Head of UX & Design

About Lanai

We believe we are in the midst of a 4th industrial revolution and AI is changing everything. Like all revolutions, this one has tremendous promise and comes with quite a lot of chaos.  With a forecasted explosion of different AI applications to support enterprises, the question is: how do leaders unlock the potential of AI for their specific goals and how do people working in companies evolve together with the technology?  This is where Lanai comes in.

Lanai is built for large organizations looking to “Lean into AI” in a thoughtful way.  Lanai will offer a software platform that helps companies adopt AI-based models and applications in a productive, cost-effective, and secure manner. Lanai’s co-founders are Lexi Reese (former COO of Gusto and VP of Google) and Steve Herrod (former CTO of VMware).  Steve incubated the concept with a talented team at Juxtapose earlier this year and Lexi is scaling the business with a talented team that shares deep technical and commercial expertise and diverse lived experiences. Lanai has received substantive funding from top-tier VC firms and will release its first product later this year.

The Impact You’ll have

UX and Design is a critical part of our ability to win in a complicated and crowded enterprise SaaS market.  You will be our founding, strategic design leader who drives the vision, strategy, and execution of exceptional user experiences across an organization's products and services. You will collaborate closely with cross-functional teams, including CEO/co-founders, product management, engineering, as well as customers (F1000 employers and employees) to ensure design plays a central role in achieving business objectives and delivering customer value.

Key Responsibilities:

Establish design as a critical competitive advantage for the business

• Align with founders to ensure design works on the highest-impact business goals

• Craft the design culture to reflect the product's core values of curiosity, commitment, clarity and community and company's aspirations to be a trusted partner to employers and employees in F1000 companies in all things Generative AI

• Advocate for the user and ensure their needs are at the forefront of all design decisions

• Drive design operations initiatives to optimize workflows, tools, and communication

Execute on design to drive business results

• Lead the end-to-end design process, from user research and concept development to prototyping and final design

• Showcase multiple designs to validate with customers and achieve overarching company goals

• Collaborate with executive leadership to integrate UX and design into the overall product strategy.

• Be a generalist comfortable with a wide range of design tasks (UX, UI, branding, etc.)

• Represent the company's design expertise internally and externally through thought leadership and community engagement

• Be at the forefront of AI-enabled and AI-first thinking in proposing user-centric designs

• Evaluate own design work objectively and iterate quickly

• Create wireframes, mockups, and prototypes to communicate design ideas and solutions effectively

Set up design processes and systems for future scaling

• Introduce lightweight processes to balance speed and quality

• Identify friction points with other departments and streamline communication

• Think ahead about how design processes can evolve as the company grows

• Use data and analytics to measure the effectiveness of design solutions and iterate based on user feedback and performance metrics.

Hire and grow a diverse, high-performing design team

• Invest time in expanding professional network to attract diverse talent

• Eventually …

  • Lead and mentor a team of designers (full time and contract), researchers, content strategists, and UX developers to create innovative, user-centered solutions (but - for next year or two, it will be you thinking the thoughts, doing the things!)

  • Foster a culture of design excellence, collaboration, and continuous improvement

  • Establish and maintain design processes, standards, and best practices

What You Bring 

The ideal candidate brings a proven track record of founding, leading and scaling high-performing design teams, deep expertise in UX design and product strategy, exceptional communication and collaboration skills.

• 8+ years of experience in UX/UI design skills across various platforms and products, with previous 0-1 experience as well as in bigger enterprise tech products

• Strong portfolio of work that demonstrates expertise in user research, branding, product design, website design

• Comfort with ambiguity, experimentation, and rapid iteration in a startup environment

• Strong communication skills, with the ability to articulate design concepts and strategies to cross-functional teams and external partners.

• Strong network of freelance collaborators that will follow you anywhere.

• Experience working in a fast-paced, deadline-driven environment.

• Bachelor's degree in design, Human Computer Interaction or a related field.

• Excellent leadership and management skills, with the ability to inspire and mentor a team of designers.

Working Environment

Lanai is based in Palo Alto and we co-create in our office, together, most of the time. We have a regular in-office cadence for team connection and brainstorming sessions, with the flexibility for remote work the rest of the time. We use the best collaboration tools, schedule regular offsites, and plan for team bonding experiences.

What We Offer

• $200,000-$250,000 annual base salary (based on level and experience) with significant equity options

• Health, dental, and vision insurance

• 401(k)

• 15 paid company holidays and 20 days PTO per year (5 days banked on Day 1)

• Your choice of tech!

Representative and Inclusive Employer

We’re committed to providing equal treatment and opportunity to all applicants at every stage of the hiring cycle and throughout their life at Lanai.  We don’t discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, gender identity, and sexual orientation), national origin, age, disability, veteran or military status, or any other legally protected status.

Note: Research says men tend to apply even if they only meet ~60% of the job qualifications, whereas women and other marginalized groups are hesitant to do so. If you don’t match 100% of the job qualifications but think you’d be a great fit, we encourage you to apply!