Senior Director, Design

About this role

At LifeStance Health, we strive to help individuals, families, and communities with their mental health needs. Everywhere. Every day. It’s a lofty goal; we know. But we make it happen with the best team in mental healthcare.

Thank you for taking the time to explore a career with us. As the fastest growing mental health practice group in the country, now is the perfect time to join our team!

LifeStance Health Values • Belonging: We cultivate a space where everyone can show up as their authentic self.

• Empathy: We seek out diverse perspectives and listen to learn without judgment.

• Courage: We are all accountable for doing the right thing - even when it's hard - because we know it's worth it.

• One Team: We realize our full potential when we work together towards our shared purpose.

Benefits As a full-time employee of LifeStance Health, the following benefits are offered: medical, dental, vision, AD&D, short and long-term disability, and life insurance. Additional benefits include a 401k retirement savings with employer match, paid parental leave, paid time off, holiday pay and an Employee Assistance Program.

ROLE OVERVIEW

As Senior Director, Design, you will lead and scale LifeStance’s design organization (Product Design, Research, Service Design, Content, and related disciplines). You will own the strategy for delivering cohesive, end-to-end experiences across the patient journey and the workflows of all key user groups—patients, clinicians, operations staff, referring providers, and payors. Your role is to empower and enable designers and researchers to execute this vision, while raising the bar on craft, embedding human-centered thinking, and ensuring design is a strategic differentiator in mental health care.

You will partner closely with Product, Engineering, Clinical, Operations, Marketing, and leadership to align design impact with business goals, clinical outcomes, and operational realities, and you will advocate with senior leadership to ensure design thinking remains a top organizational priority. Consistent with LifeStance’s values, every member of the LifeStance team is expected to support each other and the mission, which may mean participating in projects and initiatives and performing functions and responsibilities not specifically outlined in this job description.

COMPENSATION: $229,000 - $286,000/annually in addition to a competitive bonus plan

KEY RESPONSIBILITES  

Strategy & Vision • Define and drive the design vision and strategy aligned with LifeStance’s mission, growth objectives, and care model

• Translate strategic priorities into coherent design roadmaps and initiatives

• Evangelize design thinking across the organization—ensure design is deeply woven into how decisions are made

• Champion the User: Be the ultimate advocate for our users in all product decisions. Drive a culture of deep user empathy and leverage research and data to inform our design direction.

Leadership & Team Building • Build, mentor, and lead a multidisciplinary design organization (product designers, design ops, design managers, and research)

• Hire top talent and foster an environment of psychological safety, craftsmanship, collaboration, growth, and innovation

• Champion and elevate the craft of design across the organization. Be the standard-bearer for quality, establishing processes and systems that ensure we ship polished, thoughtful, and impactful work.

• Define competencies, career paths, performance frameworks, learning & development for designers

Cross-Functional Collaboration • Partner with Product, Engineering, Clinical leaders, and Operations to integrate design thinking early

• Be a voice for user empathy, human values, accessibility, equity, and inclusion in all design decisions

• Help measure and define design-led KPIs (e.g. adoption, retention, NPS, usability metrics, engagement) and tie design work to business outcomes

• Act as design representative in executive-level discussions, board-level discussions, and external forums

Research, Insights & Innovation • Oversee strategy for generative and evaluative research—ensure insights continuously inform design direction

• Foster experimentation mindset (A/B tests, prototyping, rapid iteration)

• Partner with collaborators to bring more personalized, data-driven, adaptive experiences

• Continuously scan design, health-tech, and mental-health trends for opportunities (e.g. AI/ML personalization, conversational UX, VR/AR therapeutic experiences)

REQUIREMENTS

• 10+ years in product / experience / service design, with at least 5 years in leadership (VP, Head, or equivalent)

• Proven track record scaling and leading design organizations across disciplines (UX, UI, research, content, service design)

• Experience in high-complexity, regulated domains (healthcare, wellness, mental health, medical, fintech, etc.)

• Deep expertise in user-centered design, design systems, service design, research methodologies

• Ability to partner with executives, communicate design vision, and influence strategy

• Portfolio demonstrating end-to-end design thinking, strategic impact, and high craft

• Strong operational skills: setting up process, structure, metrics, design governance

• Passion, empathy, and sensitivity—you deeply care about improving mental health access, experience, equity

• Qualified candidates must be legally authorized to be employed in the United States

• LifeStance is an EEO/Affirmative Action Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other legally protected status.

• Demonstrates awareness, inclusivity, sensitivity, humility, and experience in working with individuals from diverse ethnic backgrounds, socioeconomic statuses, sexual orientations, gender identities, and other various aspects of culture.

PREFERRED SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE

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