Our mission is to democratize opportunity for students everywhere. We believe that every student should have an equal opportunity to build a meaningful career regardless of where they go to school, what they major in, or who they know. The Handshake community includes 14 million students and young alumni at more than 700 universities. We connect talent from across all 50 states with over 300,000 employers recruiting on Handshake - from every Fortune 500 company to thousands of local mom and pop shops, nonprofits, startups, and more.

We welcome all people. We celebrate diversity of all kinds and are committed to creating an inclusive culture built on a foundation of respect for all individuals. We seek to hire, develop and retain talented people from all backgrounds. Individuals from non-traditional backgrounds, historically marginalized or underrepresented groups strongly encouraged to apply.

If you are not sure that you’re 100% qualified, but up for the challenge - we want you to apply.

Design at Handshake

We’re designing the future of career discover and recruiting for students; from their initial school acceptance letters to their first job offers, we’re committed to understanding and supporting each student as they navigate one of life’s most complex journeys.

Our design team is growing and we cover a lot of ground. We collaborate with every team across Handshake—from product management to engineering; from sales to support—because incorporating user insights from across the business leads to better design outcomes. Creativity thrives in diverse environments, and we’re committed to growing a design team that reflects the diversity of students we serve and support.

Your Impact

Handshake is hiring a Design Program Manager reporting directly to Handshake’s head of design on our growing team. This role will require you to span from strategy to surface, blending exceptional execution, systems thinking, and empathy to deliver design at Handshake. Your work will be foundational across all aspects of the Handshake experience, helping students discover their first jobs and universities and employers guide early career discovery.

Your Role

• Design Program Manager on a small, highly leveraged team.
• Work from concept to delivery to inform product strategy and shape experience for students, employers, and career services on Handshake.
• Partner with product, research, and engineering to ensure projects are well defined, high impact, and successfully executed.
• Understand Handshake's core features and product inside out, and work with the team to help set design goals and trajectory; elevate the quality of the work
• Balance priorities, resources and concurrent streams of work, helping the drive the team to meet deadlines
• Facilitate and participate in design reviews, prep, and post-mortem
• Shape, drive, and document processes and tools for effective team collaboration
• Own the design project lifecycle—from strategic planning, requirements gathering, design reviews, delivery, to implementation and launch
• Lead planning and prioritization with cross functional teams, balancing multiple inputs
• Provide visibility into current projects, team utilization, project health and priorities
• Up level the entire team through commitment to growth and mentorship.

Your Experience

• 4-6 years of experience working in a professional design setting, either in-house or agency
• Experience establishing, following, and socializing workflows, planning projects, and shipping high quality design.
• A collaborative, no ego, approach to working with others.
• Experience presenting work to leadership and executive teams in a startup environment
• Uncompromising passion for user experience and design
• Willingness to roll up your sleeves and work across a variety of channels
• Experience partnering with designers, researchers, and product managers.
• Great communication skills, written and verbal
• Relevant understanding and appreciation of current product design processes and systems
• Comfortable with ambiguity, and resilience in managing change
• Adept with diplomacy and conflict resolution

Benefits

• Stock: Ownership in a fast-growing company.
• 401k: We care about your ability to save for your future.
• Family Focus: Parental leave and flexibility for families.
• Time Off: Flexible vacation policy to encourage people to get out and see the world.
• Healthcare: World-class medical, dental, and vision policies.
• Goodies: Whatever hardware and software you need to get the job done.
• Team Fun: Regularly scheduled events, sports, game nights, book clubs.
• Learning: Learning & Development opportunities for you to grow your skills and career.
• Great team: Working with fun, hardworking, nice people who are committed to making a difference!
• ...and much more!

We value diversity of all kinds, and are committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace where we learn from each other. We are an equal opportunity employer and welcome people of all different backgrounds, experiences, abilities and perspectives.