Staff Product Designer, Districts

Posted Jul 20

ABOUT KHAN ACADEMY

Khan Academy is a nonprofit organization on a mission to provide a free, world-class education to anyone, anywhere. We already reach millions of students every month and are growing rapidly, and right now we’re hard at work helping learners address any unfinished learning that the COVID-19 pandemic may have caused. We also know that not all communities have been impacted equally by this pandemic, which makes our work focusing on providing equitable solutions to historically under-resourced communities even more important.

WE ARE DRIVEN BY OUR COMMUNITY

Our students, teachers, and parents come from all walks of life and so do we. We are fun, diverse, quirky people that come from a variety of backgrounds. Our team includes people from academia and from high tech companies and tiny startups. We hire great people from diverse backgrounds and experiences, not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because it makes our company stronger. Valuing diversity, equity and inclusion is necessary for us to actualize our mission and truly impact the communities we serve. We believe that the best way to provide impactful education is to create a diverse team of people from different backgrounds, races, religions, genders, sexual orientations, ages, and experiences. We’re a hardworking team that’s passionate about helping learners and teachers around the globe! We strive to be world class in investing in our people and commit to developing you as a professional.

THE ROLE

Imagine being a teacher in Sarasota, Florida, three years after the pandemic started, with a classroom full of 6th graders who haven’t had a normal year of school or learning since 2019. It’s the reality of so many educators and students who use Khan Academy – and our team is uniquely positioned to help them when they need it most.

We have no end of fascinating challenges that can only be solved with a deep empathy for our users, diligent product & UX thinking, and a strong drive to make a positive impact. Some questions we’re working on answering right now are:

How do we support teachers who are dealing with the impact that the pandemic had on learning?
How do we help students with learning gaps catch up to their grade level?
How do we center schools serving historically under-resourced communities in our product design and development?
How do we reach more school districts so our learning experience gets used in more classrooms?
…and more

The best part? Our work really matters: catch Sal talking to CNBC about low math and reading test scores.

We’re looking for a Staff Product Designer to embed with District Experience (vertical team) and Reporting & Insights (lateral team). The heart of this role is driving the end-to-end design strategy and solutions for reporting and data visualizations as a system – not just mockups and prototypes, but how we’re meeting business objectives and creating a competitive advantage in the market. Someone with a background working in early-stage startups and wearing multiple hats will feel right at home.

You’ll design solutions and experiences that will enable our Districts partners to implement Khan Academy successfully in their schools and classrooms, unlocking improvements to learning outcomes for students. You will develop a deep understanding of the districts and historically under-resourced communities we serve, analyze and synthesize what we know about our users and the market, generate hypotheses and experiment your way into creating value for school districts, with District Administrators as your primary stakeholder.

You will play a vital role on an inclusive, collaborative, small but mighty Design team, helping us fulfill the mission of the organization: to provide a free, world-class education to anyone, anywhere. We genuinely care about people and value compassion in our everyday interactions. You’ll be able to be yourself, feel valued, supported, learn and grow, no matter how experienced you are.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

Develop a robust data visualization design system for reporting across all user types, focusing on providing insights that drive instructional decisions across 3 dimensions: usage stats, progress in learning, and growth over time.
Leverage your previous B2B and/or B2B2C experience to navigate the tension between customer needs and what’s possible, thinking on your feet and looking for opportunities to do a little work in order to get customer requests met.
Integrate useful generative AI features into the existing “Classic Khan” experience that support the JTBDs of District Administrators and School Leaders.
Partner with the PMs, Eng Director, and heads of District Marketing and Partnerships on the product roadmap, strategy, and vision for what’s next, such as self-provisioning.
Set a standard of operational excellence by driving the design side of projects effectively through strong project management, lightning-fast execution on design iterations, and clear communication.
Join the cross-functional group that maintains our design systems, propose changes and additions to our design systems, review what other designers propose and help maintain internal consistency and usability.
Build alignment across diverse teams by being able to successfully present ideas to a range of teams and stakeholders across Khan Academy.
Manage simultaneous projects effectively through design project management, clear communication and goal setting.
Cultivate a growth mindset (another one of our values) by soliciting feedback on solutions from key stakeholders and learning how to partner effectively with Brand and Visual Design to ensure what you ship looks and feels like Khan Academy.
Write about, present, and share what you have learned, both internally and with the wider Design community via our blog and industry events.

