Everything you ever wanted to know about the Product Designer profession (and that you didn’t dare to ask)
What Is a Product Designer?
Product Designers are responsible for designing a product based on a set of specifications and requirements. Integrated into an organization, the Product Designer creates the best possible user experience within a product culture, which they also help to maintain.
They are involved in the entire product design process: analyzing needs based on existing user problems, creating the product design, and striving for better solutions daily. Thus, the Product Designer can be seen as a synthesis of a UX designer and an UI designer.
Where Do Product Designers Work?
Like many professions, Product Designers are not limited to a particular organization. They can work freelance, in an agency or consulting firm, or within the design department of a company, whether it's a large corporation or a pure digital player.
Focusing on a product vision, Product Designers primarily work with the technical team, the Product Manager, and the communication department. They may also collaborate with other stakeholders during Discovery processes or in business considerations to address strategic organizational issues.
Finally, the annual barometer of La Product Conf indicates that these profiles are quite rare, with Product Designers typically shared among three teams on average.
What Salary Can a Product Designer Expect?
A junior Product Designer's salary in France in 2022 is estimated at around €40,000 gross per year. With over 10 years of experience, a senior can aim for an average salary of €83,000 gross per year in France.
Annual gross salaries for Product roles (source: LPC 2023 barometer)
How to Become a Product Designer?
There is no standard training to become a Product Designer. However, according to the annual barometer of the Product Conf, the majority have a master's or doctoral degree and come from studies related to design, computer science, or business.
Being part of a Product organization, Product Designers collaborate agilely with other disciplines, consider business challenges and user needs from a long-term perspective, and work with a results-oriented approach.
To get the best tools to use as a Product Designer, feel free to download our Product Design Toolkit
