Founding Product Designer, GovWell
$180-200k
+ Equity
3-5 days a week in office
Modern software for local government
Be an early applicant
Modern software for local government
1-20 employees
Be an early applicant
$180-200k
+ Equity
3-5 days a week in office
1-20 employees
Company mission
To build modern software products to help government serve communities better.
Role
Who you are
- 5+ years designing complex, workflow-heavy SaaS products, with experience owning end-to-end flows across interconnected surfaces rather than isolated screens
- Proven ability to design and ship quickly alongside empowered engineers, shaping solutions early, iterating in tight loops, and creating design foundations that scale across teams
- Strong systems-level designer with a track record of defining reusable interaction patterns, workflow primitives, and design systems that prevent fragmentation as products scale
- Highly fluent in AI-native design and prototyping workflows; actively uses modern AI tools to explore ideas quickly, validate workflows, and unblock engineering with lightweight design assets
- Strong product judgment and bias toward simplicity, consistently identifying the highest-leverage usability and coherence problems and reducing complexity in high-stakes operational software
- Interest or experience in govtech or public-sector workflows is a strong plus; demonstrated ability to learn complex operational domains quickly is required
What the job involves
- GovWell is hiring a Founding Product Designer to own product coherence and usability as our platform scales
- This role ensures that as multiple engineering pods move quickly, GovWell still feels like one simple, trustworthy, and consistent product
- You will define shared interaction patterns, terminology, workflow foundations, and design systems that allow teams to execute fast without fragmenting the user experience
- You’ll be an active partner to product and engineering in shaping core workflows, reducing complexity for government users, and ensuring that speed does not come at the expense of clarity or usability
- This role reports directly to GovWell’s founders
- We operate in a hybrid model with regular in-person collaboration in our New York City office (3+ days per week)
- Own system-level product coherence across GovWell by defining shared interaction patterns, reference workflows, terminology, and design systems that prevent divergence as teams ship in parallel
- Prototype and iterate rapidly using AI-native tools such as Lovable, Figma AI, and Cursor-assisted workflows to explore ideas, test workflows, and unblock engineering
- Support 0→1 incubation work, especially AI-powered products, by providing rapid feedback, prototypes, and direction while keeping experimentation lightweight
- Partner closely with Product Management on roadmap sequencing and UX strategy to ensure cross-team initiatives fit together into a cohesive experience
- Design core government workflows end-to-end, deeply understanding how staff operate in areas like permitting, inspections, licensing, planning, and payments, and simplifying the highest-frequency paths
- Embed directly with engineers early in shaping, providing fast, high-leverage design direction that enables teams to ship quickly without heavy process or downstream redesign
- Establish lightweight but scalable design foundations, including components, patterns, and information architecture, without overbuilding systems or ceremony
- Raise the quality bar over time as the product matures, removing complexity, improving usability, and reinforcing a unified platform experience
- Ensure GovWell’s product reflects the realities of operational government work: high volume, high stakes, and low tolerance for confusion
Our take
Govwell creates software for planning and zoning within local governments, simplifying processes and modernising citizen services. With the intention of improving transparency, it is helping all sizes of government serve its communities better.
What stands out about GovWell’s workflow and automation technology is the fact that its platform is customisable. Government sectors, councils and organisations operate their tech in varying ways, and so GovWell serves these varying needs by allowing flexibility of use within its platform. This is facilitated by no-code tools to improve adaptability.
Ultimately, the platform helps local governments complete tasks in a fraction of the time. It’s a breath of fresh air in the sector, which isn’t known for its innovations, and GovWell has been smart to target this niche. It will channel recent funding into expanding its team, enhancing product development and accelerating growth.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Company
Funding (2 rounds)
Aug 2024
$4.5m
SEED
Apr 2023
$1m
SEED
Total funding: $5.5m
Company benefits
- Equity / stock options
- Up to 100% premiums covered for medical, dental, and vision insurance
- Unlimited / flexible PTO
Company HQ
Rose Hill, New York, NY
Leadership
Ben Cohen
(CTO)Previously Founder of Cohen Realty & Construction. Was also a Software Engineer at UiPath, Amazon and Uber.
Troy LeCaire
(CEO)Previously Chief of Staff for the CEO of RippleMatch. Was a Campaign Intern for Senator Russ Feingold, Legislative Intern for Senator Tammy Baldwin and Legal Intern at Froelich Law Offices.
Salary benchmarks
We don't have enough data yet to provide salary benchmarks for this role.
Submit your salary to help other candidates with crowdsourced salary estimates.
Share this job
View 6 more jobs at GovWell