User Experience (UX) has moved from a peripheral enhancement to a strategic imperative in today’s fast-evolving digital landscape. Companies have recognized that their success hinges not only on the functionality of their products but also on the seamless, empathetic, and value-driven experiences these products deliver. Given the critical role that senior UX leaders play in shaping these experiences, it’s time to reconsider the traditional boundaries of their employment contracts. This article explores why UX leaders should have agreements akin to CEOs, especially when their roles involve significant product transformations and user growth initiatives.
The Strategic Impact of UX Leadership
The design that captivates, engages, and retains users is at the heart of any successful product. For products looking to expand their user base or pivot to new markets, the role of a UX leader isn’t just operational—it’s transformational. Senior UX leaders are expected to:
- Redefine User Journeys: This means reevaluating the entire customer experience from the ground up, introducing changes that can breathe new life into a product or alienate long-standing users. This is no small feat and requires design talent and strategic vision.
- Drive Growth Metrics: Modern UX goes beyond aesthetics. Senior leaders are now responsible for outcomes tied to key performance indicators (KPIs) such as user acquisition, engagement rates, and customer retention. A comprehensive UX strategy can directly influence these metrics, tying the UX leader’s work to the company’s financial health.
- Lead Cross-Functional Collaborations: UX leaders do not work in a vacuum. Their influence spans marketing, product development, engineering, and customer success teams. Coordinating these efforts to ensure that every user touchpoint is cohesive and aligned with the company’s goals is as challenging as managing any C-suite responsibility.
Why Contracts Should Evolve
While the strategic impact of a senior UX leader is now clear, the contracts governing these positions have yet to keep up. Compared to CEOs or other C-suite executives, senior UX leaders often need the safety nets or incentives to take bold, user-focused risks. Here’s why this should change:
Alignment of Interests
A CEO’s contract typically includes equity stakes, performance bonuses, and clauses aligning their interests with the company’s long-term success. UX leaders tasked with overhauling products and driving significant user growth should have similar incentives. When UX leaders share their contributions’ rewards, they are more motivated to push boundaries, innovate, and deliver exceptional results.
Accountability and Risk
Transformative UX work carries risks. When a product’s user experience is revamped, initial adoption might lag as users adjust to the changes. This is similar to the risks CEOs take when they lead their companies into new markets or change strategic directions. Contracts that offer performance-linked guarantees provide senior UX leaders with the confidence to propose and implement bold strategies without fear of immediate job security loss.
Recognition of Contribution
The notion that UX is just a product’s “look and feel” is outdated. UX strategy impacts how a product functions, how users interact, and how it scales. When a senior UX leader plays a pivotal role in boosting user numbers, increasing retention, or driving revenue through improved experiences, their contracts should reflect this value. Equity or revenue-sharing agreements recognize their contributions beyond a base salary and create a deeper connection to the product’s success.
Structuring the Senior UX Contract
Adopting CEO-like contracts for senior UX leaders doesn’t mean replicating them wholesale but adapting the structure to reflect the nature of the role:
- Performance-Based Equity: Offering stock options or shares based on meeting specific user growth, retention, or engagement milestones ties the UX leader’s success to the product’s.
- Bonuses for Strategic KPIs: Incentives tied to Net Promoter Scores (NPS) improvements, user acquisition, or conversion rates make sense for UX leaders whose designs directly impact these figures.
- Job Security During Transitions: Providing a buffer or guaranteed tenure during major redesigns or strategy shifts ensures that UX leaders can implement changes with the confidence that their jobs won’t be threatened by short-term user pushback.
User experience design has graduated from an operational function to a strategic force that can make or break products. As senior UX leaders take on responsibilities that affect entire product trajectories and user bases, their contracts should reflect this significant impact. By adopting contracts that include incentives, equity, and security clauses similar to those offered to CEOs, companies can empower their UX leaders to drive innovation, take necessary risks, and align their efforts with long-term company goals. Ultimately, this alignment benefits the company, its users, and its bottom line.
Senior UX leaders deserve recognition not just in their titles but also in the contracts that govern their roles. It’s time for a change acknowledging their contributions as vital to a company’s success.