• Job Description

  Req#: 244637

  Head of Experience Design - Online

  At Sainsbury’s we believe that the customer should be at the heart of everything we do. Our vision is to create the easiest, most enjoyable experiences that better serve our customers’ ever-changing needs. We work across a range of services, products, touch points and tools to deliver distinctive, integrated, and consistent experiences for our customers and colleagues across Sainsbury’s Group (which includes Sainsbury’s Food, Argos, Nectar, Tu and Habitat).

  We drive brilliant experiences across all our brands in-store and online, operating in agile teams and squads, working seamlessly with teams right across the business to make the most of the exceptional knowledge, insight and talent we have.

  About this role:

  As the Head of Experience Design – Online, you will be responsible for crafting the future vision for our online customer experiences across our entire online estate across the Sainsbury’s, Argos, Habitat and Tu brands.

  You will lead a fantastic, talented experience design team to create our customer experience vision and to build a framework for great experience design across the business. You will work with a large team of experience designers with specialisms in interaction and user experience design, ranging from junior to senior designers, supporting them to deliver value as quickly as possible, testing and learning as you go.

  You will need to partner closely with the Insights, Product, & Data and Analytics teams, alongside your counterparts in the wider design team, including Head of Research, Head of Service Design, and the other Heads of Experience Design, to understand, uncover and measure opportunities, ensuring the team are focused on the areas of greatest impact.

  You and your team will work closely with the Product, Engineering and eCommerce teams to align around common outcomes and OKRs, prioritise product roadmaps, define our future customer vision, and build a culture in which teams are collaborating and experimenting at pace, measuring the impact of their work and communicating the value they are delivering to the wider business.

  Within the team you will have the opportunity to work in a dynamic environment in a sector that is going through unprecedented transformation. As well as a commitment to work with you to drive your development, we also offer a creative, collaborative culture, a flexible approach to working and lots of great colleague benefits.

  We know that great experiences aren’t created by accident. That’s why we’ve built a large, diverse and inclusive team. From UX to service designers. Copywriters to researchers and accessibility specialists. Together, we craft exceptional products and services. We make things better, and we’re respected across the group for the impact we have.

  What you need to do:

  • Working with the Senior Head of Experience Design, you will need to define and create the joined-up vision for customer experience across our digital channels, re-imagining what great experience means and how it will be delivered.
  • Work with your experience design team and direct reports to establish clear goals and outcomes that can be measured within year, helping to prioritise the work they do based on what will deliver the most value and support our broader corporate strategy, whilst building a collaborative, safe environment for designers to test and learn at pace.
  • Look for opportunities to drive consistency across our customer experiences, bringing designers together across your team to collaborate around common outcomes.
  • Work with the Heads of Product in digital to drive exceptional customer experience in everything we deliver for our customers, influencing roadmaps and bringing the customer to life in all conversations.
  • Lead and manage stakeholders and project teams through a user-centred design approach whilst balancing business challenges and strategic vision.
  • Work with the guidelines, marketing, transformation, strategy, eCommerce and product teams to ensure we show up consistently for customers.
  • Collaborate closely with our experience design research, data and insights teams to identify opportunities and measure the impact our experiences have for colleagues, customers and towards achieving our corporate strategic priorities.
  • Act as an ambassador for design led thinking across the Sainsbury’s Group; informing and engaging all divisions including marketing, retail, strategy and commercial on the value that exceptional design can bring to our customers
  • Lead your design team on a day-to-day basis, empowering them to be their best self, whilst also supporting their personal development, helping them grow and flourish within the Sainsbury’s group.

  Skills we’re looking for:

  • Extensive experience as a design leader, leading a large design team across a broad portfolio of work
  • Strong working knowledge of and passion for user-centred experience design
  • Excellent communication, presentation and influencing skills up to Director level
  • Proven ability to manage and lead large, complex teams, priorities and resources across engagements, based on short and long-term needs
  • Proven ability to provide clear design direction to influence delivery needed to support a compelling experience vision
  • Proven ability to support designers with their own personal development, helping coach, lead and mentor senior designers.

  What you need to show:

  • Strong thought leadership on design led thinking and service design within a broad, complex team
  • The ability to collaborate with both experts and generalists in a large retail environment
  • High levels of collaboration with both digital, technology and marketing colleagues
  • The willingness to drive business transformation by using design thinking
  • Experience of managing creative teams in large scale businesses or agencies
  • Ability to work in a matrix organisation, with strong influencing skills to ensure the business supports and delivers the experiences you and the team create
  • Strong mentoring and leadership skills
  • The ability to communicate the value of customer and colleague experience and service design in commercial terms

  Support we will provide:

  • A thriving design culture, opportunity to discuss and share work with open, collaborative feedback
  • A mature design system and set of standards to work with
  • Research, accessibility and UX copywriting expertise
  • Mentoring, support and plenty of opportunity to work with a talented design leadership team

  Tips and guidance on what we look for in portfolios: https://medium.com/p/1ace9c422d2

• About the company

  Shop online at Sainsbury's for groceries, clothing, homewares, electricals, financial services and more. Together we’re helping everyone eat better.

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