Senior Product Designer (Cape Town,)

Company: Arilo Inc.

Department: Creative

Location: Cape Town, South Africa, V&A Waterfront

Working model: On-site

Employment type: Full-time, permanent

Reports to: Head of Creative

Salary: Market-related CTC, commensurate with experience and capability

Start date: As soon as possible

1. Why this role, why now

Arilo Inc. is an AI-native creative production and marketing agency with studios in New York City, Cape Town, and the Philippines, working across global luxury beauty and skincare brands and high-growth startups. Software — dashboards, SaaS platforms, web and mobile products — sits at the centre of our digital work, and this role exists because that work currently has no single senior owner. Arilo is looking for a Senior Product Designer to take on that ownership end-to-end and to build the design system that will support the agency's product work going forward.

2. The first three to six months

In this period, the successful candidate is expected to:

• Take ownership of a live client product and simplify a flow that currently causes friction for users
• Establish the foundational elements of Arilo's design system 
• Present design rationale directly to a client and build the client's confidence in that rationale
• Begin coaching designers who are not UI/UX-trained, raising the standard of digital craft across the studio
• Apply analytics or usability data to identify and resolve friction in an existing product flow

3. What we're looking for

This is a capability-first hire, years of experience are considered a guide, not a hard cut-off, though this is realistically a role for someone with five or more years designing digital products. Essential capabilities:

• Proven ability to simplify complex business systems and workflows into clean, usable design
• Expert-level Figma, including components, variables, auto layout, design systems, prototyping, and Dev Mode
• A portfolio of shipped software: dashboards, SaaS platforms, or web/mobile applications actually in production
• Confident, client-facing communication, including the ability to present rationale and respond to feedback
• Professional fluency in written and spoken English

Advantageous:

• Advertising agency experience is beneficial
• Working knowledge of HTML/CSS and modern front-end constraints, particularly React-based products
• Defined AI workflows for research, ideation, or rapid prototyping
• Usability and analytics tooling, motion tools, and WCAG accessibility knowledge
• Market-related CTC package, benchmarked to experience and capability
• A tooling and software budget, including AI tooling
• An annual learning and conference allowance
• The opportunity to build Arilo's product design practice and design system from the ground up
• Direct partnership with the Head of Creative and Founder on high-profile client work