Senior Design Editor, A.I. Initiatives

Key Skills

Aartificial intelligence, Design, Generative AI, Large Language Models - LLMs, Machine learning techniques

Job Description

The New York Times is seeking a designer to join our newly formed team focused on artificial-intelligence initiatives in the newsroom. The team ensures The Times remains on the forefront of digital journalism by prototyping internal and reader-facing applications of generative A.I. and other machine-learning techniques. Our goal is to develop new forms of journalism, empowering reporters across the newsroom with new and useful tools, while establishing principles for the ethical use of these technologies.

As a core member of the team, the senior design editor will conduct user research to better understand problems faced by colleagues and readers that could be solved with machine learning. You will turn your findings into recommendations and design prototypes for features and products that could improve internal workflows, reporting capabilities, and how The Times is presented to readers. You will contribute to working prototypes of web applications and other interfaces.

The team, led by the editorial director for A.I. initiatives, will also include colleagues with a mix of engineering and editorial talent, acting as a kind of skunkworks team within the newsroom. Everyone on the team is expected to have some technical ability. Together, you will partner with other teams in the news, product, and technology groups to take the best ideas from prototypes to production.

You are an inveterate tinkerer, eager to experiment with new technologies and share your findings with others. We favor demos over memos, prototypes over concepts, collaboration over silos, and learning over knowing it all.

This role is based in our New York City, Times Square office.

Responsibilities:

• Conduct qualitative user research with colleagues and readers, and reporting back to the team with clear insights and recommendations
• Design and prototype new features and products that rely on generative A.I. and other machine-learning techniques
• Contribute to the technical development of prototypes in web applications and other interfaces
• Stay up-to-date on the latest A.I. research and model development, to help inform the team’s work and spread technical proficiency throughout the organization
• Develop relationships with other designers in the newsroom and on product teams, to learn from their existing work with A.I. and collaborate on new projects
• You will report to the Editorial Director for A.I. Initiatives team

Basic Qualifications:

• 6+ years of experience with digital design and user research
• 3+ years of experience designing dynamic interfaces that consider their underlying datasets and server-side components
• 2+ years of experience collaborating with journalists or other creative professionals on software development
• A portfolio of work samples that showcases your design process

Preferred Qualifications:

• Demonstrated understanding of large-language and transformer models
• Front-end web development skills to collaborate with engineers on the team
• Experience and enthusiasm for working in cross-functional groups, giving and receiving feedback, and contributing to a team’s culture
• Experience with quantitative user research and analysis, in addition to qualitative research
• Experience designing bots and conversational interfaces

REQ-016159

The annual base pay range for this role is between:

$140,000—$160,000 USD

The New York Times is committed to a diverse and inclusive workforce, one that reflects the varied global community we serve. Our journalism and the products we build in the service of that journalism greatly benefit from a range of perspectives, which can only come from diversity of all types, across our ranks, at all levels of the organization. Achieving true diversity and inclusion is the right thing to do. It is also the smart thing for our business. So we strongly encourage women, veterans, people with disabilities, people of color and gender nonconforming candidates to apply.

The New York Times Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of an individual's sex, age, race, color, creed, national origin, alienage, religion, marital status, pregnancy, sexual orientation or affectional preference, gender identity and expression, disability, genetic trait or predisposition, carrier status, citizenship, veteran or military status and other personal characteristics protected by law. All applications will receive consideration for employment without regard to legally protected characteristics. The New York Times Company will provide reasonable accommodations as required by applicable federal, state, and/or local laws. Individuals seeking an accommodation for the application or interview process should email reasonable.accommodations@nytimes.com. Emails sent for unrelated issues, such as following up on an application, will not receive a response.