Product Design Architect

Okta•Washington, DC

9h•$216,000 - $297,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Identity is the key to unlocking the potential of AI. Okta secures AI by building the trusted, neutral infrastructure that enables organizations to safely embrace this new era. This work requires a relentless drive to solve complex challenges with real-world stakes. We are looking for builders and owners who operate with speed and urgency and execute with excellence. This is an opportunity to do career-defining work. We're all in on this mission. If you are too, let's talk. At Okta, we're building a world where anyone can safely use any technology, and, within Okta Platform R&D, we're specifically focused on protecting the future of work. We bring simple and secure access to people and organizations everywhere, promising to not only protect the identities of our customers' workforce and users, but to ask, "what more can we make possible?" As a Product Design Architect, you are the lead designer for the entire Okta platform. You ensure that all our products work together as one cohesive, simple, and secure experience. You will define the design vision, set company-wide standards, and influence high-level strategy alongside executive leadership. Where Principal Product Designers own the UX strategy within product and portfolio areas, you'll own the design architecture that connects them at the Okta-wide level, setting the innovation agenda, establishing standards across portfolios, and ensuring that Okta's products define what great identity experiences look like, both inside our walls and in the industry. This role sits at the intersection of design craft and strategic leadership. You'll work across R&D organizations, partnering with product and engineering leadership to make decisions that have broad, lasting impact on how millions of users navigate, understand, use, and trust Okta's products. This role shapes the highest-order design strategy across Okta's full product portfolio. You will lead company-wide discovery efforts and work hand-in-hand with product leadership and executive teams to translate business ambitions into compelling, human-centered product visions. You will establish best practices and raise design fluency across the entire Research & Development organization. You will help refine the structural design decisions that product teams build within: the platform-level IA, cross-product navigation models, shared interaction paradigms, and the design governance processes that ensure those standards hold over time. You'll do this through a combination of deep craft work (architecture maps, journeys and user flows, design standards), strategic facilitation (cross-org alignment, design reviews), and active mentorship of the senior and principal designers who look to you for direction. You won't be embedded in a single product area, you'll be the connective tissue across all of them. In this role, you'll get to… Communicate inspiring, forward-looking visions of the future for Okta and our customers that energize teams and attract talent Drive company-wide efforts that improve our ability to scale design solutions for the largest and most complex global customers Facilitate strategic sessions with senior leadership and executive teams and serve as an advocate for our customers at the most senior levels Influence company strategy and help define Okta's position in the market by contributing design perspective to the highest-level product and business conversations Set an example for how we best use AI across to ship high quality designs and evangelize those approaches across Engineering, Product, and Design. Enable execution across the company by aligning teams around company-level goals and design standards Collaborate with senior leadership to define the future of AI at Okta Actively work to uplevel design fluency across the entire company, not just the Product Design team, so that more of Okta thinks and builds with design quality as a baseline Mentor designers at any level; be a standard-bearer for Okta's core values and for industry best practices Be an early adopter of new methods in design, including AI-assisted workflows. Form an opinion about evolving design methods and practices, and help the organization adopt those new methods Stay deeply attuned to competitor products, UX trends, and emerging technology, and bring those insights into the organization in ways that create competitive advantage

Requirements

Degree in a related field or relevant work experience as a Product Designer
15+ years of experience as a Product Designer
Significant portion of time operating at a senior or principal level across large, complex product portfolios
Demonstrated proficiency in leveraging AI-powered design tools and plugins within your workflow
Proficient in Claude Code, Figma, Miro, and/or similar design and facilitation tools
Possess at least a basic knowledge of HTML/CSS/JavaScript/React
Industry expert with experience designing for enterprise scale and identity security
AI-first mindset with practical experience using AI tools in daily design workflows
Company-wide, systems-level perspective; ability to see across the entire product portfolio and identify connective tissue
Strategic thought partner to product leadership and executive teams
Proven ability to lead and facilitate design thinking at the executive level
Ability to translate abstract business goals into actionable, human-centered design strategies
Ability to create new organizational and operational standards that outlast any individual deliverable
Effective external voice for Okta Design (represent Okta at conferences, contribute bylines, appear on podcasts)
Exceptional communication skills; ability to distill complex concepts into clear, inspiring narratives for any audience
Share Okta's values and work in accordance with those values

Responsibilities

Define the design vision for the entire Okta platform.
Set company-wide design standards.
Influence high-level strategy alongside executive leadership.
Own the design architecture that connects product and portfolio areas at the Okta-wide level.
Set the innovation agenda and establish standards across portfolios.
Ensure Okta's products define great identity experiences.
Lead company-wide discovery efforts.
Work with product leadership and executive teams to translate business ambitions into product visions.
Establish best practices and raise design fluency across the R&D organization.
Refine structural design decisions including platform-level IA, cross-product navigation models, and shared interaction paradigms.
Define design governance processes to ensure standards hold over time.
Perform deep craft work (architecture maps, journeys, user flows, design standards).
Facilitate strategic sessions (cross-org alignment, design reviews).
Mentor senior and principal designers.
Communicate inspiring, forward-looking visions of the future for Okta and customers.
Drive company-wide efforts to scale design solutions for large global customers.
Facilitate strategic sessions with senior leadership and executive teams.
Serve as an advocate for customers at the most senior levels.
Influence company strategy and define Okta's market position.
Set an example for using AI to ship high-quality designs and evangelize these approaches.
Enable execution by aligning teams around company-level goals and design standards.
Collaborate with senior leadership to define the future of AI at Okta.
Uplevel design fluency across the entire company.
Mentor designers at any level.
Be a standard-bearer for Okta's core values and industry best practices.
Be an early adopter of new design methods, including AI-assisted workflows.
Form opinions on evolving design methods and help the organization adopt them.
Stay attuned to competitor products, UX trends, and emerging technology.
Bring insights into the organization to create competitive advantage.