CVP, Director of Digital Design Strategy and Innovation

Location Designation:Hybrid - 3 days per week

Business Unit Overview

In Marketing, you'll dive into a world of diverse opportunities, crafting innovative campaigns, managing impactful content and fostering meaningful connections with key audiences. Collaborate with experts across disciplines, leveraging data and insights to drive decision-making, unlock new growth potential and optimize our differentiating capabilities.

Role Overview:

New York Life is embarking on an ambitious journey to deliver industry-leading digital experiences for our customers and agents/advisors. This is a transformative role where creativity meets purpose. Beyond concepting, this role is about the strategy and execution of digital product design strategies, concepts, and visions that inspire key partners across the organization to new heights of what's possible to deliver on NYL's mission and strategy.

We are seeking a visionary Director of Digital Design Strategy and Innovation to lead transformative design initiatives that elevate our customer and financial advisor/agent experiences. This role will drive innovative design strategies that connect users with intuitive, engaging, and seamless digital solutions. By collaborating across product, marketing, technology, and design teams, this leader will shape design practices that enhance customer and agent journeys, strengthen brand trust, and improve business outcomes.

What You'll Do:

Design Strategy Development:

• Develop human-centered and data-driven digital product design strategies for 0-1 and 1-n digital product execution, enhancements, innovation, and strategic concept validation to deliver on NYL business strategies and OKRs
• Connect digital design strategies for end-to-end cohesive and seamless experiences across departments and digital products
• Partner with product, technology, business, program, and other leaders to envision seamless design experiences across a range of digital product experiences for consumer/customers, agents/advisors, and other priority users.
• Deliver design artifacts such as wireframes, interactive prototypes, and visual concepts that translate strategic objectives into impactful experiences
• Develop scalable design strategy frameworks, guidelines, and principles to ensure seamlessness and cohesion across products.
• Lead efforts to integrate emerging design tools and techniques, including generative AI, to rapidly accelerate design innovation and especially rapid prototyping
• Develop and deliver compelling storytelling and visual communications/materials to convey design strategies to all levels of NYL stakeholders
• Design, deliver, and scale design workshops with stakeholders (e.g., product designers, product managers, etc.) to develop, iterate, and align on design strategy

Innovation & Emerging Technology:

• Identify and experiment with cutting-edge design tools and frameworks, including AI-enhanced design systems, to push creative boundaries and accelerate concept validation.
• Stay up to date on advances, use cases, and applications of GenAI (e.g., agentic AI)
• Foster an experimentation culture, leveraging design-driven frameworks to rapidly test and iterate on new digital concepts
• Champion the adoption of intelligent design practices that personalize experiences, improve engagement, and simplify complex digital interactions.
• Utilize insights from user testing, research, and data analysis to refine design strategies and enhance product outcomes.
• Partner with UX research and other research and data teams to develop scalable approaches for testing and validating innovative design concepts to minimize risk and optimize outcomes.

Leadership & Collaboration:

• Lead a matrixed team of designers, agencies, and contractors for the purposes of delivery design strategies, concepts, and other artifacts
• Influence and inspire cross-functional teams to embrace design as a strategic driver of growth and customer loyalty.
• Collaborate with business leaders, IT teams, and marketing stakeholders to align design strategies with broader organizational objectives.
• Develop and deliver training programs that democratize design thinking, design innovation, and collaboration

Portfolio **You must include a portfolio or case studies as a document or link with your resume when applying. Please DO NOT use file sharing software such as Drop Box or Google Docs as we cannot access them.**

What You'll Bring:

• Bachelor's degree in Design, Human-Centered Design, or related field; equivalent experience considered.
• Minimum of 10 years of experience in digital design leadership, innovation strategy, or product design
• Minimum of 3 years leading design agencies and/or contractors/freelancers
• Proven experience aligning design strategy with business objectives to drive measurable outcomes.
• Strong background in user-centered design, accessibility, and UX best practices.
• Familiarity with AI-driven design tools and their application in enhancing digital experiences.
• Excellent communication and leadership skills with a track record of influencing diverse teams and senior stakeholders

"Our team works with dynamic digital products to revolutionize financial services.

Every effort impacts millions of people and fuels the dreams of families, the strength of communities, and the stability of generations to come. At New York Life, we don't just build careers; we build legacies." -Kelly Smith, Head of Product Design

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Pay Transparency

Salary Range:$140,000 - $205,000

Overtime eligible:Exempt

Discretionary bonus eligible:Yes

Sales bonus eligible:No

Actual base salary will be determined based on several factors but not limited to individual's experience, skills, qualifications, and job location. Additionally, employees are eligible for an annual discretionary bonus. In addition to base salary, employees may also be eligible to participate in an incentive program.

Our Benefits

We provide a full package of benefits for employees - and have unique offerings for a modern workforce, including leave programs, adoption assistance, and student loan repayment programs. Based on feedback from our employees, we continue to refine and add benefits to our offering, so that you can flourish both inside and outside of work. Click here to discover more about our comprehensive benefit options or visit our NYL Benefits Site.

Our Diversity Promise

We believe in a diverse workforce because it is our mission to advocate for the financial security and success of people in every community. This is why diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are guiding principles that are embedded in our brand and our culture. Click here to learn more about how we have been recognized for our leadership.

Recognized as one of Fortune's World's Most Admired Companies, New York Life is committed to improving local communities through a culture of employee giving and volunteerism, supported by theFoundation.We're proud that due to our mutuality, we operate in the best interests of our policy owners. To learn more about career opportunities at New York Life, please visit the Careers page of www.NewYorkLife.com.

Job Requisition ID:91648