UX Lead, Schibsted Product Lab

Job description

We’re building the next generation of Schibsted’s media products Schibsted’s product ambition is to reinvent our media destinations for the AI era to make our journalism a relevant daily habit for more people. Most of that work happens in our existing product organisation, where we continuously improve and reinvent products used by millions of people every day. But some opportunities require something different: more freedom from today’s products and business models, longer horizons, greater uncertainty and permission to challenge the core. That's why we're setting up Schibsted Product Lab . Product Lab is a small, autonomous product environment that builds, launches and tests the next generation of Schibsted’s media products with real users. We start small, increase investment as evidence grows, stop ideas that do not prove themselves, and help successful products become part of, or reshape, Schibsted’s core. We are now looking for an UX Lead to join the Product Lab core team! How we want to work Our ambition is to make Product Lab an AI-enabled, high-velocity product environment where we can move from idea to execution at high speed. We want to push the boundaries of how emerging technologies can transform the way we discover, design and build products, equipping small teams with the tools and capabilities to turn ambitious ideas into real user experiences in days rather than months. We embrace experimentation, challenge established ways of working and prioritise learning over perfection. And we see the ability to confidently stop an idea that doesn't work as just as important as knowing when to invest further. The role and mission The UX Lead is a senior, hands-on role responsible for ensuring that user insight and real-world evidence shape what Product Lab chooses to build and invest in. Working across Product Lab's portfolio – from early exploration and ideas to seeds and bets – you will explore emerging behaviours and unmet needs, make new product opportunities tangible through concepts and prototypes, and rapidly test them with real users. You will move fluidly between research, concept development, interaction design, prototyping and experimentation – often before the problem or solution is well defined. You will work closely with the core team of Product Lab, including specialists in product management, technology and editorial development, to help answer three key questions: Is there something meaningful here? What could it become? What evidence do we need before investing further? What you will do Shape how Product Lab does discovery. Set a high bar for research and experience design, and build lightweight ways of working that get ideas from uncertainty to evidence fast, without extra process. Understand changing audiences. Combine user research, behavioural signals and market developments to see how people's needs and expectations around news and media are shifting, and where new products could fit. Frame opportunities. Work with product, technology and editorial colleagues to turn broad questions and signals into clear user problems and testable hypotheses. Prototype and experiment. Turn hypotheses into prototypes and experiments you can put in front of real users quickly, from simple provocations to live product tests. Build the evidence and take seeds further. Find the assumptions that matter most, test them, and bring the evidence into decisions about whether to stop, iterate, pivot or invest. Help seeds that earn their place grow into coherent, distinctive products, and keep discovery going as they mature. Lead and coach. Coach and give design and discovery direction to UX designers in temporary seeds and bets. You lead through craft and expertise, not formal authority. Share learnings. Help make sure that what is learned through Product Lab initiatives is shared with the broader Schibsted organisation. Who we are looking for You are an experienced product designer who is comfortable operating before there is a roadmap, requirements or even a clearly defined problem. You combine strong product and interaction design skills with curiosity about people, technology and emerging behaviours. You prototype to learn, not just to communicate. You are comfortable discarding your own ideas when the evidence points elsewhere, and you can move between strategic questions and making something concrete in the same week. We believe you need to bring: Strong exploratory and evaluative user research, including interpreting behavioural evidence. Strong product and interaction design, shown in concepts you have taken from idea to validation. Fast prototyping at the right fidelity, including with AI-assisted tools. Good product judgement and the ability to synthesise ambiguous information into a clear point of view. Experience working closely with product, technology and other disciplines. The confidence to challenge assumptions, including your own, when the evidence points elsewhere. Experience with AI-enabled products and the media industry is highly valuable, but more important is the ability to make uncertain opportunities tangible, testable and progressively less uncertain. Why join us You help build something new from the start. You join the Lab's first core team and shape how it works and what its culture becomes. You build on things a start-up has to earn first. Trusted brands, our journalism, our data and millions of users. Your work reaches real users. We launch to learn, and products that work have a path into Aftonbladet, VG, Aftenposten and our other brands. You get room to work and clear decisions. The Lab works outside today's roadmaps and KPIs, and every idea gets a clear decision at set points. You work on what's changing in media. AI is changing how people find and use journalism, and young people are forming their habits outside traditional news sites. You help decide what Schibsted's answer looks like. About Schibsted Schibsted is the largest news provider in the Nordics, with brands such as VG, Aftonbladet, TV4, MTV, Aftenposten, Svenska Dagbladet, and Podme. Every day we inform, engage, and entertain millions of people across Sweden, Norway, and Finland. Since 1839, trust has been our foundation. Our journalism empowers people, builds communities, and strengthens democracy – and innovation ensures we continue to protect that mission. Our democracies depend on independent journalism. That’s our business.