Senior Service Designer

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This range is provided by UCL. Your actual pay will be based on your skills and experience — talk with your recruiter to learn more.

UCL is one of the world's leading universities, recognised for academic excellence, global impact, and a strong commitment to tackling real-world challenges. We are a diverse community where bold ideas are not only welcomed but expected- where thinking differently is part of our culture.

Now is an exciting time to join us as we build a new service design capability and lead transformation that is reshaping how students and staff experience UCL. User-centred design enables us to simplify complexity, create great experiences, and deliver meaningful, measurable value across the university.

About the role

As a Senior Service Designer, you will play a pivotal role in shaping how UCL delivers its most critical services to students and staff. Sitting within the Strategic Change team, you'll lead the design of services that are intuitive, inclusive, and aligned with UCL's strategic priorities-transforming how people experience the university every day.

This is a high-impact role at the heart of UCL's transformation agenda. You'll collaborate across complex systems and structures to design services that connect people, processes, and technology, whether that's improving student enrolment, streamlining staff onboarding, or enhancing access to core university functions.

You'll help us to grow UCL's internal service design capability- coaching colleagues, sharing best practice, and utilising tools and methods that embed user centred design at every stage of transformation. Championing the voice of the user, you will support us to build a culture of design-led improvement that will shape UCL's future.

You will:

• Lead the design of end-to-end services that are seamless, inclusive, and user-centred.
• Conduct deep user research to uncover insights and drive meaningful change.
• Collaborate with users, academic and professional teams to co-create impactful services.
• Ensure alignment across operating models, organisational structures, and processes.
• Champion service design in strategic change initiatives, from discovery through to delivery.
• Define success metrics and demonstrate the tangible value of your work.
• Serve as a trusted advisor to senior leaders, influencing decisions at the highest levels.

About you

You are a confident and curious designer with a strong track record of shaping and delivering user-centred services in complex, multi-stakeholder environments. You bring deep expertise in service design, from research and journey mapping to prototyping and testing, and you thrive on turning complexity into clarity. You also understand how operating models can shape service delivery and ensure they support seamless, scalable, and sustainable experiences.

You're skilled at navigating large organisations and understand how to design services that work across digital, physical, and organisational boundaries. You know how to engage diverse voices and translate their needs into great services.

You lead with empathy and evidence, facilitating collaborative design and supporting delivery teams to bring ideas to life. You're as comfortable in a workshop as you are advising senior leaders, and you know how to build trust, influence decisions, and embed sustainable design practices that leave a lasting legacy.

In return, you'll have the opportunity to make a significant impact in our new Service Design team, working alongside visionary leaders and talented colleagues. We offer a collaborative environment where your ideas are valued, your growth is supported, and your work directly contributes to the university's bold strategic goals. Our people really are our greatest asset and we invest in them so that they can fulfil their potential.

Equity, diversity and inclusion is important to us. We are committed to creating an environment where everyone is encouraged to give their best in a place where their unique…