capabilities by working across product, technology, data, marketing, and legal disciplines.

• International Market Exposure: Gain valuable experience in localization, international product strategy, and managing diverse user needs across different cultural contexts.

📝 Enhancement Note: The challenges are characteristic of leading growth initiatives in a large, international FinTech company, requiring strategic thinking, adaptability, and strong problem-solving skills. The growth opportunities are significant for career advancement and skill specialization.

💡 Interview Preparation

Strategy Questions:

• "Describe a time you led a redesign of an acquisition or onboarding flow and the measurable impact it had on conversion rates. What was your process?" (Focus on quantifiable results, hypothesis testing, and your leadership role.)

• "How would you approach defining and prioritizing a growth roadmap for Mercado Pago's onboarding process in a new country like Mexico?" (Emphasize market research, data analysis, localization, and iterative implementation.)

• "Discuss a situation where you had to balance user experience with complex regulatory or business requirements. How did you navigate it?" (Highlight problem-solving, compromise, and finding elegant solutions.)

Company & Culture Questions:

• "What excites you most about Mercado Libre's mission to democratize commerce and financial services in Latin America?" (Connect your passion to their purpose.)

• "How do you foster a culture of experimentation and continuous learning within a design team?" (Discuss your leadership style, feedback mechanisms, and approach to failure.)

• "Describe your experience working in a hybrid environment. How do you ensure effective collaboration and team cohesion?" (Highlight communication strategies and tools.)

Portfolio Presentation Strategy:

• Narrative Arc: Structure each case study as a story: the challenge, your approach, the solution, and the outcome. Make it engaging.

• Focus on "Why": Clearly articulate the rationale behind your design decisions, linking them to user needs, business goals, and data.

• Data Visualization: Present key metrics clearly. Use charts and graphs to showcase impact effectively and concisely.

• Role Clarity: Be explicit about your individual contributions, especially if you led the initiative or managed a team.

• Interactive Elements: If presenting digitally, consider interactive elements or annotated screenshots to walk through user flows and key features.

• Q&A Readiness: Anticipate questions about your process, challenges, alternatives considered, and future iterations.

📝 Enhancement Note: Preparation should focus on demonstrating a strong understanding of growth metrics, data-driven design, leadership, and the specific context of Mercado Pago's mission and market.

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📌 Application Steps

To apply for this UX/UI Design Leader position:

• Submit Your Application: Utilize the provided application link on the Mercado Libre careers portal.

• Curate Your Portfolio: Select 2-3 of your most impactful growth-focused case studies that specifically highlight your experience in acquisition, onboarding, and conversion optimization. Ensure each case study clearly articulates the problem, your process, the solution, and quantifiable business results.

• Tailor Your Resume: Update your resume to emphasize leadership experience, growth design strategies, data-driven decision-making, and your contributions to key business metrics. Integrate keywords from the job description naturally.

• Prepare Your Presentation: Practice presenting your chosen case studies, focusing on storytelling, data visualization, and clearly articulating your strategic thinking and leadership approach. Be ready to answer in-depth questions about your process and impact.

• Research Mercado Libre & Mercado Pago: Understand their mission, market position, product offerings (especially Mercado Pago), and recent initiatives. Consider how your skills and experience align with their goals for democratizing commerce and financial services in Latin America.

⚠️ 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.