The opportunityAt Adobe, our Audiences team shapes how enterprise customers segment, reach, and activate the people who matter most to their business. The work spans data infrastructure, AI-powered workflows, and experience design at exceptional scale. As a Design Manager, you will lead a squad of product designers responsible for the most heavily used surfaces in Adobe Experience Platform (AEP). You will set the quality bar for the team's output, grow each designer's career intentionally, and represent the squad's impact to cross-functional partners and leadership. Your focus is building a team that delivers outstanding work, not doing that work yourself.
What you'll do- Foster a team culture grounded in trust, clarity, and shared accountability, where every designer knows what success looks like and how to get there.
- Coach designers individually on craft, career growth, and risk-taking, matching assignments to each person's strengths and development goals.
- Own squad operations: prioritization, agendas, and shielding the team from noise, allowing them to direct their efforts toward their highest-impact work.
- Partner with Product Management and Engineering leads to shape roadmap priorities, ensure design has a seat at the table early, and navigate tradeoffs on behalf of the team.
- Advocate for the team's contributions at the right altitude, crafting narratives that connect design output to measurable customer and business outcomes.
- Guide the squad through ambiguity as the product evolves toward AI-powered and agentic experiences, helping designers adapt their practice and adopt new tools.
- Resolve cross-functional conflicts and organizational friction so your designers can focus on the work, not the politics.
What you need to succeedMust-haves:- 3+ years leading product design teams, with demonstrated experience growing individual contributors and raising a team's collective output.
- A clear point of view on design quality that you can articulate, defend, and evolve over time.
- Experience navigating complex organizational dynamics on behalf of a team, including prioritization tradeoffs, collaborator alignment, and conflict resolution.
- Strong storytelling skills applied to elevating a team's work, not just your own.
- Comfort leading through ambiguity in product direction, tooling shifts, and organizational change.
Nice-to-haves:- Experience with enterprise products, data platforms, or AI-powered workflows.
- Familiarity with audience segmentation, personalization, or activation products.
- Experience onboarding and integrating new team members into an established squad.
- Equivalent practical experience in design leadership in place of a formal degree.
Preferred Accessibility Design Skills:- Experience designing accessible and inclusive interfaces for people with disabilities.
- Understanding of applying WCAG conformance criteria in design, specifically testing comps, wireframes, and prototypes for accessibility standards.
- Accessibility certifications CPACC, WAS, CPWA, or ADS from the IAAP preferred.
About Adobe DesignAdobe Design is the multidisciplinary, global organization behind Adobe experiences. Our full-stack team includes design researchers, design engineers, experience designers, brand designers, content strategists, and program managers dedicated to delivering exceptional experiences for Adobe users.
Expected Pay Range:Our compensation reflects the cost of labor across several U.S. geographic markets, and we pay differently based on those defined markets. The U.S. pay range for this position is $128,100 -- $250,875 annually. Pay within this range varies by work location and may also depend on job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the job location during the hiring process.
In California, the pay range for this position is $173,300 - $250,875
At Adobe, for sales roles starting salaries are expressed as total target compensation (TTC = base + commission), and short-term incentives are in the form of sales commission plans. Non-sales roles starting salaries are expressed as base salary and short-term incentives are in the form of the Annual Incentive Plan (AIP).
In addition, certain roles may be eligible for long-term incentives in the form of a new hire equity award.
