The role of

Product Designer

A Product Designer’s specialty is to translate user insights into attractive, easy-to-use user interface that customers and end-users want to use.
Product Designer

Responsibilities

A Product Designer is mainly responsible for the ideation, prototyping and validation aspects of the design process. They focus on translating research findings, business goals and user feedback to engaging product design that meet user needs, desires and expectations. They build, maintain and/or make use of an existing design system as part of their work process.

Product Designers work closely with the entire product development team, but especially close to UX Leads, UX Researchers and Front-end developers. They can work as a strategic partner to UX Leads, Product Owners and Product Managers, providing input for the product vision and roadmap.

Product Designers are sometimes referred to as Interaction Designers or User Interface Designers.

  • Translate research findings, business goals, user feedback and ideas into testable prototypes of meaningful fidelity
  • Facilitate ideation workshops for their team to get input for design work
  • Contribute to goal-setting and follow-up
  • Define accessible design patterns and reusable components to help make the implementation process more efficient
  • Map user flows
  • Ensure that the visual design is accessible and of high quality
  • Conduct usability testing, involving their team members
    and stakeholders in the process
  • Iterate prototypes based on user feedback
  • Document and communicate design decisions clearly to their team
  • Present design work to their team and relevant stakeholders
  • Deliver accessible design specification to developers
  • Contribute to product vision and roadmap
  • Build, maintain and/or make use of existing design systems, design guidelines and asset libraries
  • Grow design maturity by sharing knowledge with their team, including them in the design process
  • Be a UX Buddy to a new Product Designer in Visma’s design community
  • Contribute to knowledge sharing and events in Visma’s design community

A Senior Product Designer does many of the same things as a Product Designer, but typically has more experience and responsibility, and is expected to take lead in certain projects. 

In addition to the role of Product Designer, Senior Product Designers:

  • Are expected to have a strategic mindset and think beyond immediate project requirements, understanding business goals, user needs and market trends, using that information in their design decisions.
  • Lead design projects and mentor mid-level and junior designers.
  • Collaborate effectively with product teams, communicate design decisions and rationale clearly, and negotiate trade-offs between user needs, business goals, and technical constraints.
  • Contribute to defining and improving design processes and help maintain design documentation.
  • Contribute to the product design strategy for their product line in collaboration with Product Managers, UX Leads, and product teams, leveraging business objectives, user needs, and market trends to create a cohesive vision for the product's design and user experience.
  • Ensure the quality of the design work produced by their team, enforcing design standards, accessibility and best practices.

A Product Design Lead leads the product design vision and strategy, manages and/or mentors designers, and collaborates with product management to ensure design initiatives align with the product vision and meet business objectives.

In addition to the role of Senior Product Designer, Product Design Leads:

  • Lead and manage a team of designers, providing guidance, mentorship, and feedback to ensure adherence to accessible design standards and efficient progress towards shared goals.
  • Develop and communicate the product design strategy for their product line in collaboration with Product Managers, UX Leads, and product teams, leveraging business objectives, user needs, and market trends to create a cohesive vision for the product's design.
  • Collaborate with product management to align design initiatives with the product vision and roadmap, balancing user needs and business goals. 
  • Develop and implement design methods, processes and best practices, ensuring that teams are using effective methods to produce high-quality, accessible designs.
  • Communicate design decisions clearly and advocate for design solutions that balance user needs, business goals, and technical feasibility.
  • Defines and oversees design metrics, empowering teams to analyse data and provide actionable recommendations, measuring and presenting the impact of design work to increase design maturity in teams.
  • Mentor and coach designers at all levels, providing feedback, setting goals and expectations, and guiding career development.

Specialization opportunities
for

Product Designer

  • Specialise in one of the proposed specialisation areas for Product Designers, e.g. Accessibility, Facilitation, Visual Design or Front-end Development
  • Take on more responsibility and work towards becoming a Senior Product Designer
  • Consider moving into a closely related field, such as Front-end development

Accessibility

Accessibility is usability for people who interact with products differently. Learn how to help teams approach accessibility.

Front-end Development

Learn how to translate UX and design work into code or simply how to best communicate and hand-over design specs to developers.

Facilitation

Learn how to enable others to reach their goals, promote team collaboration and encourage innovative problem solving.

Product Analytics

Setting clear goals and following up on the impact of UX improvements can help guide research and design efforts.

UX Research

Learn more about how to run research project, avoid bias in usability testing and structure, build and maintain research repositories.

Visual Design

Visual design focuses on the aesthetics of the user interface. Learn how to work with colours, illustrations and more.

Resources

Here you will find everything from Slack channels where you can connect with the design community, to events, links and community support from the Hubs.

Related roles

In Visma Learning Zone you will find an overview of all design roles and their different areas of expertise and responsibility. In addition, you will find how designers can grow in Visma.

Service Designer

A Service Designer addresses all touchpoints across the customer journey within a product line, including how the internal organisation works to deliver that customer journey.

Service Designer
UX Researcher

A UX Researcher is responsible for the discovery and evaluation aspects of the design process. They focus on uncovering and understanding user behaviours, goals and expectations.

UX Researcher
Product Designer

A Product Designer’s specialty is to translate user insights into attractive, easy-to-use user interface that customers and end-users want to use.

Product Designer
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