User Interface/User Experience Designer — Design System

CLA (CliftonLarsonAllen)•Cedar Rapids, IA

7d•Hybrid

About The Position

CLA is a top 10 national professional services firm where our purpose is to create opportunities every day, for our clients, our people, and our communities through industry-focused wealth advisory, digital, audit, tax, consulting, and outsourcing services. Even with more than 8,500 people, 130 U.S. locations, and a global reach, we promise to know you and help you. CLA is dedicated to building a culture that invites different beliefs and perspectives to the table, so we can truly know and help our clients, communities, and each other. CLA is growing and seeking to hire an experienced User Interface/User Experience Designer — Design System to join our talented Information Technology team. The position offers growth, flexibility and a collaborative work environment. In this position you should have the following; excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to communicate at all levels. Strong problem solving and creative skills and the ability to exercise sound judgment. Most important, demonstrate a high level of integrity and dependability with a strong sense of urgency and results-orientation. This Designer owns product design work for an assigned product surface within CLA’s digital portfolio while contributing to shared design system components. This is a hybrid role: it combines strong product design practice (assuming AI-enabled prototyping fluency) and design system ownership. AI-workflow is integrated into how this designer works, used throughout discovery, validation, and stakeholder alignment to move work faster and with more evidence. As a senior design voice within cross-functional triads (Product, Engineering, UX), the Senior Designer partners from problem definition through delivery and is accountable for business outcomes, not just deliverables. Design at this level functions as decision support, with outputs tied to measurable business problems, validated user needs, and workflow adoption goals. The role challenges low-evidence work and elevates design as a strategic input to what gets built. The role models best practices in continuous discovery, AI-assisted prototyping, evidence-based decision-making, and design system discipline. This role reports to the Manager of Product UX and partners closely with peer designers across CLA’s UX organization.

Requirements

6+ years of experience in UX or product design within complex enterprise environments
Proven ownership of product domains or end-to-end workflows with measurable outcomes
Demonstrated experience designing within a mature design system at scale, including direct contribution back to shared components, participation in governance discussions, and partnership with engineering on cross-team adoption
Experience working in cross-functional product teams to shape direction and delivery
Strong portfolio demonstrating strategic thinking, decision-making, and impact
Experience leading discovery and translating ambiguous problems into clear direction
Strong communication and stakeholder management skills
Working knowledge of accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1 AA)
Bachelor's degree or a combination of relevant experience and training may be considered in lieu of a degree.
Experience contributing to component libraries or design system governance
Experience as a designer on AI-enabled product features (in addition to AI-enabled prototyping)
Familiarity with product analytics, behavioral design, and modern prototyping tools
Experience mentoring designers or contributing to team development
Experience with enterprise component frameworks (Material UI (MUI) preferred)
Experience mentoring designers or contributing to team development

Responsibilities

Own design strategy and delivery for an assigned product surface, partnering with PMs and engineering to set direction and define success
Connect design work to measurable business and user outcomes (e.g., efficiency, adoption, quality)
Lead discovery to identify high-value problems and translate insights into actionable direction
Use AI-enabled prototyping tools (Lovable, Figma Make, v0, Cursor, or equivalent) as a primary method to validate direction before engineering invests, surface trade-offs early, and align stakeholders around evidence
Move work from problem framing through validation, high-fidelity design, and engineering handoff
Generate and communicate trade-offs that inform product-level decisions
Design end-to-end workflows across roles, systems, and dependencies
Balance long-term experience quality with practical delivery constraints
Build and refine components, tokens, and patterns in the Seamless Design System so they scale across products
Identify reusable patterns from product work and contribute them back to the design system with clear rationale
Promote disciplined reuse and prevent unnecessary divergence from established patterns
Partner with the team to drive common componentry to ensure decisions hold up across the portfolio
Document and govern contributions so other designers can reuse them confidently
Partner with Product, Engineering, Research, and business stakeholders to shape direction
Communicate design rationale in business terms (outcomes, value, risk, trade-offs)
Influence and align stakeholders without formal authority, including non-designers who push back on design decisions
Navigate ambiguity and organizational complexity to drive progress
Deliver high-quality interaction and visual design across workflows and states
Apply accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1 AA) and behavioral design principles
Raise the bar on AI-enabled prototyping across the team, sharing patterns and methods other designers can adopt
Stay current on emerging AI-enabled design and prototyping tools, evaluating fit for CLA’s workflow
Mentor designers on product thinking, craft, and stakeholder engagement
Contribute to team practices, standards, and knowledge sharing across the UX organization