Function : Design

Reports to : VP Product

Location : Gurgaon - On-site, 3 days/week (Monday, Tuesday and Thursday)

Engagement : Contract

Experience : 15+ years in strictly consumer-tech product design, at least 3 years in a design team leadership role

Works with : Vertical PMs, Platform PMs, Engineering, Product Analytics

About CIMET :

CIMET powers Australia's leading Comparison-as-a-Service (CaaS) platform across Energy, Telecom, Insurance, and Finance. We are evolving from a comparison tool into a platform that guides households through complex financial decisions, proactively recommends switching opportunities, and builds a trusted long-term relationship with users across multiple life events and verticals.

Design is not a support function at CIMET. It is how we make that evolution real for the user.

Why this role exists :

CIMET's current design capability is a team of Designers supporting four verticals plus internal product work. As the platform scales and the product vision grows more complex - AI-powered recommendations, persistent user profiles, multi-vertical journeys, B2B white-label surfaces, design leadership needs to grow with it.

This role exists to raise the bar on the entire design function : sharper user journey thinking, tighter PM-Design collaboration, a real design system, and a culture where design drives conversion and trust outcomes, not just visual polish.

Role summary :

As UI/UX Lead, you will lead CIMET's design function across all consumer-facing and internal product surfaces. You will set the design standard, manage and grow the design team, own the design system, drive user research into every significant product decision, and be the strongest voice in the room on user experience quality and journey coherence.

This is a player-coach role. You will lead the function and hold the vision, and you will also be living in Figma (and the latest AI vibe design tool!) doing the work on the most complex journeys.

Non-negotiable bar :

You must have led design for a transactional consumer product where the primary user task is a high-stakes decision : financial, insurance, or comparable. Decorative, brand-led, or content-heavy design backgrounds will not qualify. The product you have led must show measurable conversion and trust outcomes from design decisions.

What you will own :

Design leadership and team :

- Lead, manage, and grow CIMET's design team : set individual expectations, run design critiques, manage workload allocation across verticals and platform, and build a culture of quality and directness.

- Define what 'good design' means at CIMET : set the quality bar, create review rituals, and hold the team to it.

- Build the design team's capability over time : identify gaps in the current team, define future hiring needs, and establish an onboarding standard.

- Represent design credibly at the leadership level : communicate design direction, trade-offs, and outcomes to VP Product, CTO, and CEO when relevant.

Design system and standards :

- Own and evolve CIMET's design system : component library, interaction patterns, motion standards, accessibility requirements, and design-to-dev handoff protocols.

- Ensure design system adoption is consistent across verticals and white-label surfaces, with clear governance on when custom components are allowed.

- Define the design token structure and work with engineering to ensure the design system is implemented in code, not just documented in Figma.

- Own the design system versioning and deprecation process so engineering teams are never working from stale specs.

User journey design across verticals :

- Own the end-to-end design of CIMET's core user journeys : comparison, eligibility, plan selection, checkout/application, and post-conversion touchpoints.

- Lead design for the most complex and highest-stakes surfaces : AI-powered recommendations, persistent user profiles, identity and onboarding, and multi-vertical journeys.

- Drive information architecture decisions before handing to visual design : PMs define what the product needs to do, you define how the user experiences it.

- Ensure design coherence across the platform : a user moving from Energy to Insurance to Finance should feel like they are using one product, not three.

User research and evidence-based design :

- Build user research into the product development cycle as a standard, not an occasional project : usability testing, concept validation, journey mapping, and synthesis.

- Own the relationship with any external research or user testing platforms used by the team.

- Challenge product decisions that are not grounded in user evidence - including your own.

- Build a culture where the design team generates and shares user insights, not just visual outputs.

PM-Design collaboration model :

- Define and enforce the handoff standard between PM and Design : PMs complete information architecture and user flow definition before design begins.

- Run structured design briefs, not open-ended requests : context, constraints, user goal, success metric, and timeline are required inputs.

- Create a review and feedback culture that is direct, specific, and focused on user outcomes, not preference.

- Work with the VP Product to embed design quality reviews into the quarterly product cycle.

Ideal candidate profile :

Experience (must-have) :

- 15+ years of product design experience in consumer-tech, with at least 3 years in a design team leadership role managing a team.

- Has owned the design of a transactional or high-stakes consumer product : financial services, insurance, e-commerce checkout, utility switching, or comparable.

- Deep experience in conversion-critical journey design : multi-step forms, eligibility flows, offer presentation, and checkout/application surfaces.

- Has built or significantly evolved a design system that is adopted in production code, not just documented.

- Experience working in a multi-product or multi-vertical environment where design coherence across surfaces is a real challenge.

Design craft (must-have) :

- Expert Figma proficiency : component architecture, auto-layout, prototyping, and handoff. Experience with Figma's dev mode or equivalent.

- Strong information architecture instinct : can structure complex decision flows in ways that reduce cognitive load without oversimplifying.

- Mobile-first, responsive design fluency : CIMET's users are predominantly mobile. Every surface must be designed mobile-first.

- Accessibility standards : WCAG 2.2 AA minimum. Not a box-tick but embedded in design practice.

- Data-informed design : comfortable reading funnel data, heat maps, and session recordings to identify design failure points.

Leadership and collaboration :

- Direct and constructive : runs design reviews that improve work, not reviews that make people feel good. Gives specific feedback tied to user outcomes.

- PM peer, not PM service desk : challenges weak product briefs, pushes back on undefined problems, and refuses to design solutions before understanding the user goal.

- Engineering respect : understands implementation constraints well enough to design feasibly and at the same time pushes back when the engineering constraints are not credible.

- Research advocate : consistently pushes for user evidence before design decisions, even under timeline pressure.

- Taste and rigour : has genuine design taste and also insists on measurable outcomes. Both, not one or the other.

Tools and education :

- Figma (expert), Figma Make or equivalent prototyping tools, Attention Insights or equivalent heatmapping/attention analysis.

- Familiarity with user testing platforms : Maze, UserTesting, Lookback, or equivalent.

- Working knowledge of front-end constraints : HTML/CSS fundamentals, responsive grid systems, and design token implementation.

- Bachelor's degree in Design, HCI, or related field. Portfolio is weighted more heavily than degree pedigree.

Why join CIMET :

- Design that moves real numbers. We measure design success in funnel conversion, task completion and user trust, so your work shows up in the business.

- Hard, high-stakes problems. AI-powered recommendations, persistent user profiles, multi-vertical journeys and B2B white-label surfaces, all on one platform.

- A seat at the leadership table. You report to the VP Product and present design direction to the CTO and CEO when relevant.

- Build the function. Own the design system, set the quality bar and grow the design team across four verticals plus internal product work.

- A product company on the rise. We built our own comparison platform in 2017 and work directly with Australia's largest energy retailers, telecommunications providers and health funds. Around 220 people across Australia, India and the Philippines. ISO 27001 certified.

Working style and expectations

- Player-coach : you will lead the team and you will also be in Figma on the hardest journeys. This is not a purely managerial role.

- On-site, Gurgaon : this role requires full on-site presence 3 days a week (Monday, Tuesday and Thursday). Proximity to PMs and engineers is a functional requirement, not a preference.

- Conversion is a design metric : CIMET measures design success in funnel conversion, task completion, and user trust, not design awards or visual consistency alone.

- AI-assisted design is expected : you will use AI-assisted design tooling (Figma Make, AI prototyping tools, generative UI) as a standard part of the team's workflow, not as an experiment.

- Portfolio required : shortlisting will not proceed without a portfolio that includes at least 2 end to end transactional consumer journeys with stated conversion or usability outcomes.