Head of Design Research

Hey, g'day, mabuhay, kia ora, 你好, hallo, vítejte!

Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming and you're probably keen to find out what's on offer, so we'll get straight to the point.

Where and how you can work

Our flagship campus is in Sydney. We also have a campus in Melbourne and co-working spaces in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. But you have choice in where and how you work, we trust our Canvanauts to choose the balance that empowers them and their team to achieve their goals.

What you’d be doing in this role

As Canva scales change continues to be part of our DNA. But we like to think that's all part of the fun. So this will give you the flavour of the type of things you'll be working on when you start, but this will likely evolve.

At the moment, this role is focused on:

 

• Team Lead - Lead, mentor, and grow the Design Research team—building research capability, fostering psychological safety, and developing consistent standards of excellence across evaluative and generative methods.

• Future research - Craft and lead a design research strategy that informs product vision, company goals, and long-term opportunities in an AI era.

• Close the Loop (evaluative) research - Drive streams of work to find and fix user issues across Canva’s product surfaces by identifying and close loops, and to ensure an objectively high quality bar

• Self-serve research - Enable product teams to confidently conduct their own research through training, templates, and shared frameworks - while maintaining a strong quality bar

• Sub-specialty lead - Evolve the Design Research sub specialty by strengthening methodologies, elevating craft standards, and integrating AI-assisted techniques that improve speed, quality, and scale.

• Set and maintain a quality bar for design research - both via hands-on research, and coaching, training, processes, and oversight

• Autonomy & Decision Making: Sets direction for the group with clarity and confidence, defining priorities and navigating trade-offs across multiple teams, while aligning to strategic direction

• Lead communications to all relevant company goal stakeholders

• Drive prioritisation so that this key resource is focused on the key priorities

• Insight Impact, Measurement and Communication - define and measure research success metrics

• Define and manage the research tool ecosystem - including AI-enabled platforms that improve insight generation, collaboration, and organisational understanding.

You're probably a match if:

• You're a Seasoned leader with deep expertise across generative, evaluative, and mixed-methods research

• Motivated by shaping product strategy, elevating research craft, and integrating emerging AI capabilities into meaningful practice

• AI resesarch native, consistently learning and evolving skills as fast as the technology is unlocking capabilities

• Skilled leader to ensure the team has the right strategy, quality bar, and delivery

• Passionate about using research to drive business and product strategy to delight our community, from the most high level strategy all the way to specific product details

• Strong stakeholder management and communications skills to partner with senior leaders and ICs across Product, Design, Engineering, and Data

• Force multiplier to amplify the impact of research by unlocking Product teams across Canva to conduct their own research

 

What's in it for you?

Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard - and we do - but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a range of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work.

Here's a taste of what's on offer:

• Equity packages - we want our success to be yours too

• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers

• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more

• Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally

Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info.

 

• Other stuff to know

We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.

We celebrate all types of skills and backgrounds at Canva so even if you don’t feel like your skills quite match what’s listed above - we still want to hear from you!

Please note that interviews are conducted virtually.