We are recruiting for a Designer within our Sustainable Future mission

About Nesta

We are Nesta, the UK’s innovation agency for social good. We design, test and scale solutions to society’s biggest problems. Our three missions are to give every child a fair start, help people live healthy lives, and create a sustainable future where the economy works for both people and the planet. 

For over 20 years, we have worked to support, encourage and inspire innovation. We work in three roles: as an innovation partner working with frontline organisations to design and test new solutions, as a venture builder supporting new and early stage businesses, and as a system shaper creating the conditions for innovation. 

Harnessing the rigour of science and the creativity of design, we work relentlessly to change millions of lives for the better. Find out more at nesta.org.uk. 

About Sustainable Future and design at Nesta

Our Sustainable Future mission focuses primarily on reducing carbon emissions from the UK’s homes. Working with and alongside a range of partners, we are developing, testing and investing in solutions that could speed up adoption of heat pumps and other low-carbon technologies. 

Designers at Nesta play an important role in our work, and the design team has recently developed and launched nationwide digital services, tested the design of new policies, supported research into flexible energy use and experimented with AI interfaces to support heating engineers, amongst many other projects.

The role

We are looking for someone with design craft skills (e.g. digital, product, industrial design) who’s looking to apply that expertise to social innovation. This role might suit someone with design agency experience looking to move into social impact and design-for-policy work, ideally with some experience relating to energy and/or sustainability. Nesta’s design team has a broad range of experience and different backgrounds, including design of services, behavioural interventions, digital technology, physical products, architecture, brand, graphics and many more. What we have in common is a focus on designing for social impact and for the benefit of people and the planet. 

In this role, you will be part of a team of around thirty people who work full-time on the Sustainable Future mission, including researchers, behavioural scientists, data scientists and policy specialists. You’ll also interact with other methods experts from across Nesta, the Behavioural Insights Team, and partner organisations, who work on mission projects on a more ad-hoc basis. You will work with the mission Design Lead and one other designer, and will be part of a growing community of designers across Nesta’s wider Design and Technology practice.

This role is for someone who has worked on projects that have met user needs, contributed to briefs and been part of interdisciplinary teams delivering solutions through an applied design process. Designers in the mission work on a range of different projects, meaning your tasks will vary day to day. The successful candidate will regularly:

• Lead elements of research and testing with end users

• Create physical and digital prototypes at different levels of fidelity

• Collaborate with non-designers from inside and outside of Nesta.

• Clearly communicate what their work means for project outcomes and make recommendations on the direction of mission programmes

Responsibilities

As a Designer, your work will involve supporting the delivery of projects within the mission using your design expertise. You will be expected to:

• Plan, undertake and support user research.

• Design, develop and test potential solutions with end users, supporting projects to do so.

• Facilitate individual workshops to bring people together.

• Produce design iterations from low-fidelity sketches to functional prototypes.

• Support the end-to-end design of interventions often involving multiple channels, touchpoints and partners.

• Ensure Nesta and our partners balance the needs of end users with business and social objectives.

• Work within a multidisciplinary team to design, prototype and test innovative solutions.

• Actively participate in collaboration, including co-design or multidisciplinary working.

• Role model design-led approaches within the mission and across Nesta and contribute to improving Nesta’s approach to design by being part of our design and product community

• Help identify and scope ideas for new work.

• Take responsibility for managing your own contribution to projects

• Quickly get to grips with new areas, topics and contexts relevant to your work, and build your subject knowledge

Required experience

• Experience in a design discipline, such as service design, user experience design, product design, etc.

• Experience working on multiple design projects that have met the needs of end users and stakeholders. Ideally, contributing to the end-to-end journey of a service that involves multiple channels and touchpoints.

• Experience in undertaking a range of activities from client engagement to user research, prototyping and testing.

• Experience of working with non-designers in a design process.

• User research: Ability to conduct and plan for interviews, observations, ethnographic/immersive research and other research methods. 

• Evidence and context-based design: You can work with others to use evidence (qualitative and quantitative) to inform the design of projects, products, and services. You can absorb large amounts of conflicting information and use it to produce simple designs or recommendations.

• Prototyping: You have experience in prototyping and user testing, and know how to choose the most appropriate ones. You know how to solicit feedback to iterate on ideas.

• Communication skills: You can listen to the needs of users, stakeholders and partners and interpret them in a way that is clear for both audiences. You know how to manage stakeholder expectations. You can be flexible and tailor communication to suit the audience.

• Highlighting risks: You know how to identify key risks with a design and strategies, and adapt to them. You can generate multiple solutions to a problem and test them.

• Community collaboration. You know how to work collaboratively within a group, actively networking with others and varying feedback for the appropriate time to ensure the discussion sticks. You can use your initiative to identify problems or issues in the team dynamic and rectify them.

Desirable experience

• Experience of applying agile, lean and design thinking principles.

• Experience of creating functional prototypes.

• Experience of designing interventions with a social purpose.

• Experience of applying behavioural science principles to design

• Experience of designing interventions relevant to our Sustainable Future innovation mission.

• Experience working within and/or knowledge of the energy sector.

What we offer

Salary: circa £37400 plus an array of benefits, including health cash plans, dental insurance, the ability to buy and sell annual leave, eyecare vouchers and more.

Location: This role is based in Blackfriars, Central London, hybrid working arrangement (with at least 2 days working from the office)

Term: Permanent

Hours: This is a full-time role but we offer a range of flexible working arrangements and encourage our people to take advantage of them. Many do.

Making an application

To apply for this role, please submit your application before 8:00am on 23rd March.

Interviews will take place w/c 6th April 2026.

At Nesta, we believe that a diverse workforce leads to an organisation that is more innovative, more creative and gets better results.

We want our workforce to represent the diversity of the people and communities we serve. We also want our workplace to be one where different experiences, expertise and perspectives are valued, and where everyone is encouraged to grow and develop.

This means that when we are recruiting, we actively seek to reach a diverse pool of candidates. It also means that we are happy to consider any reasonable adjustments that potential employees may need to in order to be successful.

We recognise the importance of a good balance between work and home life, so we do everything we can to accommodate flexible working, including working from home, compressed or part-time hours, job shares and other arrangements.

Please just let us know in your application or at any stage throughout the process (and beyond) if these are options you would like to explore.