Senior UX Design Contractor

About Element 84

Element 84 is a woman-owned small business that works with public, private, and non-profit sector clients to develop geospatial data processing pipelines & build software that helps answer big questions about our health, our infrastructure, and our changing planet. We solve challenging problems across a wide range of industries, but our superpower is cloud-based geospatial data processing, remote sensing, and Earth science systems. Our headquarters is located in Alexandria, VA, and we have a satellite office in Philadelphia, PA. Element 84 also supports a large remote workforce from a variety of other states.

A Few Other Things You Should Know

1. Element 84's values are: We Invest in Each Other, We are Reliable, and Our Work Benefits our World.

2. Element 84 works on meaningful projects that are challenging—from a technical, people, and team perspective. We make an impact on large projects through our leadership and expertise, both formal and informal.

3. Element 84 values life outside of work. We offer parental leave for everyone and support each other through family challenges like medical problems, adoptions, and new babies.

4. Element 84 has had a flexible work schedule since our founding in 2010.

5. Element 84 is committed to fostering a culture of curiosity and respect for all individuals as we constantly strive to create a work environment where everyone feels welcome and supported.

About You

You are curious about the world, are constantly learning, driven to lead (formally or informally), and have a strong work ethic. You're interested in solving impactful problems in science, medicine, and other projects that have a societal good. You can work independently or with a team, prioritize your projects, and be effective without micromanagement.

You'll care about writing. Our team is remote, and written communication is essential. In addition to caring about a well-crafted email and a succinct conference abstract, you understand that good writing is good design and engineering.

Job Summary

At E84, UX Designers are responsible for discovery and design work - in other words, for leveraging human-centered design methods to deeply understand a client's problem, the users needs, and the technical possibilities of projects, and then translate that into responsive, accessible designs for web applications. Our clients and the solutions we build for them vary, but tend to focus on geospatial web applications in domains like water management, earth sciences, risk management and more.

We are seeking contractors to contribute to our work. You would be notified of design opportunities including details like the timeline, client, and expectations for the work. Project demands may vary throughout the year. We expect contractors to agree to work on the full duration of the project which depends on the clients needs, some are only one sprint, some are one year. We cannot define in advance what opportunities will be available, but by being selected as a contractor you are pre-approved to work on a project should you agree to it. Contractors must align to our company values, and present a unified experience with Element 84 to clients.

This is a contract position; the successful candidate will operate as an independent contractor and will not be an employee of our company.

Your work would typically include some or all of the following key responsibilities:

Discovery

• Designing and leading stakeholder workshops in Miro or Figjam

• Conducting qualitative research

• Synthesizing and presenting insights

• Providing design concepts or defining a design direction

Design

• Defining user flows or systems diagrams

• Creating wireframes in Figma

• Designing high fidelity clickable prototypes in Figma

• Prototyping map or data visualizations

• Ensuring designs meet accessibility criteria

• Creating or using a design system to ensure consistency throughout interfaces

Collaborating with the team, client, and end users

• Providing insightful updates in sprintly meetings

• Being accountable for keeping to time estimates for your tasks

• Taking client feedback gracefully and iterating appropriately

• Presenting clickable walk-throughs in Figma directly to clients and creating slides when necessary to convey insights

• Being a thoughtful teammate that shows respect for all colleagues and client partners

Evaluation

• Conducting usability testing, gathering scores like NPS, or analyzing usage data

• Supporting engineers by answering design questions or providing feedback on their PRs

Expertise

• Leveraging an understanding of visual design fundamentals, human-centered methods, steering clients and building consensus iteratively, and collaborating across disciplines particularly with technical experts and software engineers.

• Working on map-based designs or with geospatial data, dashboards, or decision-making tools. Experience with similar projects or domains is desired but not a requirement.

Required Qualifications

Competencies/Skills

• Strong grasp of visual design fundamentals.

• Substantial understanding of modern UX principles and responsive, accessible web app design patterns.

• Proficiency in modern design software, particularly Figma.

• Ability to build and work with design systems and component libraries.

• Portfolio that clearly showcases your abilities and experiences.

• Strength in qualitative UX research methods.

• Experience with leading and contributing to UX research and discovery.

• Strong communication skills and the ability to work within a team environment.

• Comfort leading participatory workshops in tools such as Miro or Figjam.

Required Experience

• Minimum of 3 years of work experience in UX, UI, or Product.

Nice to haves (not required):

• Experience designing and developing visualizations of data science, AI, and machine learning model outputs.

• Experience designing maps or working with GIS data.

• Semantic HTML, CSS, Javascript, and/or React expertise.

• Experience collaborating with front end engineers to polish the front-ends they build based on your designs.

• Strength in quantitative UX research methods.

• Graphic design or branding experience.

Education

• No specific background is required, design skills can come from bootcamps, be self-taught, or be gained formally. As long as the skillset is strong and well-demonstrated, the origin of that skillset can be flexible.