Job Description
This is a pipeline position with an anticipated award in early Fall 2026.
Location: Columbia, MD
Telework: TBD, subject to manager approval and tasking
Clearance Required: TS/SCI with Polygraph
Salary Range: $165,000 to $185,000
At Shadow Strategies, you will join a culture defined by innovation, purpose, and meaningful impact. We seek senior UX practitioners who uncover operator needs, establish a clear experience strategy, and shape complex systems around real mission outcomes. If you are inspired by complexity, motivated by clarity, and committed to excellence, we invite you to become part of something exceptional.
This role supports the creation of a declarative, mission-adaptable workflow interface for cyber operations. The capability will enable operators to express mission intent, define parameters and boundaries, understand system behavior, and guide automation through a clear, trustworthy operational experience. You will lead research, strategy, workflow design, prototyping, documentation, and briefing to help move the platform from static infrastructure management toward offensive mission automation.
What You’ll Do
Conduct user and mission research with analysts, operators, engineers, and mission stakeholders
Analyze current workflows, decision points, constraints, workarounds, and latent operator needs
Translate research findings into an experience strategy aligned with mission outcomes and system direction
Define declarative workflows that allow operators to express intent, establish parameters, and set operational boundaries
Create user stories, journey maps, workflow models, service blueprints, and information architecture that make complex work understandable
Produce wireframes, prototypes, and high-fidelity interface concepts that translate strategy into tangible system behavior
Design interactions that make system state, changes, constraints, automation behavior, and points of human judgment visible
Plan and conduct usability studies, prototype evaluations, and evidence-based design iteration
Collaborate with software developers, systems engineers, and mission teams to move concepts into operational capability
Document and brief research findings, experience strategy, design rationale, and the recommended path forward
Travel as needed to engage operators, understand mission environments, facilitate working sessions, and brief stakeholders
Who This Might Be a Fit For
You have worked across user research, experience strategy, interaction design, prototyping, and evaluation
You are comfortable engaging operators in complex mission environments and creating clarity from ambiguity
You understand how mission intent, automation, data, policy, and interface behavior intersect
You can distinguish a stated request from the underlying operational problem
You prefer clarity over cleverness and durable solutions over quick fixes
You can document and brief strategy in a way that technical, operational, and leadership audiences can act on
Required Skills
User research and human-centered design for complex digital systems
Experience strategy, workflow modeling, and information architecture
Interaction design, wireframing, and prototyping
Usability evaluation and evidence-based iteration
Documentation and briefing of research, strategy, and design rationale
Collaboration with software development and systems engineering teams
Helpful Experience Areas
Offensive cyber operations or related cyber, intelligence, or national security environments
Declarative workflow systems or mission automation
Analyst and operator experience design
Designing for automation transparency, human oversight, and understandable system behavior
Systems thinking across software, data, workflows, and organizational constraints
Field research and stakeholder engagement in operational environments
Years of Experience and Degree Requirements
Bachelor’s degree in Human-Computer Interaction, User Experience Design, Human Factors, Interaction Design, Psychology, or a related field and 10 years of experience
OR an associate degree and 14 years of experience
OR 16 years of experience without a degree
Degrees must be obtained from an accredited college or university recognized by the U.S. Department of Education.
Work Environment
Based in Columbia, MD
TBD telework per week, subject to manager approval and tasking
Travel based on mission needs to engage operators, support research, facilitate working sessions, and brief stakeholders
Multidisciplinary teams supporting cyber mission systems in classified environments
Senior individual contributors are trusted to shape experience direction and connect evidence to execution
What Comes With It
You will have what you need to do your best work:
Fully covered health insurance for medical, dental, and vision
Paid parental leave: 16 weeks if you give birth, 4 weeks if your partner does
Flexible leave: 36 days total each year, including 25 days of PTO and 11 paid holidays
401(k) for your future
Short-term and long-term disability
Annual health stipend if you opt out of our insurance
The Extras? They’re Built In.
No points systems. No bean bags. Just clarity, autonomy, and a mission that matters.
Shadow invests in exceptional people because demanding work requires more than a paycheck. Our benefits are designed to provide meaningful support inside and outside the mission.
See our benefit plan at: https://www.shadowstrategies.io/benefits
Shadow Strategies is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to creating a workplace that values diversity and fosters inclusion. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, gender identity, and sexual orientation), national origin, age, disability, genetic information, or any other protected status in accordance with applicable federal, state, and local laws.
Salary is determined by various factors, including but not limited to location, the individual’s particular combination of education, knowledge, skills, competencies, and experience, as well as contract-specific affordability and organizational requirements.
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About Shadow Strategies LLC
Shadow Strategies solves problems with innovative strategies. We approach complexity with creativity and resolve, focus on impact and quality, and embrace uncertainty in the pursuit of clarity. We do this together, for all.
