Design Engineer

ABOUT ECHELON

Echelon is building the AI platform for Business Operations. Our goal is to automate the knowledge work of BizOps so one exceptional operator can deliver the leverage of an entire team, as Ramp and Rippling have done for Finance and HR.

Our platform combines passive process mining with a living ontology that maps how work happens across people, systems, documents, decisions, and outcomes. It connects structured and unstructured data trapped in fragmented, duplicative, and legacy enterprise systems, then turns that context into automated workflows and AI agents.

We are an early-stage company tackling a difficult product and technical problem at high speed. You will work directly with founders and engineers, make decisions with incomplete information, ship, and own the results. The pace, rate of change, and standards are high.

THE MANDATE

Own design at Echelon. Turn complex enterprise data and workflows into clear, polished product experiences, and establish a design direction the team can trust. We need a hands-on design leader with exceptional craft, strong product judgment, and the speed to support a growing engineering team.

You will partner closely with our founders, bring informed recommendations to the table, and take ownership of day-to-day design decisions so the founders can step back from detailed design oversight.

WHAT YOU'LL OWN

• Lead product design from an ambiguous problem through exploration, interaction design, visual design, and implementation with engineering.
• Design clean, professional dashboards and workflows that make complex data, relationships, evidence, and recommendations easy to understand and act on.
• Set a coherent visual and interaction standard across the product, with reusable patterns that help engineers ship consistently.
• Move quickly between ideas, Figma, AI tools, and prototypes to test options, gather feedback, and keep engineering moving.
• Work directly with founders and engineers to challenge assumptions, explain design tradeoffs, and make clear decisions.
• Partner with engineers through delivery, refine the details in the shipped product, and raise the quality of the overall user experience.
• Where useful, bring designs to life in code with AI-assisted tools and collaborate with engineers on production quality.

WHAT YOU BRING

• A portfolio of polished product work demonstrating strong visual craft, interaction design, and end-to-end ownership.
• Experience designing dashboards or other data-rich products and presenting complex information clearly.
• The judgment and independence to lead design, make recommendations grounded in experience, and earn the trust of opinionated founders.
• A track record of moving from ambiguity to shipped work in a fast-moving environment.
• Fluency with Figma and a willingness to adopt AI and other tools that improve the speed and quality of design iteration.
• Strong collaboration and communication: you can explain why a design works, incorporate direct feedback, and help engineers execute it well.
• Comfort supporting multiple engineers and product workstreams without becoming a bottleneck.

We care more about the quality of your work and your ability to lead design than a specific number of years of experience.

USEFUL EXPERIENCE

• AI-assisted prototyping or building interactive product experiences in code.
• React, TypeScript, or close collaboration with frontend engineers.
• Design systems, complex data visualization, enterprise software, or workflow-heavy products.
• Being an early design hire who established product direction and design standards.

LOCATION AND COLLABORATION

San Francisco or fully remote. We are open to candidates regardless of location who can work Echelon's hours and collaborate closely with the team.

INTERVIEW PROCESS

You will start with a conversation with Brian Rackle, followed by conversations with the founders focused on your portfolio, design thinking, and how you would approach Echelon's product.

BENEFITS

• Team lunches and dinners in the office.
• On-site gym access for employees working from the office.
• Fully covered health, dental, and vision insurance.
• 401(k) plan.
• Access to AI tooling of your choice.
• Unlimited PTO.