Design System Lead

BRMi • Vienna, VA

17h • $90,000 - $124,000 • Onsite

About The Position

We are seeking an experienced Platform Design Systems Lead to guide the development, governance, adoption, and continuous improvement of design-system practices within an assigned digital product platform. This role ensures platform-specific components, design tokens, patterns, documentation, and implementation guidance align with established enterprise design-system standards while supporting scalable, consistent, accessible, and high-quality digital experiences.
The Platform Design Systems Lead will collaborate with design, engineering, product, accessibility, and enterprise design-system teams to translate organizational standards into practical platform solutions. This position focuses on platform-level strategy, governance, documentation, adoption, technical enablement, and design-to-development workflows rather than ownership of the enterprise-wide design system.
The ideal candidate combines strong design-system expertise with front-end technical knowledge, an understanding of CI/CD and release processes, and the ability to influence cross-functional teams. While hands-on development experience is valuable, the primary focus is on improving design-system adoption, implementation consistency, accessibility, and operational efficiency.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in design systems, product design, design operations, front-end engineering, or a related digital product discipline.
• Demonstrated experience leading, governing, or significantly contributing to design-system adoption within a product area, platform, or large-scale digital environment.
• Working knowledge of front-end technologies, including HTML, CSS/SCSS, JavaScript, and TypeScript.
• Familiarity with modern component frameworks and libraries such as React, Vue, or comparable technologies.
• Ability to collaborate effectively with engineering teams and evaluate technical implementation feasibility.
• Experience with design token management, theming systems, component-library architecture, and cross-platform implementation considerations.
• Understanding of CI/CD concepts and workflows, including build, testing, release management, versioning, documentation, dependency management, and quality assurance.
• Experience identifying technical and process gaps and translating findings into actionable recommendations.
• Strong understanding of design principles, UI/UX best practices, accessibility standards, and inclusive digital experience practices.
• Knowledge of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
• Experience using design tools such as Figma.
• Experience with design-system documentation platforms such as Storybook, Zeroheight, or comparable tools.
• Strong understanding of design-system governance, contribution models, component documentation, and adoption practices.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, facilitation, leadership, and stakeholder management skills.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate across design, engineering, product, accessibility, and leadership teams.
• Strong organizational, analytical, problem-solving, and change-management skills.

Nice To Haves

• Experience partnering with front-end engineering teams on component libraries, design token pipelines, CI/CD processes, release governance, or documentation automation preferred.
• Hands-on experience developing front-end prototypes, implementation examples, or component documentation using HTML, CSS/SCSS, JavaScript/TypeScript, React, Vue, or similar technologies preferred.
• Experience supporting a hybrid design-system model that incorporates enterprise standards and platform-specific implementation practices preferred.
• Experience with mobile or cross-platform design systems, including React Native, SwiftUI, Jetpack Compose, or similar frameworks preferred.
• Background in design operations, design tooling, documentation strategy, or platform-level design-system governance preferred.
• Experience supporting accessibility audits, design-system quality reviews, adoption measurement, or contribution-model improvements preferred.
• Experience contributing to open-source design systems, UI libraries, or reusable internal component libraries preferred.

Responsibilities

• Define and maintain the platform design-system roadmap in alignment with product objectives, platform priorities, accessibility requirements, and enterprise design-system standards.
• Promote adoption of approved design patterns, components, design tokens, documentation, and contribution practices across the assigned platform.
• Represent platform requirements, constraints, and feedback in enterprise design-system discussions to support practical implementation.
• Provide recommendations to leadership regarding design-system priorities, technical gaps, adoption challenges, risks, and opportunities for improvement.
• Collaborate with design, engineering, product, accessibility, and enterprise design-system teams to ensure platform solutions meet business, user, technical, and accessibility requirements.
• Establish and maintain platform-level governance processes, contribution workflows, intake procedures, decision criteria, and implementation standards.
• Facilitate collaboration between designers, developers, and stakeholders to improve design-to-development handoffs, clarify ownership, and align expectations.
• Coordinate with enterprise design-system partners on cross-platform requirements, standards, and decisions.
• Evaluate front-end implementation feasibility and provide technical guidance regarding design-system components, patterns, and design tokens.
• Partner with front-end engineers to ensure components and patterns are accessible, performant, reusable, maintainable, and aligned with enterprise standards.
• Support improvements to CI/CD and release processes for design-system assets, including build, testing, documentation, versioning, dependency management, and deployment workflows.
• Identify technical gaps in component libraries, design token pipelines, documentation, and implementation processes and recommend improvements.
• Develop platform implementation guidance, technical examples, and lightweight prototypes as needed.
• Create and maintain design-system documentation using tools such as Storybook, Zeroheight, and other documentation platforms.
• Develop and deliver training materials, workshops, office hours, and onboarding resources to promote consistent design-system adoption.
• Document component usage guidelines, design token applications, accessibility expectations, contribution processes, and engineering handoff standards.
• Provide guidance to platform teams regarding the appropriate use of enterprise standards and platform-specific implementation practices.
• Conduct platform audits to evaluate design consistency, code alignment, accessibility compliance, documentation quality, and design-system adoption.
• Analyze audit results, adoption metrics, and stakeholder feedback to identify opportunities for improvement.
• Monitor emerging design-system technologies, accessibility practices, documentation tools, and front-end development trends.
• Recommend improvements that reduce rework, strengthen implementation consistency, and improve design-system maturity.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Benefits

• Comprehensive Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance
• Employer-Paid Life Insurance
• Employer-Paid Short-Term and Long-Term Disability Insurance
• 401(k)
• Paid Time Off (PTO) that includes Vacation Leave, Sick Leave, and 11 Paid Holidays
• Educational Assistance

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Education Level: No Education Listed