Principal Product Designer

IFS•Austin, TX

3d•Hybrid

About The Position

IFS is a global enterprise software company seeking a Principal Product Designer to join their team. The role involves designing solutions for critical industries like field service, asset management, manufacturing, and supply chain. The designer will be responsible for the full product design lifecycle, from problem framing to shipped and measured product, working within cross-functional squads. A key aspect of the role is exploring how emerging technologies like AI, ambient computing, and voice will shape future user interfaces in these industries. The company emphasizes innovation, collaboration, sustainability, and diversity.

Requirements

At least 8 years of end-to-end product design experience — from discovery through to shipped product — and you can point to work that reflects real ownership, not just execution
Comfortable running your own research: planning the study, conducting interviews, synthesising findings, and turning them into a clear design direction
Know how to work in a cross-functional squad — making real decisions alongside engineers and PMs, not waiting to be handed a brief
Know Figma well and have the visual craft to back your thinking up
Treat accessibility as a design constraint from the start, not a checklist at the end
Have thought seriously about what AI means for the interfaces you build — not just as a feature to add, but as something that changes the fundamental design problem
Measure your work — task success rates, support ticket volume, adoption — and use those signals to drive the next iteration

Nice To Haves

Experience shipping AI-driven features — prompts, fallbacks, human-in-the-loop moments — not just awareness of the concepts
Familiarity with design tokens, contribution models, and what it means to design for a system rather than a screen
Some exposure to quantitative signals: task success rates, funnel data, or A/B results — and a habit of using them

Responsibilities

Own design for defined feature areas end-to-end — from problem framing through to production-ready Figma files, with a clear rationale for every decision
Work in a cross-functional squad with engineers and PMs, making real decisions rather than executing on someone else's brief
Present design thinking to stakeholders with confidence — handling pushback with evidence, not just conviction
Plan and run user interviews, JTBD analysis, and journey mapping independently — turning findings into clear design direction, not just a readout
Track quantitative signals alongside qualitative insight, and use both to drive iteration
Design AI-driven features with a clear understanding of where AI helps and where it introduces risk — prompts, fallbacks, and human-in-the-loop moments included
Bring a genuine perspective on how the interfaces we're building today might become obsolete — and what should replace them
Contribute to the IFS design system by proposing reusable components and patterns rather than designing one-offs
Apply WCAG 2.1+ accessibility standards from the start, and design for edge cases, error states, and real-world data — not just the happy path