WHAT YOU BRING

You have at least 8+ years of relevant experience on an in-house product design team.
You are outstanding across interaction design, prototyping, and information architecture, with strong visual design chops.
You have the ability to juggle ambiguous and broad problems/opportunities along with smaller well-defined projects.
You are a critical participant in design reviews, both in delivering feedback to teammates to strengthen their work, but also in soliciting feedback at every step of the process.
You have exceptional verbal and written communication skills for technical and non-technical partners, internally and externally.
You are comfortable in ambiguous situations and dynamic environments that run similar to a startup, where you regularly interact with and gather feedback from Senior Leadership.
You are scrappy, have a bias toward action, and love moving fast.
You know how to build strong relationships cross-functionally and bring people into the conversation when their input and buy-in is crucial.
You bring a lean approach to product design and regularly ask yourself: how do we learn quickly and ship regularly? What’s the most concise experience we can deliver that still provides value?
Bonus if you have experience with growth-stage products or designing for growth.

Qualities we value in ourselves, and those who join our team:

Introspective, mature, and emotionally intelligent.
Invested in your own growth and the growth of our Design team.
Proactively seek out the people/information you need to move work forward and unblock yourself.
High comfort level working within a strong product and pedagogical vision from our CEO Sal Khan and our CLO Kristen DiCerbo, PhD.
Able to balance the immediate tactical needs of helping deliver and ship features with scouting ahead for what’s next.
Willing to roll your sleeves up and pitch in when a project goes off-script.
Passionate about education and designing engaging learning experiences, deeply curious about how and why people learn.
Huge bonus if you’ve worked at a startup before.

NOTE: Submitting a portfolio with your application is required. We're looking for a portfolio that demonstrates exceptional design solutions and visual design chops that are aligned to business objectives within tight timeframes and constraints.

PERKS AND BENEFITS

We may be a non-profit, but we reward our talented team extremely well!

Competitive salaries
Ample paid time off as needed – we are about getting things done, not face time
Generous parental leave
A fun, high-caliber team that trusts you and gives you the freedom to be brilliant
The ability to put your talents towards a deeply meaningful mission and the opportunity to work on high-impact products that are already defining the future of education
Affinity groups where Parents, Black, Hispanic/Latino, Women and Gender Minorities, and LGBTQIA+ identified folks come together
And we offer all those other typical benefits as well: 401(k) + 4% matching & comprehensive insurance including medical, dental, vision, and life

At Khan Academy we are committed to fair and equitable compensation practices, the well-being of our employees, and our Khan community. This belief is why we have built out a robust Total Rewards package that includes competitive base salaries, and extensive benefits and perks to support physical, mental, and financial well-being.

For this position, our hiring salary range is $145,000-$181,000 USD or $163,000-$204,000 CAD, depending on your legal residence in the US or Canada, respectively. The pay range for this position is a general guideline only. We determine the final salary offer by factoring in experience and skills, evaluating the state of the job market, and assessing pay equity within the team.

MORE ABOUT US

The Design Team is a diverse and close-knit group, spanning many disciplines, who are passionate about designing for the complexities of education. We are driven by our dedication to learners, our craft, and nurturing our unique, low-ego, playful, and rigorous culture. We listen carefully, think deeply, and move quickly, to help millions of learners all over the world. Join us.

OUR COMPANY VALUES

Live & breathe learners

We deeply understand and empathize with our users. We leverage user insights, research, and experience to build content, products, services, and experiences that our users trust and love. Our success is defined by the success of our learners and educators.

Take a stand

As a company, we have conviction in our aspirational point of view of how education will evolve. The work we do is in service to moving towards that point of view. However, we also listen, learn and flex in the face of new data, and commit to evolving this point of view as the industry and our users evolve.

Embrace diverse perspectives

We are a diverse community. We seek out and embrace a diversity of voices, perspectives and life experiences leading to stronger, more inclusive teams and better outcomes. As individuals, we are committed to bringing up tough topics and leaning into different points of view with curiosity. We actively listen, learn and collaborate to gain a shared understanding. When a decision is made, we commit to moving forward as a united team.

Work responsibly and sustainably

We understand that achieving our audacious mission is a marathon, so we set realistic timelines and we focus on delivery that also links to the bigger picture. As a non-profit, we are supported by the generosity of donors as well as strategic partners, and understand our responsibility to our finite resources. We spend every dollar as though it were our own. We are responsible for the impact we have on the world and to each other. We ensure our team and company stay healthy and financially sustainable.

Bring out the joy

We are committed to making learning a joyful process. This informs what we build for our users and the culture we co-create with our teammates, partners and donors.

Cultivate learning mindset

We believe in the power of growth for learners and for ourselves. We constantly learn and teach to improve our offerings, ourselves, and our organization. We learn from our mistakes and aren’t afraid to fail. We don't let past failures or successes stop us from taking future bold action and achieving our goals.

Deliver wow

We insist on high standards and deliver delightful, effective end-to-end experiences that our users can rely on. We choose to focus on fewer things — each of which aligns to our ambitious vision — so we can deliver high-quality experiences that accelerate positive measurable learning with our strategic partners.

We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, or Veteran status. We value diversity, equity, and inclusion, and we encourage candidates from historically underrepresented groups to apply.