SMS Assist Summary

At SMS Assist, we’re not just in the business of fixing properties—we’re fixing an entire industry. Typically, facilities maintenance is tough work—both in the nature of the job (plumbing, HVAC, snow removal) and the lack of clarity throughout the experience. We decided a better way wasn’t only possible, but essential. Through our award-winning technology platform, built and powered by SMSers, we connect local contractors to our customers and help manage an experience that surpasses expectations. 

Recognized on Forbes’ Cloud 100 list, Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500, Chicago Crain’s Top Tech Employers, and more, SMS Assist manages more than 186,000 properties where people live and work. Our customers’ livelihoods are in our hands—think a restaurant manager whose only fryer goes down on a busy Friday night or a family in Florida without power after a hurricane. We work across the industries that make up your community, including retail, food service, banking, residential, and more, and we help them find the right provider in our network (we call them Affiliates) in more than 45 trades. 

We’re innovators, disruptors, and out-of-the-box thinkers. We set each other up for success in the office and for the perfect spike on the volleyball court during an intramural game. We’re community volunteers, karaoke partners, and lifelong friends. We’re passionate about the people we serve, and we give our all because we care. We want to make every property better, and we want your help to make it happen.

Summary

The UX Architect works closely with SMS Assist business leadership, product owners, engineers, and our users to craft experiences across multiple channels and platforms. This role will draw on their knowledge of the UX lifecycle (research, concepting, iterative design, testing) to help define and create user-centered design solutions that address user needs and SMS Assist’s business goals. They engage in effective dialog with the engineering team, with a focus on optimizing business agility, value, and iterative User Experience design and direction.

The UX Architect participates in these areas of UX discipline:
• User Research
• Usability testing
• Information Architecture
• Wireframes/Prototypes
• Content Strategy
• Facilitating Ideation/Brainstorming

Responsibilities
• Create elegant, smart, and usable designs for web and mobile applications
• Collaborate with our UX team to deliver easy-to-use experiences that empower our users and meet stakeholder expectations
• Communicate design strategy to product owners, clients, developers and other team members, while also being able to articulate design rationale
• Support development of presentations, storyboards, and client feedback mechanisms to communicate design process
• Collaborate across functional groups and across design teams early and often
• Work closely and often with leads, stakeholders, clients, and IT
• Use design thinking methodologies to empathize, learn, ideate, challenge stakeholders and UX peers, and iterate
• Take a user-centered design approach and rapidly test and iterate concepts
• Convey brand voice and shape the product experience by crafting UI copy that helps users complete the task at hand
• Manage design deliverables with Agile project management techniques
• Support internal brainstorms, ideation, and design thinking workshops
• Research and share knowledge of the industry’s latest UX trends and tools
• Contribute to UX vision and strategy
• Drive the design review cycle and gather on design requirements independently
• Raise the bar for product quality by advocating for user-centered product roadmaps
• Work with team members across time zones
• Ensure confidentiality of internal and external data
• Perform ad-hoc projects and other duties as assigned

Professional Skills

• Verbal Communication – Proficient
• Written Communication – Proficient
• Teamwork – Proficient
• Relationships – Proficient
• Negotiation – Proficient
• Organizational Awareness – Proficient
• Learning Agility – Proficient
• Analysis – Proficient
• Problem Solving – Proficient
• Process Orientation – Proficient
• Prioritization – Proficient

Role Specific Skills

• Proficient with UX tools to produce wireframes, prototypes and workflows
• Ability to create lightweight prototypes to test concepts
• Familiar working with design system UI libraries
• Ability to present UX research to build empathy for users, UX deliverables to convey workflows, and UI comps to ensure design fidelity
• Ability to convey user experience through stories and frame problems for a diverse audience of stakeholders, helping them envision potential design opportunities
• Ability to craft presentations to facilitate communicating UX deliverables
• Working knowledge of usability principles, conventions, and techniques
• Able to proactively manage stakeholder expectations and communicate accurate timelines
• Passionate and vocal advocate about all things UX and other areas of design and innovation

Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications
• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent work experience
• 2+ years of experience creating iterative design, working closely with team leads, peers, customers, and developers from inception through implementation
• Experience designing and shipping software design experiences
• Experience collaborating with Product Management and Engineering counterparts
• Experience contributing to a project’s entire product lifecycle