Over the last 14 years, Ellevation Education has built a thriving business serving the educators who support English Learners. Today, nearly 2,000 districts across the country use Ellevation software to drive English Language Development (ELD) in their schools. We are a successful, growing business with a real mission: helping ELLs achieve their highest aspirations.
We’re hiring a Director of Product Design to lead this function as we pursue our goal of being the premier and most impactful ELD solution on the market. This role reports to our Chief Product & Technology Officer and serves on the R&D Leadership team, where Design sits alongside Product and Engineering as an equal partner in developing strategy and setting direction.
You'll inherit a team of four product designers (with one to two open roles to fill) supporting work across four product domains. The core challenge is how to connect our compliance, instruction, and assessment tools into a set of unified workflows that drive impact in the classroom and across the district. The right candidate will bring a sharp recruiting eye, strong people leadership, and enough hands‑on judgment to set the bar.
Impact
- 1 month : Build a clear picture of Ellevation’s strategy and the role design plays in success. Internalize our approach to People Leadership and the Product Design Career Matrix. Develop rapport with direct reports, R&D leadership peers, and key commercial stakeholders. Understand our operating rhythm, team rituals, and shape‑up planning cadence.
- 3 months : Spend time with our customers and develop a clear sense of how they use Ellevation products. Develop a deep understanding of the feedback loops within the product. Understand Ellevation’s approach to recruiting and begin sourcing for open roles. Establish high‑trust relationships with other R&D and functional leaders. Partner with the Principal Product Designer to assess the current state of Backpack and the craft bar across the team.
- 6 months : Steward the overall direction of Product Design. Ensure designers are participating meaningfully in upstream shaping, not just downstream delivery. Partner with the Principal Product Designer to set and pursue the team’s craft, systems, and AI fluency goals. Work closely with R&D Leadership to calibrate on performance and resource allocation across Product, Engineering, and Design. Continue to grow influence across the organization.
- 12 months : Take full ownership of Product Design at Ellevation. Expand the team’s capacity through hiring, mentorship, and the rituals that let design scale across four domains. Work with Product and Engineering leadership to define healthy collaboration patterns from shaping through delivery. Partner with the Principal Product Designer to drive Backpack adoption as a competitive advantage.
About You
- 8+ years managing Product Designers, with a track record of building resilient teams, growing talent, and developing leaders.
- A clear communicator who can articulate design decisions to non‑design audiences and earn trust through framing trade‑offs.
- Raises the bar on craft. Gives honest feedback, pairs with designers on hard problems, and sets a clear standard for what good looks like.
- Bias to action. Tests ideas in the world, iterates on what ships, and does not get stuck debating.
- AI‑fluent. Has a developed perspective on AI in the design craft, builds LLM‑assisted workflows, and teaches others to do the same.
- Designs with empathy for users unlike themselves and brings diverse perspectives into the process.
Nice to Haves
- Enterprise SaaS builder background with experience delivering for both key decision‑makers and end‑users.
- Personally goes to the source on user research and brings the team along.
- Thinks in systems and creates coherent experiences across workflows rather than isolated features.
- Loves to win with great people. Builds influence across functions, shares credit broadly, brings out the best in others.
Travel Expectations
- Boston‑area preferred.
- Role requires in‑person presence in Boston minimum of 10 times per year for monthly 2‑day scheduled onsite visits.
Compensation: This role offers a competitive base salary of $170,000 – $220,000. The budgeted target is the midpoint, commensurate with candidate experience and internal parity. The full range reflects growth during employment. In addition, we provide a comprehensive benefits package to all full‑time employees.
Benefits: Medical, dental, vision, and basic life insurance. 401(k) retirement plan with employer match up to 50% of the first 7% contribution, pre‑tax and Roth options; flexible paid time off; sick and disability policy; 10 paid company holidays, 2 floating holidays, and winter office closure between Christmas and New Year’s; generous parental leave; backup childcare or eldercare and additional perks.
Additional Information
Ellevation operates under Curriculum Associates, LLC, an Equal Opportunity Employer. Curriculum Associates, LLC will not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment based on race, color, creed, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disability, genetic information or any other category protected by law. Such action shall include, but is not limited to, employment, upgrading, demotion, transfer, recruitment or recruitment advertising, layoff or termination, rates of pay or other forms of compensation.
We use E‑Verify to confirm the employment eligibility of all newly hired employees. Ellevation’s data‑collection practices comply with California privacy laws and uphold individuals’ rights.
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