At Retool, we’re building a fundamentally better way to develop software. We believe in empowering technical builders with a new kind of development environment—one that makes it dramatically easier and faster to create mission-critical internal tools.

Retool designers make decisions that will affect millions of people, from the developers creating software to the employees who operate it every day. Instead of designing just one product, we’re effectively designing unique software products for thousands of companies across many different verticals.

This also presents a unique design challenge. Because it’s possible to build nearly anything in Retool, we don’t have absolute control over how our users experience the product. We’re constantly seeking just the right balance between convention and configuration, between technical expressiveness and conceptual simplicity.

As a Product Design Manager, you’ll be joining an experienced, tight-knit, and collaborative group from diverse backgrounds who love combining research, data insights, and peer feedback into a user-centered design process. While we work very closely with our product teams, we’re intentional about preserving space for designers to learn and work alongside each other.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Lead, mentor, and grow a team of product designers, providing guidance and fostering a high-performance, user-centered culture
• Own and drive the complete product design lifecycle of major features, setting a high bar for craft and execution
• Collaborate closely with cross-functional partners in product, engineering, success, sales, and marketing to align on priorities, uncover customer insights, and shape product strategy
• Conduct user research and synthesize findings to guide design decisions and validate solutions
• Define and evolve Retool’s design system, ensuring consistency and scalability across the platform
• Provide direct feedback, coaching, and structured career development to designers on your team
• Champion and establish best practices for user-centered design, usability, and accessibility across Retool
• Partner with leadership to build and scale the design function, influencing how design is valued and integrated into our broader product development process

YOU MIGHT WORK

• Design Team & Culture – Build and scale a high-performing design team by hiring top-tier talent, developing processes that enable great design, and fostering an inclusive and collaborative team environment
• Adoption – Accelerate the adoption of Retool by shortening time-to-value, inspiring new customers, and encouraging network effects
• Design Systems – Define the system that not only powers Retool’s UI but also enables customers to create cohesive internal tools

THE SKILLSET YOU'LL BRING

• Have 5+ years of experience in product design, with at least 2 years managing or mentoring designers
• Have a strong portfolio demonstrating generalist design skills and experience driving the product design lifecycle from end-to-end
• Are excited about breaking down technically complex problems into intuitive abstractions, balancing power and simplicity
• Love thinking systematically about hard problems with a lot of tradeoffs—then going deep on getting the details right through rapid, continual iteration
• Have experience designing developer-centric products, creative software, and/or enterprise internal tools
• Are customer-obsessed and excited to spend time with users to understand their needs and pain points
• Are an excellent communicator (and consider writing a fundamental design skill)
• Have experience working closely with engineers and product teams in fast-paced environments
• Thrive in ambiguity, can independently prioritize work based on user needs and business goals, and take responsibility to drive product ideas forward
• Have a strong bias toward action and a focus on driving impact, not just output
• Are comfortable with basic HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. (Bonus points if you have working knowledge of SQL, databases, or APIs!)