Product Owner, Design System Director

JOB SUMMARY

With every journey, travel has the power to shape us and our world. Begin your journey at Marriott International, voted 24 years in a row as one of Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work For, as a Product Owner, Design System Director. Join our high energy and talented Design System team creating best-in-class digital experiences for one of the most recognized hospitality companies in the world.

We are seeking a highly motivated and experienced Product Owner for our cross-functional design system squad. This individual will drive the coordination, planning, development, and delivery of our digital design system as a product, ensuring it aligns with the strategic goals of the Marriott Digital organization and meets the needs of our 20+ product teams and 38+ hotel brands. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in product development, an understanding of design principles, and a passion for creating cohesive, scalable, flexible and user-centered design solutions.

This role will be part of a product squad within the Digital UX Design organization, while being aligned to the roles, responsibilities, and rituals of the product management discipline. You will be focused across all digital product areas and platforms (web, app, and on-property) to plan and execute a roadmap of features, reusable components, and global styles that drive consistency, connection between products, and an overall user experience that is seamless, easy, and intuitive.

CANDIDATE PROFILE

Education and Experience

• 8+ years of professional experience in product management of web-based sites and/or native mobile applications, front-end development, or business analysis.
• 4-year undergraduate degree in relevant discipline, or equivalent experience.
• Experience using Agile project management tools such as Jira and Confluence.
• Experience with modern web development technologies such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and React.
• Experience with content management systems such as Adobe Experience Manager (AEM).
• Knowledge of Agile methodologies and experience working in an Agile environment.
• Strong understanding of design principles, UI/UX design, accessibility standards, and front-end development.
• Familiarity with design and prototyping tools such as Figma, Sketch, Adobe XD, etc.
• Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands-on execution.
• Ability to lead, influence, operate, and build strong relationships in large-scale complex environments.
• Ability to coordinate planning, requirements, rollout, and reviews across multiple teams.
• Strong written, verbal, interpersonal, and presentation skills.
• Highly organized, strong attention to detail, and excellent time/task management skills.
• Ability to use data to drive decision making.

Nice to Have:

• Experience with working closely with the design or front-end development of responsive web and native mobile app experiences for complex, multi-dimensional programs.
• Experience managing the development of design system components, patterns, and templates at scale for large enterprise organizations, especially within the commerce or travel space.
• Proficiency with cross-platform product development for web and mobile applications.

CORE WORK ACTIVITIES

Team Leadership:

• Ensure that the design system is aligned to overall company goals and product strategies.
• Evangelize the design system's impact on product development.
• Build relationships and collaborate with cross-functional stakeholders, including other product owners, designers, engineers, accessibility experts, content authors, brand teams, marketers, and external vendors.
• Provide structure, support, and a strong voice as the decision maker of design system squad to get work done and keep it on track.
• Help refine a way of working and governance model that guides teams to use the design system in their products.
• Help pioneer a vision and strategy for the future of the design system development, including Figma to code generation across multiple platforms.

Demonstrating and Applying Discipline Knowledge:

• Develop, communicate, and maintain a product roadmap and backlog for the design system by balancing user needs, business priorities, stakeholder dependencies, and team capacity.
• Lead regular stand-up, prioritization, story refinement, grooming, retro, and review meetings.
• Leverage analytics tools to track component usage and adoption by products and inform opportunities for design system optimization.
• Field and prioritize intake requests for design system updates from UX, product, engineering, and brand teams.
• Seek opportunities for product teams to contribute back to the design system through their feature work.
• Partner with product teams to prioritize the development of common elements, prepare requirements, align engineering resources, and sync on rollout timelines.
• Make tough decisions based on changing priorities and risks, pivot as needed, and set expectations with stakeholders.
• Document technical requirements and acceptance criteria for common elements based on specs provided by designers.
• Facilitate story refinement and grooming sessions with the design system squad and dependent stakeholders to finalize requirements and size Jira stories for development.
• Plan development sprint cycles based on priorities and engineering team capacity.
• Partner with the tech lead to develop and deploy common components, global styles and tokens, brand updates, and bug fixes for web, iOS, and Android.
• Review common elements developed by both design system and external product team engineers to ensure quality execution and reusability according to design specs and technical requirements.
• Coordinate with product teams on the adoption of common components enhancements with breaking changes and the deprecation of legacy components.
• Track and report on key metrics to measure the design system squad's performance and productivity.

At Marriott International, we are dedicated to being an equal opportunity employer, welcoming all and providing access to opportunity. We actively foster an environment where the unique backgrounds of our associates are valued and celebrated.Our greatest strength lies in the rich blend of culture, talent, and experiences of our associates. We are committed to non-discrimination on any protected basis, including disability, veteran status, or other basis protected by applicable law. All locations offer 401(k) plan, stock purchase plan, discounts at Marriott properties, commuter benefits, employee assistance plan, and childcare discounts. Benefits are subject to terms and conditions, which may include rules regarding eligibility, enrollment, waiting period, contribution, benefit limits, election changes, benefit exclusions, and others. Click here to learn more.

Full-time positions also offer coverage for medical, dental, vision, health care flexible spending account, dependent care flexible spending account, life insurance, disability insurance, accident insurance, adoption expense reimbursements, and paid parental leave.

Washington Applicants Only: Employees will accrue paid sick leave, 0.0384 PTO balance for every hour worked and be eligible to receive minimum of 9 holidays annually.

Marriott HQ is committed to a hybrid work environment that enables associates to Be connected. Headquarters-based positions are considered hybrid, for candidates within a commuting distance to Bethesda, MD; candidates outside of commuting distance to Bethesda, MD will be considered for Remote positions. Marriott International is the world's largest hotel company, with more brands, more hotels and more opportunities for associates to grow and succeed. Be where you can do your best work, begin your purpose, belong to an amazing global team, and become the best version of you.