If you’ve spent your career inside a design system someone else built — designing within a frame that someone else set — and you’re now ready to be the person who sets the frame, this is the role. ColoredCow is a 12-year-old custom software company in the middle of an AI-era transition. Our design function has been one person for years; we’re hiring the second person to build it from here.
What You're Walking Into
We are 25 people across three offices (Gurgaon, Tehri, Dwarahat). Twelve years old. Bootstrapped. We build custom software for long-term clients in healthcare technology, the social sector, ad-agency operations, government think tanks, and education. Never as a product company; always as a delivery partner who takes the relationship seriously.
The honest part — the part that decides whether this role is right for you:
The design function has been one person (Hitesh) for years. The company website was built in 2016 and has been updated periodically since — but each update has tended to break the flow of the original design, leaving blots that don’t fully connect. We have a portfolio page and a case study page; both represent 2016 ColoredCow, not who we are in 2026. We have a recently shipped services page (coloredcow.com/services/) that does represent the current shape of the business. We have a design system that one designer uses — it works for him, and it needs to be built further before a second designer can plug into it. The design workflow lives in that one designer’s head; it isn’t documented yet.
None of this is bad. It just means the next designer walks into real material to evolve, not a blank slate, and not a polished system either. You’ll find blots and bright spots side by side.
We are mid-transition on AI. Production design — layouts, variations, mockups, copy iterations — has compressed dramatically with tools like v0, Claude, Figma AI, Stitch, and UX Pilot. What stays scarce, and what we hire for, is design judgment: which design to produce, why this direction, and whether it moves the business outcome our clients actually care about.
What You'd Actually Do (From Week One)
- From Week 1:
- Meet the team in 5–10 minute conversations (Hitesh, Vaibhav, Pokhi, Deepak Tripathi, the founder, the hill office leads on video)
- Audit the live website — services page (current), case study page (stale), portfolio page (stale), and the gaps between them
- Read the Design Function Map and the Design First Principles operating frame
- Sit in on a live client engagement scoping call with the founder
- Start a working note on what you’d change in the existing design system, with reasoning
In the first 90 days:
- Ship one case study page rebuild end-to-end using AI-augmented design (v0, Claude, Figma AI alongside Figma) — so we have a current proof point of what 2026 ColoredCow design looks like
- Audit the design system; document the design workflow currently held in one designer’s head
- Contribute to one live client engagement on UX or product design work
- Begin running design intake and triage for new client requests
By six months:
- Own the design function as a builder, not a maintainer
- Hire and onboard a junior designer or intern
- Co-shape the productized design service offering — a thesis we are testing this year (the founder is running a 90-day build to test whether what ColoredCow has done as bundled work for years can be sold as a priced service line; you co-shape it as the first operator)
This Role Is Not For You If
- You’re rooted in SaaS, Fintech, or D2C product design and looking for that kind of work. ColoredCow does custom software for long-term client engagements in different segments. The shape of the work is genuinely different.
- You’re a graphic designer (visual / branding / illustration / fashion communication) without UX or product depth. Graphic design at ColoredCow is supporting work done by existing team members; this role is UX and product-led.
- You can’t walk through a specific AI use case in your application — which tool, what was the prompt, what was the output, what you did with it, what you iterated. If you can’t write that in concrete detail, this isn’t the role yet. Generic “I use ChatGPT and Figma AI” answers tell us you haven’t yet built the AI-native muscle this role needs.
- You expect a senior designer above you who frames the brief and you operate inside it. This role is the senior designer. You frame the brief.
- You want a structured corporate environment with defined career ladders and large teams. We’re 25 people, founder-led, mid-transition — not that.
- You expect polished collateral to start with. The portfolio page is stale. The case study page is stale. The first proof point of new design is the one you ship.
What You Need (And What You Don't)
What you need:
- 3–7 years of UX or product design experience, with at least one project where you owned design end-to-end and shipped under real constraints (not a portfolio piece for a class brief)
- Demonstrated AI-native workflow — not “I’ve tried v0 once” but specific projects where AI changed your process and you can walk through it tool-by-tool, prompt-by-prompt, output-by-output
- A working point of view about how design and product decisions should land. Craft alone isn’t enough; we hire for judgment about what should ship and why
- Comfort with ambiguity. The first 90 days have a known shape; what comes after, we co-shape with you
- Direct client communication ability — you’ll work with US-based and India-based clients on Slack and on calls from Day 1
What you don’t need:
- A specific degree (NID, NIFT, IDC, IIIT — none required, none disqualifying)
- A specific tool stack — Figma is our default, but we hire for thinking and adapt the toolchain to what works
- Years inside a brand-name design studio — small-team experience tends to translate better than agency-name prestige
- Visual perfectionism — we ship-honest, iterate publicly, treat first drafts as drafts
The Details
- Experience: 3–7 years
- Location: Gurgaon (in-office) is the default. Hillside office option in Tehri or Dwarahat available as desired — periodically or for extended stretches; figured out together.
- Compensation: ₹10–15 Lakhs per annum, proportional to experience, skillset, and contributions
- Beyond the salary: Design training subscriptions, subscriptions to leading design journals and magazines, conference attendance and design-community participation, access to our office library — any book you ask for, we get
- Reports to: Founder directly during the first 12 months; structure may evolve as the team grows
- Start date: Within 4 weeks of offer (notice period flexible, talked through case-by-case)
How To Apply
- Send your resume and portfolio to [email protected].Subject line: Application: Founding Designer — [Your Name]Or apply through the form at the end of this page.Your portfolio can be a website, a Behance / Dribbble profile, a PDF, or a Figma link. What matters is that it shows work you owned — not just work you contributed to. If your portfolio sits behind a login wall (Behance-private, password-protected), please share an open alternative; portfolio access friction is itself a signal we read.Along with your resume and portfolio, please include a 200-word note covering three things:
- One specific AI use case from your work — which tool, what was the prompt, what was the output, what you did with it, what you iterated. Be concrete.
- One thing you’d change about ColoredCow’s services page (coloredcow.com/services/) and why.
- One question you actually want to ask us.
Write the note now, not later. Strong candidates are busy, and the "I'll do it later" instinct is real — but the applications that get saved for later usually don't come back. 10–15 minutes is enough. Write it directly, not perfectly; a candid 200 words beats a polished essay that never arrives.
Even if you’re someone who started in a different field and moved into design — we’re interested. Our current designer started as a computer science graduate. What matters is what you can do now and how fast you learn.
How Our Hiring Process Works
- We read your application and reply within 7 working days, either way
- If both sides see a possible fit: a 30-minute video conversation with the founder. Not a traditional interview — a two-way conversation. We expect you to ask as many questions as we do
- A take-home design task (around 4 hours, unpaid): a real anonymized brief from a current client engagement
- A 12-day paid working period at the Gurgaon office on actual design work — paid daily at the equivalent of the offered CTC
- Decision from both sides at the end of the working period. If yes from both: formal offer. If no from either: honest parting, paid in full for the working period
Application Timeline
Applications close May 15, 2026. If we extend, we’ll update this page.
We review applications weekly. You’ll hear from us within 7 days of applying — either a conversation invitation or an honest response about fit.
Also Hiring: Design Associate (Junior / Intern)
If you’re earlier in your career — or making a career change into design — we have a separate posting for that role: coloredcow.com/career/product-designer
Same company, same transformation, same opportunity to build something from scratch. Different starting point. ₹5-8L (junior) or ₹15-25K/month (intern track).
