Senior Manager, Product Design - Design Platform

Upstart is an AI lending marketplace focused on reducing the cost and complexity of borrowing through technology. The Senior Manager, Product Design - Design Platform will lead the Design Platform team while remaining hands-on, shaping the design system, web and mobile platform strategy, and AI-enabled workflows that help teams move from idea to production.

Responsibilities:

• Shape the next generation of Upstart’s design system, defining the component architecture, token strategy, and visual language that guide how products are built across the company
• Define our platform strategy across web and mobile app, deciding what should be shared and where each experience should feel distinct
• Explore what AI-enabled design systems can become, turning emerging capabilities into new workflows, machine-readable standards, and tools that change how teams build
• Define how we measure impact, using data to guide priorities and build leadership support
• Establish the operating model for the Design Platform, creating clear ownership, governance, and contribution models across platform and product teams
• Develop two senior designers as leaders and builders, giving them the context, feedback, and space to take on ambitious platform work
• Partner with engineering and product design leaders to rethink how products get built, making the Design Platform the foundation teams use to move from idea to production

Requirements:

• 8+ years of product design experience, including 2+ years of direct people management experience
• Experience building or substantially scaling a design system adopted across multiple product teams
• Experience defining design patterns or platform strategy across both web and native mobile experiences
• Experience owning design systems work across components, tokens, documentation, governance, and visual design direction
• Experience partnering directly with engineering on design system implementation, including component APIs and token architecture
• Ability to prototype or contribute to component implementation
• Experience with AI-assisted design, prototyping, build tooling, or design-to-code workflows
• Knowledge of multi-platform theming and native mobile design systems across iOS and Android
• Analytical skills to use data to measure impact, identify insights, and inform decisions
• Business judgment to set priorities, make tradeoffs, and build leadership support
• Experience developing senior individual contributors and facilitating design critique