About Horizontal

Horizontal is a nonprofit organization serving frontline defenders, activists and journalists through digital security and tool development. We empower grassroots communities to use technology effectively and to operate safely from surveillance, censorship and repression.

Working at Horizontal

Horizontal’s values drive both our collaboration with partners and our work internally. We believe in the power of group consensus in decision-making, and strive to ensure that all team members are heard and contribute to the success of the organization. Just as important as the success of projects is each team member learning, growing, and feeling fulfilled in their work.

We are a distributed team, with members located on different continents. Team members are free to work from wherever they want as long as they have a good enough connection to join our online meetings and collaborate effectively. While we make sure to respect each other’s boundaries and work/life balance, remote work requires some flexibility to accommodate different time zones.

We are a small team in a young and growing organization. We are intentional in how we develop our organizational culture and processes, and hope to recruit someone interested in being part of this journey and investing themselves for the medium to long-term.

As a community-centered organization, diversity of life experiences makes a big difference in how we identify needs, and design and implement solutions. As a result, we deliberately seek applicants with different perspectives, identities, and experiences to build an inclusive workplace to better inform our programs and processes. Horizontal is an equal opportunity employer and encourages people of all races, genders, ages, abilities, orientations, ethnicities, and national origins to apply.

Women, People of Color, LGBTQ+, and disabled folks are highly encouraged to apply and self-identify in the application.

The Role

Responsibilites

• Communicate and collaborate with our development team and partners to understand design needs.
• Design beautiful & modern graphic solutions to communicate complex technical concepts to a non-specialist audience.
• Develop digital assets for websites, mobile apps, and social media channels.
• Develop and implement Brand Style Guides for new projects.
• Handoff designs to developers in a way that reduces their workload.
• Ensure that our design systems are organized, sustainable, and well-suited for collaboration with our designers.

What we need (required qualifications):

• You have a minimum of 3 years of experience designing mobile or web apps.
• You are proficient in Figma.
• You have experience working with a software development team.
• You are tech savvy. Having an interest in, and natural ease with, technology is critical to understand our projects and design smooth user experiences.
• You have excellent organizational and prioritization skills, you pay close attention to detail in all your work.
• You resonate with Horizontal’s values.
• You are flexible and independent. We are a distributed team and remote work isn't for everyone: it requires discipline and the ability to work independently, communicate daily over several different platforms, and be flexible to accommodate meetings across multiple time zones. You should also be able to work on multiple projects simultaneously.
• You are naturally curious, willing to learn from others and to work collaboratively. We're always striving to get better at what we do and learn new skills or tools, and are not scared to say "I don't know, I'll research it".

What we would like (preferred qualifications):

• You have experience working with other media (video, animation, illustration, etc)
• You have experience working on security-focused applications.
• You have experience working on civic tech, human rights, internet freedom, social justice, or activism (not necessarily as a designer).
• You are fluent in a language other than English.
• You are familiar with, or have an interest in, design justice, centering communities typically marginalized by design, and finding alternatives to exploitative design processes.

What we DON'T need:

• You don’t have to be completely fluent in written and spoken English. We just need you to understand and speak English well enough to ensure that we can work together effectively.
• You don’t need formal education. We are looking for skill and passion more so than degrees.

Conditions and benefits

• Salary depends on location and experience.
• Remote: we are open to people based in the Global South (Latin America and the Caribbean, North Africa and the Middle East, Subsaharan Africa, Central and South Asia, East and Southeast Asia)
• Flexible: make your own work schedule. As long as you can join team meetings, work whenever you want.
• Unlimited personal days (for personal medical needs, family care, menstruation days, mental health, and bereavement).
• Public holidays from your country of residence and cultural holidays you observe.
• Five weeks paid leave.

Apply

We want to hire individuals who are in line with our values and mission, are a good match at a technical level, and who can join the team for more than a few months (and ideally for many years!). For this reason, the application process is a little lengthy. But we are committed to completing the whole process in about two months.

The different steps of the application process are:

• Initial review of the application: we assess whether you’d be a good match with our organization in terms of values and mission, and if you have all of the required qualifications.
• Technical review of the application: a UX designer reviews the technical aspects of your application, including past projects, design portfolio, and Figma files.
• First interview: you will meet with the programs lead and/or the operations lead to chat about your previous experience and your interest working at Horizontal.
• Technical interview: you will meet with a UX designer, who will ask you technical questions on your design processes and how you approach design challenges.
• Technical assessment: you will be asked to complete a technical test so that we can better assess your skills. The test will take no longer than five hours. Nobody should work for free, so this assessment is compensated.
• Team interview: you will meet with 4 or 5 team members for a casual conversation on your work habits and preferences, your motivation in joining us, and how things work internally at Horizontal. This is as much for team members to get to know as for you to get to know us and make an informed decision on whether Horizontal is the right place for you!