Senior UX Design Manager

** MUST BE WILLING TO RELOCATE TO BENTONVILLE, AR **

Aquent is thrilled to partner with a global retail pioneer that is redefining how millions of customers experience shopping and membership value every single day. We are looking for a visionary design leader to step into a high-impact role where you will shape the future of customer and member experiences on an unprecedented scale. In this position, you will lead and inspire a talented team of UX designers, driving the strategy and execution for how customers discover, engage with, and build lasting relationships with world-class membership programs, seamlessly bridging digital interactions with physical touchpoints to make everyday life easier and more valuable for millions.

The Opportunity

As a key design leader, you will have the unique opportunity to define the experience vision across the entire customer lifecycle-from acquisition and onboarding to benefit discovery and long-term retention. You will collaborate closely with cross-functional partners in Product, Engineering, Research, Marketing, and Analytics to influence product roadmaps and deliver cohesive, integrated experiences. This role is perfect for someone who thrives on translating customer insights and behavioral data into actionable design opportunities, setting a high standard for customer-facing products, and pioneering the integration of cutting-edge AI tools to elevate the design process.

What You'll Do

• Define the experience vision and design strategy across the entire customer lifecycle, including acquisition, enrollment, onboarding, benefit discovery, engagement, renewal, and retention.
• Connect digital and physical touchpoints to ensure customers and members experience clear, consistent value across all interactions.
• Translate customer insights, business priorities, and behavioral data into actionable design opportunities that enhance both the user experience and business performance.
• Collaborate closely with Product, Engineering, Research, Marketing, and Analytics partners to influence roadmaps and deliver cohesive, integrated experiences.
• Set and maintain a high standard for customer- and member-facing experiences, guiding the team from early concepts through to shipped products.
• Provide expert guidance in interaction design, visual design, motion, prototyping, and compelling storytelling.
• Utilize motion design purposefully to explain transitions, guide attention, provide feedback, and create moments of delight.
• Develop clear narratives, storyboards, and realistic prototypes to make complex ideas tangible and foster alignment across teams.
• Partner with Engineering during implementation to ensure interaction behavior, visual details, accessibility, and performance meet intended design standards.
• Explore and apply AI to improve the speed, breadth, and quality of design approaches, integrating it across discovery, synthesis, concept exploration, content development, prototyping, critique, and engineering collaboration.
• Combine AI-assisted design and coding tools to create realistic, interactive prototypes and expand exploration possibilities earlier in the design process.
• Evaluate AI outputs with critical care, checking accuracy, challenging assumptions, identifying bias, and validating ideas with customers and members.
• Build repeatable team practices that enhance quality and productivity while maintaining accountability for design decisions and responsible use of information.
• Support team members at all levels of AI experience through shared learning, training, and best practices.
• Lead, coach, and develop a team of UX designers, providing clear direction, meaningful ownership, and actionable feedback tailored to individual growth and goals.
• Foster a strong critique culture where ideas are thoughtfully challenged, and feedback consistently improves the work.
• Support career development, performance management, hiring, and strategic allocation of design talent.
• Cultivate an environment that encourages questions, experimentation, respectful disagreement, and learning from mistakes.
• Apply a deep understanding of the customer-to-member lifecycle, including value perception, conversion, activation, habit formation, benefit utilization, renewal, and churn.
• Understand how UX influences these outcomes through clarity, relevance, ease of use, emotional connection, and trust.
• Partner with Research and Analytics to identify friction points, develop hypotheses, and evaluate experiments.
• Measure success through customer and member outcomes, alongside key metrics like conversion, engagement, retention, and long-term value.
• Make thoughtful tradeoffs that support growth while preserving customer confidence and trust.

Must-Have Qualifications

• 7-10 years of experience designing and delivering consumer-facing digital products.
• Minimum 2-3 years of experience leading and managing UX designers.
• A portfolio showcasing shipped customer or member experiences with strong craft in interaction design, prototyping, motion, and storytelling.
• Hands-on experience using AI tools in your work, with concrete examples of their impact on your process or outcomes.
• Experience in membership, subscriptions, loyalty, or consumer growth, demonstrating an understanding of design's contribution to measurable outcomes.
• Working knowledge of qualitative research, behavioral data, usability testing, and experimentation.
• Proven ability to navigate between long-term experience strategy and detailed design decisions.
• Strong communication and influence skills, with experience aligning diverse partners around clear customer problems and design directions.
• A commitment to creating accessible, inclusive experiences across both digital and physical contexts.

Nice-to-Have Qualifications

• Experience with retail, ecommerce, or omnichannel experiences that seamlessly connect digital interactions with physical stores.
• Experience leading design initiatives across complex organizations and multiple partner teams.
• Experience scaling design systems, motion principles, or AI-assisted workflows across a design team.