Digital Product Director

IDEO London is looking for a Digital Product Director to help shape what it means to design AI-driven products that people actually trust. This is a senior role for someone who thinks of AI as a design material — not a feature set — and who understands that the hardest problems in AI aren't just technical. They're human.

Responsibilities

• You’ll spend most of your time embedded in client work, directing product engagements from brief through to market.
• You’ll also help build something bigger: IDEO’s AI product practice in Europe, at a moment when the regulatory landscape is becoming a genuine creative opportunity.
• You’ll report to the London Leadership Team and work closely with directors and interdisciplinary teams across the studio.
• Business development is a natural part of the role — growing relationships, shaping opportunities, and helping clients understand what it genuinely means to build AI into their products and organisations responsibly.

Why is this role important for IDEO's work?

The question has shifted. Companies aren't asking “what can AI do?” anymore. They're asking “how do we make AI investment turn into something our customers actually want — and trust?” That's the work. And it takes more than technical fluency. It takes the ability to sit at the intersection of human need, business ambition, and the emerging rules that will define how AI gets built in Europe.

Once here you will

• Lead digital product engagements from brief through to market, owning quality, pace, and the client relationship throughout.
• Act as the main client point of contact on strategic accounts, building trust beyond the immediate project team.
• Direct multidisciplinary teams with clear thinking and steady hands, keeping work moving without losing rigour or craft.
• Help clients navigate the shift from AI-bolted-on to AI-native.
• Prototype and pressure-test concepts early.
• Contribute to our AIx practice — developing tools, methods, and points of view that sharpen how IDEO and our clients think about designing with AI responsibly and at scale.
• Help us treat the European regulatory environment as a design brief.
• Coach and mentor designers and product leads, modelling excellent craft and client communication.
• Scope and frame follow-on work, growing relationships and helping define where IDEO can have the greatest impact.
• Represent IDEO externally through talks, writing, and thought leadership.

We're looking for someone with

• A strong track record of leading and launching complex digital products.
• A designer and leader who has shipped products where AI plays a meaningful role.
• Someone who can hold both rigour and imagination.
• Genuine fluency in how AI is reshaping product design.
• Confident working in Figma and prototyping early.
• Strong people leadership.
• Experience scoping and framing new work, writing proposals, and presenting to senior clients.
• Experience navigating complex stakeholders.
• A genuine understanding of UX and interaction design fundamentals.

It’s a bonus if you

• Have shipped AI-native products.
• Have familiarity with the EU AI Act or the broader European regulatory landscape around AI.
• Have experience in health, financial services, consumer technology, retail, or sustainability.
• Have helped build an innovation practice or capability within a larger organisation.
• Are fluent in a second European language.

What We Believe

AI is a new material. The outcome still needs design. We build things because people want them — not just because we can. And we believe the best AI products aren't the most technically sophisticated ones; they're the ones that earn trust, create genuine agency for the humans using them, and hold up when the stakes are real.

What does IDEO offer you?

• Innovation and creativity: Lead work that genuinely matters.
• Learning and growth: We’re here to support your development.
• Community and well-being: Collaboration and community are central to what we do.
• Projects with purpose: We partner with clients to use design as a force for good.
• Compensation: £90,000–£100,000 GBP, depending on experience.

Location

This position is based out of our London studio with an in‑person-first working model, including at least three days a week working from the studio.

Please note that the successful candidate must be based in the UK and have the unrestricted right to work in the UK. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer sponsorship for this role.

Commitment to Diversity

At IDEO, we are committed to the work of advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion within our organisation and in the world.