Lead Strategic Designer

We are looking for a Strategic Designer with 8+ years experience of human‑centred service design at their core, with the range to go beyond end‑to‑end to operate top to bottom. Moving upstream to influence and shape strategy and downstream to drive delivery and evaluate outcomes for business growth. This role will work in agile, cross‑functional teams across public and private sectors. Helping clients make confident, design‑led decisions through a consultative, evidence‑based approach.

What You’ll Do

• Frame strategic business challenges as design opportunities and develop actionable recommendations for senior stakeholders.
• Lead end‑to‑end projects from research and strategy to design and delivery to uncover needs and opportunities in complex ecosystems.
• Develop new propositions and define what a product or service is, for whom, and why it matters.
• Build alignment across teams, championing the value of strategic design with clients and collaborators.
• Run user research activities and turn research insights into blueprints, prototypes, and delivery roadmaps that deliver measurable impact.
• Analyse data and analytics to evidence along the design process, uncover opportunities, quantify business value, support decision‑making, and foster continuous improvement.
• Collaborate with product, design and delivery teams to prioritise backlogs into roadmaps and pull through high‑quality delivery.
• Develop and support the responsible use of AI and emerging technologies.
• Contribute to the growth of Tangity’s strategic design practice and business development.
• Help with business development by building client relationships, creating points of view, presentations and proposals.

Responsibilities

• Lead projects with strategic clarity and design excellence across engagements from start to outcome.
• Manage key stakeholders across the engagements.
• Connect human insight to business value grounded in evidence to aid in driving decision making.
• Build business cases and value propositions that communicate and frame the commercial value for strategic design decisions.
• Define and apply design principles that guide delivery teams and sustain quality beyond the engagement.
• Contribute to agile delivery, pulling strategy through to sprint planning, shaping backlogs, and providing continuous design input.
• Evaluate output of the work, identifying where to improve, optimise, extend, or retire.
• Mentor designers and coach client teams, building their capability and confidence.
• Support business development, including identifying opportunities and contributing to proposals and pitches.

Benefits and Inclusion

We offer a range of tailored benefits that support your physical, emotional, and financial wellbeing. Our Learning and Development team ensures continuous growth and development opportunities for our people. We also offer flexible work options. We are an equal‑opportunity employer. We believe in the fair treatment of all employees and commit to promoting equity and diversity in our employment practices. We are proud Disability Confident and a committed employer, actively collaborating with individuals who have disabilities and long‑term health conditions to eliminate barriers. We guarantee an interview to applicants who declare a disability and meet the minimum requirements for the role. If you require any reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know. Join us in building a truly diverse and empowered team.

Qualifications

• Curious about people, organisations, and the systems that connect them.
• Strategically ambitious – you want to shape the problem, not just respond to the brief.
• Confident enough to challenge a client, and humble enough to learn from them.
• Comfortable in ambiguity – able to bring structure and clarity without closing down creative range.
• Systems thinker who sees beyond individual touchpoints to root causes and leverage points.
• Generous collaborator who makes multidisciplinary teams better.
• Outcome focused – you stay engaged through delivery and care whether the thing you designed actually works.
• Clear communicator who adapts their register from boardroom to research debrief.
• 8+ years experience in service design, strategic design, or a closely related discipline.
• Proven ability to lead complex strategic design engagements end‑to‑end, from research and framing through to delivery.
• Strong research and synthesis skills – being able to generate insight and turn it into clear strategic and design direction.
• Experience working with and influencing senior client stakeholders.
• Demonstrated ability to connect design to business strategy and high‑quality delivery.
• Strong workshop facilitation and co‑design skills across varied audiences.
• Experience working in or alongside agile delivery teams.
• A portfolio that shows strategic range, service design craft, and commercial value.
• Curiosity and experimentation into the role of AI in your job and clients future.

Nice to Have

• Experience in financial services, insurance, or other regulated industries for clients.
• Understanding of product management principles and delivery methodologies.
• Experience running structured innovation methods such as design sprints.
• Public speaking, thought leadership, or published work on design and strategy.
• Experience mentoring designers or building design capability within client organisations.

About the Studio and Employer

Tangity, part of the NTT DATA Design Network, is a global design studio dedicated to humanising complexity. We combine Strategy, Technology, and Design to create meaningful, inclusive, and impactful services that improve lives and systems. Our studios work closely with delivery teams to embed design deeply into every project and across every touchpoint. At NTT DATA, you have endless opportunities to think big, act bold and take ownership. As a $30+ billion business and technology services, AI and digital infrastructure leader, we co‑innovate solutions with clients and partners globally for business and societal impact. Serving 75% of the Fortune Global 100, with experts in over 70 countries, we encourage experimentation and recognise great work. Upon joining the NTT DATA UK family, you will experience a culturally diverse organisation living our values of Clients First, Teamwork and Foresight as we partner with our customers every day. At NTT DATA UK, we are proud to support and invest in our people. We offer a variety of rewarding career paths and opportunities to develop professionally – with access to cutting‑edge innovation.