Senior Manager, Product Design - Design Platform

This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Senior Manager, Product Design - Design Platform based in United States. This is a senior design leadership opportunity focused on building the foundation that enables product teams to design and ship high-quality experiences at scale. You will lead the evolution of a company-wide design system across web and native mobile platforms, balancing consistency with platform-specific needs. The role combines hands-on product design with people leadership, with approximately 60% of your time dedicated to design craft and 40% to managing and developing senior designers. You will explore AI-enabled design workflows, machine-readable standards, and design-to-code tools that can fundamentally change how teams build products. Working closely with engineering and product design leaders, you will establish the governance, contribution models, and operating practices that make the platform effective across the organization. Your work will influence how ideas move from early concepts to production, creating a scalable foundation for faster and more consistent product development. The environment is digital-first, collaborative, and innovation-focused, with opportunities to shape both the design discipline and the future of AI-native product development. Define and evolve the design system's component architecture, token strategy, visual language, documentation, and governance to create a cohesive foundation for products across the organization. Establish the design platform strategy across web and native mobile, determining where experiences should share patterns and where platform-specific solutions are more appropriate. Explore and introduce AI-enabled design workflows, machine-readable standards, prototyping approaches, and design-to-code tools that improve how designers and engineers collaborate. Partner closely with engineering and product design leadership to ensure the design platform is implemented effectively and becomes an integral part of product development. Establish clear ownership, governance, contribution models, and operating processes across platform and product teams. Define meaningful metrics for design platform success, using data and insights to prioritize investments, demonstrate impact, and build leadership alignment. Lead, coach, and develop two senior designers, providing direction, feedback, context, and opportunities to take ownership of ambitious platform initiatives. Drive improvements to the overall product development experience by making the design platform a dependable foundation for moving ideas efficiently into production. Requirements 8+ years of professional product design experience, including at least 2 years of direct people management experience. Demonstrated experience building or significantly scaling a design system adopted across multiple product teams. Strong experience defining design patterns and platform strategies across both web and native mobile products. Deep knowledge of design systems, including component architecture, design tokens, documentation, governance, and visual design direction. Proven ability to partner directly with engineering teams on design system implementation, including component APIs and token architecture. Strong product and business judgment, with the ability to establish priorities, navigate tradeoffs, and build support among senior stakeholders. Strong analytical skills and the ability to use data to measure impact, identify opportunities, and inform design platform decisions. Excellent communication, collaboration, and design critique skills, with the ability to influence across product, design, and engineering organizations. Experience developing senior individual contributors and creating an environment where experienced designers can grow as leaders and builders. Ability to prototype or contribute to component implementation is prefe