Senior Interaction Designer

Pay up to £68,205, plus 28.97% employer pension contributions, hybrid working, flexible hours, and great work life balance. We’re looking for an outstanding Senior Interaction Designer to help design and deliver accessible, user-centred digital services for the UK Government. You’ll work within multidisciplinary teams to create clear, inclusive experiences that support citizens and colleagues alike. This role combines hands-on design, strong decision-making, and collaboration, using research, analytics and prototyping to shape high-quality services. As a senior practitioner, you’ll lead where needed, mentor others, contribute to shared design patterns, and play an active role in the DWP design community.

DWP is the UK’s largest government department. We help people into work, and make payments worth over £195bn a year to support and empower millions of people. The scale of what we do is extraordinary, and our purpose is unique. We’d love you to join us.

What skills, knowledge and experience will you need?

• Evidence-Led & Context-Based Design: Demonstrates the ability to lead the design of solutions grounded in user research, data, and evidence. Influences outcomes by identifying gaps in knowledge and ensuring design decisions are informed by context and insight.
• Prototyping Expertise: Extensive experience using a wide range of prototyping tools and methodologies. Provides guidance and sets best practice for prototyping to support iterative design and informed decision-making.
• Communication & Facilitation: Highly effective communicator, able to present work and articulate design rationale clearly to varied audiences. Actively listens to others' perspectives and facilitates constructive discussions to reach shared understanding.
• Accessibility & Inclusive Design: Champions inclusive design practices, with strong knowledge of WCAG 2.2 guidelines and experience designing services that meet AA accessibility standards.
• Collaboration & Design Leadership: Significant experience working in the open and actively engaging others throughout the design process. Provides advice on improving ways of working to enhance collaboration across teams. Leads and contributes to design community activities across workstreams and departmental areas.

You’ll play a key role in creating accessible, user-centred experiences that support citizens, agents and DWP colleagues. Working within either the Digital Modernisation & Efficiency (DME) team or the Health and Disability team, you’ll collaborate closely with multidisciplinary teams, valuing shared ownership, constructive challenge and collective problem-solving over hierarchy. You’ll bring excellent attention to detail, a strong commitment to quality, and confidence in making design decisions that support well-assured, high-performing services.

In this role, you’ll demonstrate best practice in user-centred design across both digital and non-digital interactions, championing accessibility and inclusion and considering the impact of emerging technologies. You’ll use research and analytics to understand user needs, identify opportunities, and create effective prototypes using appropriate tools and methodologies. You’ll work collaboratively across teams, contribute to shared design patterns, and provide constructive feedback to other designers, adapting quickly in a fast-paced delivery environment. As a senior practitioner, you’ll lead and coordinate design work where needed, support and mentor other designers, and actively contribute to the design community within DWP and across government.

Details:

• Location: You’ll join us in one of our brilliant digital hubs in Birmingham, Blackpool, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle-upon-Tyne or Sheffield, whichever is most convenient for you.
• Hybrid Working: We work a hybrid model – you’ll spend some time working at home and some time collaborating face to face in a hub.
• Pay: We offer competitive pay of up to £68,205.
• Pension: You’ll get a brilliant civil service pension with employer contributions worth 28.97%.
• Holidays: A generous leave package starting at 26 days rising to 31 days over time, plus up to 3 extra days off a month on flexi-time and public holidays.
• Benefits: Flexible working including flexible hours; volunteering and charitable giving; diversity and inclusion initiatives; discounts and savings; interest-free loans for bike or season ticket; sports and social activities; professional development and career progression opportunities.
• Culture & Recognition: DWP has been recognised as Diversity Employer of the Year (2024) and other awards for leadership and inclusion.

Process: We know your time is valuable so our application and selection process is just two stages:

• Apply: complete your application on Civil Service Jobs with full instructions when you click through.
• Interview: a single stage interview online.

Click apply for more information and to start your application.