Lead UX Design

athenahealth • Boston, MA

2d • $130,000 - $222,000

About The Position

Design meaningful experiences that help healthcare teams work more effectively in athenahealth’s EHR and practice management products. Partner with product and engineering to solve complex clinical and operational problems through UX strategy, research, and design execution. Balance design craft with practical decision-making in a large, regulated product environment. The role reports to the UI & UX Design Manager.

The team designs experiences for core clinical and operational workflows across healthcare organizations. It partners with product, engineering, clinical, and research stakeholders to improve usability, consistency, and value delivery across the product suite. The team uses user research, design systems, prototyping tools, and collaborative planning to shape and validate solutions across a complex product landscape.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Design, Human-Computer Interaction, Cognitive Psychology, Computer Science, Business, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 5+ years of professional experience in digital product design.
• Experience creating strong design deliverables, including visual design, interaction design, prototyping, copywriting, and design specifications.
• Experience planning, facilitating, analyzing, and presenting user research using qualitative and quantitative methods.
• Experience working in an agile software development environment.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Strong stakeholder management skills, including the ability to influence without direct authority.
• Ability to work through ambiguity, evaluate tradeoffs, and make timely decisions that keep work moving forward.

Nice To Haves

• Experience using AI tools as part of a design workflow.
• Experience designing for complex enterprise, healthcare, or workflow-heavy products.

Responsibilities

• Lead discovery and framing of user-centered problems across complex product areas.
• Facilitate visioning sessions and translate ideas into sketches, flows, wireframes, and prototypes.
• Conduct and synthesize user research, heuristic reviews, and client feedback to inform design decisions.
• Partner with product and engineering throughout agile planning, development, and release cycles to ensure design intent is carried through implementation.
• Develop interaction models and workflows that simplify complex user, system, and data relationships.
• Present design concepts, recommendations, and tradeoffs to product, clinical, and engineering stakeholders.
• Mentor junior designers through design reviews, feedback, and day-to-day collaboration.
• Support team-level design practices and process improvements that strengthen consistency and quality.
• Use AI tools to accelerate design exploration, prototyping, and refinement, applying judgment to select, adapt, and validate outputs before sharing with partners.
• Travel 20% annually.
• Contribute to design system adoption and consistency across product experiences.
• Support cross-functional planning by helping clarify scope, risks, and design dependencies.
• Collaborate on documentation that communicates design rationale and implementation guidance.
• Participate in team critiques and shared learning to strengthen design quality.
• Help identify opportunities to improve workflows, tools, and team practices.
• Support onboarding and knowledge sharing for new team members.
• Adapt to changing priorities and contribute to adjacent work as needed.

Benefits

• Health and financial benefits.
• Commuter support.
• Employee assistance programs.
• Tuition assistance.
• Employee resource groups.
• Collaborative workspaces; some offices welcome dogs.
• Flexible work arrangements intended to support work-life balance.
• Events including book clubs, external speakers, and hackathons.
• Learning opportunities, support from an engaged team, and an inclusive environment.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior