Lead Product Designer

🧠 About Cortex
Cortex is the Engineering Operations Platform that enables organizations to continuously improve their operational maturity and reduce developer friction. With centralized visibility, clear ownership, automated Scorecards, and golden paths, we help engineering organizations operate as one.

Our customers – from startups to Fortune 100 enterprises – create a culture of engineering excellence, reducing incidents by 30% and improving MTTR by 50%, all while making it easier for developers to focus on building.

📍Location
We’re fully remote and welcome candidates from anywhere in the US! We have all-company offsites a few times a year where we fly the whole team out to meet in person, build stronger relationships, kick off important projects, and have fun!

🤝 The Team
We are a mighty group of ~80 passionate individuals excited about building a product that developers love. We recently raised $60M in Series C Funding this year led by Scale Ventures (with participation from Sequoia, IVP, and others) to build the Future of Developer Experience. You can read more about it here.

💼 Role Summary
We are looking for a Lead Product Designer to take ownership of complex product areas within Cortex, partnering closely with Product and Engineering to shape solutions end-to-end. You will be responsible for translating ambiguous, complex problems into clear, thoughtful product experiences, making informed tradeoffs, and driving decisions that move the product forward.

This role is focused on product thinking, decision-making, and execution in a fast-moving startup environment. We are looking for someone who thrives in ambiguity, collaborates closely with product and engineering, and can take ownership of complex problems from concept through launch.

🛠️ Responsibilities

• Drive the design vision: Lead and execute the design strategy for major product initiatives, setting a new standard for design and user experience at Cortex. You are relentless about crafting a delightful, industry-leading experience.
• Elevate product quality and UX flow: Proactively identify and resolve complex user experience issues, focusing on streamlining core workflows and improving overall product usability and polish.
• Partner closely with engineering to shape scalable, thoughtful product experiences: Work in tight collaboration with engineers to define solutions, make tradeoffs, and ensure what we build is both usable and technically sound.
• Operate effectively in ambiguity: Take loosely defined problems, bring structure, and drive them through to clear, actionable solutions.
• Strategic Prototyping and Testing: Design, plan, and execute high-fidelity prototypes and user testing to validate concepts and inform design direction across the product management and engineering teams.
• End-to-End Feature Delivery: Own the design process from concept development, through wireframing, high-fidelity mockups, and final handoff. Collaborate with Product Managers and Engineers to ensure features meet a high bar for user experience.
• Maintain exceptional craft: Maintain an unwavering attention to detail to ensure product consistency, completeness, and a professional, polished user experience.

✔️ Qualifications

• 5-7+ years of experience as a Product Designer working on complex B2B or enterprise SaaS products. Experience with developer tools is a plus. Startup experience is highly desirable.
• Proven experience leading end-to-end design projects with significant business impact.
• Expert proficiency with Figma, prototyping tools, and user research methodologies.
• Experience working across complex product surfaces with an ability to balance consistency, scalability, and product needs.
• You can point to a portfolio of work that clearly demonstrates your ability to solve challenging user problems and execute with exceptional craft and attention to detail.
• Passionate about creating beautiful, useful, and usable interfaces guided by user feedback, while maintaining the ability to make strong decisions in ambiguous situations.

💰 Compensation

• Starting Salary Range: $190 - 220k
• Competitive Equity Package

*Our job titles may span more than one career level. The actual base pay is dependent upon many factors, such as: training, transferable skills, work experience, business needs and market demands. The base pay range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. This role is eligible for equity and benefits.

🌴 Perks & Benefits

• National medical, dental & vision insurance (we cover 100% for employees!)
• Unlimited PTO & flexible working hours
• 401k plan
• Gender-neutral parental leave
• $1000 yearly Learning & Development stipend
• $400 monthly perks stipend (use it on anything)
• Pet Insurance

Cortex is committed to a diverse and inclusive workplace. Cortex is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, protected veteran status, disability, age, or other legally protected status. For individuals with disabilities who would like to request an accommodation, please email people@cortex.io