About Awaze
We’re the European leader for holiday rentals, operating across multiple brands and high-volume
websites including cottages.com, hoseasons.co.uk and novasol.com, taking more than 8 million
holidaymakers away each year.
The staycation market is booming, and we understand the need to have a seamless digital journey. We’ve
had some good results, but we know we can be better. That’s why our vision is simple: to deliver the best
possible booking experience by putting the customer experience at the heart of everything we do. We’ve
got a number of long-established brands with a loyal customer base, supported by significant investment
from our owner, Platinum Equity. We’ve recently invested in a brand new base in Central Manchester,
which will form our Technology and Product Excellency hub.
The Role
This role is all about creating something from the ground up and offers a chance to join our new
Manchester office at the start of something genuinely exciting.
We’re looking for an experienced Product Designer, with a background in UX and a passion for creating
persuasive designs across mobile, tablet and desktop. You’ll not only be designing for a brand-new
platform that we’re building, you’ll also be helping to design the culture of a new environment; we want
collaborators who can help to nurture a culture of great UX, innovation and teamwork.
What you’ll be doing
You’ll be joining a full-stack product team, working closely with a team of software engineers, product
managers and analysts to design our new customer facing web platform. You’ll need to be comfortable
with understanding the needs of our customers and their behaviour, creating design recommendations
founded on that data and translating this into pixel perfect design.
You’ll have the opportunity to overhaul our websites, building a design system to make a single point of
reference for the team. Of course, it goes without saying that you’ll be responsible for everything from
wireframing to prototyping, to delivering significant design updates and incremental experiments. We’re
not just looking for someone to sit behind the scenes, though; we want someone who is comfortable in
being involved in user research and usability testing sessions, too.
You’ll become our subject matter expert, imparting your knowledge with the wider Product and design
team. You’ll take ownership of what you do, thriving in a test and learn environment and sharing your
successes and learnings.
It’s key that you have strong communication skills, a decisive mind and a genuinely innovative approach
to design.
Key skills we need:
You’d be one of the founding members of our Manchester team, so we need a Designer who is
enthusiastic, driven and keen to work effectively as part of a new squad.
– You’ll have experience within eCommerce, gained either in-house of through an agency
– You must be a problem solver; we’re going through a rebuild to address challenges we’ve had
with legacy systems, so it’s key you can analyse information and turn this into tangible design
recommendations
– Ability to inform design decisions based on quantitative evidence. Having experience with A/B
testing and data from the likes of Google Analytics or HotJar
– Ability to qualitatively test your work ensuring it is usable and delightful
– You’ll be comfortable working with wireframing and rapid prototyping tools, such as UXpin,
Sketch or Figma
– You’ll be at ease working with Software Engineers in an Agile environment. Although we don’t
need a designer that can code, an appreciation of front-end principles would be a bonus
– As we primarily use Figma for design and prototyping, you’ll ideally need to be familiar with that
(or similar tools, such as UXPin, Sketch, InVision, Marvel and Adobe XD)
– You are confident in your design and can influence others in the team
– You can demonstrate how your designs have contributed to commercial success
– You’re naturally inquisitive and proactive by nature, with a collaborative spirit for teamwork and
sharing of ideas
Equally as important as all the technical “stuff”, we’re looking for someone who is hungry to learn and
develop. We don’t believe in standing still (we work in travel, after all), but instead think that everyone
should be learning, all the time. Whether it’s a new technology, an industry event or a mentoring
opportunity, we want someone who lives and breathes design, and who is eager to progress.
If you’re excited by working in a fast-paced environment, are obsessed by all things customer and want to
be part of joining us as we overhaul our technology, we’d love to chat.
What we’ll give you
– This is an opportunity for you to join us at a pivotal point in time and play a key part in our new
platform build
– You’ll be supported by a team of genuine leaders, who have a passion for great design in an Agile
environment; we’re talking about leaders who have worked in world-class organisations and who
are keen to transform us to the same standard
– You’ll be joining a brand new team, so you’ll have the freedom to inform the best way of working
to get the job done. We work cross-functionally, so you’ll be given opportunities to develop skills
outside of your core skillset.
– You’ll have the opportunity to shape the culture of our new, City Centre office, leading by
example
– You’ll be an integral part of a team creating a process which will make booking holidays easier
and more enjoyable for customers, and who doesn’t want that?
– We’re investing heavily in our Tech and Product teams and have big plans for the next few years,
so progression opportunities are almost certain.
We offer a competitive salary and great benefits; we’re all about holidays, so we practise what we preach
and offer some great travel discounts. We offer flexible working hours and remote working, too. We’d
also offer you private medical and life assurance – of course we hope you won’t need these, but we want
to offer you security.
