Tom Scott

Thank you for looking at my LinkedIn! 

For the TL;DR folks:

I help companies build leadership teams to preserve and build their legacy. Want to meet or know more? https://linktr.ee/tomscottt

Longer version: 

I am a two-time founder. I sold my first company, Fearless, in 2023 after growing it from £0 to 10m in 4 years. In that time, some companies I've worked with (in many capacities) include BP, London Stock Exchange, Klarna, Skyscanner, Wise, Miro, Toyota, Google Ventures, Handshake, Fantasy, Jio, Attio, and Gravity Sketch. 

Now, I'm building Verified. We are an executive search company building the teams of tomorrow. 

Companies globally trust us to build world-class teams that have a lasting impact on their enterprises.

With our executive search and board advisory services, we build high-performance design and engineering teams for clients ranging from FTSE 100 companies to VC/PE portfolio companies, placing their senior teams.

I believe I've been put in this world to help others realise their purpose by finding great work and enabling companies to support them. 

My credentials:

- Advisory to global CEOs and VCs on building design teams.
- Public speaker on all things talent, design and building companies.
- Most followed design recruiter on social media
- Built my own design agency, so I understand design well.
- Interviewed the world’s best leaders on various topics.

Outside of work, I am a man of God, a devoted father and an Olympic weightlifter. Glory to God! 

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/tomscottt

Co-Founder & CCO

A list of REMOTE Design roles in Europe: 

1. Canonical - Visual Designer (EMEA remote)
2. GitHub - Senior Product Designer (Spain remote)
3. BJAK - Senior Motion Designer (UK remote)
4. ThriveCart - Product Designer (UK/EU remote)
5. SmartRecruiters - Senior Product Designer (France remote) 
6. HubSpot - Senior Product Designer (Ireland remote) 
7. Mozilla - Creative Lead (UK remote) 
8. Addepar - Senior Product Designer (UK remote) 
9. Consensys - Design Director (EMEA remote) 
10. Contentsquare - Staff Product Designer (UK/Italy/Germany/Spain remote)
11. Vivid - Senior Product Designer (EU remote) 
12 Kraken - Senior Product Designer (EMEA remote) 
13. Smartsheet - Senior Product Designer (Bulgaria remote) 
14. Hostaway - Senior Product Designer (EMEA remote) 
15. GitLab - Staff Product Designer (EMEA remote) 
16. Protex AI - Brand & Digital Designer (Hungary remote) 
17. LastPass - Product Designer (Hungary remote) 
18. Mediafly - Midweight Designer (UK remote) 
19. Metalab - Design Lead (Global remote) 
20. Prolific - Lead Product Designer (UK remote) 

Even though there is a lot of push to go back to 3-4 days in the office, there are still a ton of companies offering remote options which I know is vital for so many people. I hope this list helps! I'll continue to post remote roles. 

All links to jobs in the the comments. Happy Monday!

1x Exit. Building my 2nd company: Verified. Design and Exec Recruiting.

A real issue for design teams when hiring:

Some design teams are so far ahead, prototyping with newer AI tools and, in general, ways of working, that it’s difficult to find designers who have done this and meet every requirement. 

This is why we need to hire on potential, not just polished portfolios. 99.9% of the time, the perfect designer just does not exist. 

This is why hiring more interns and early-stage designers would be great, as they are often far ahead with AI understanding and the newer ways of working in design, as it’s all they’ve known.

I've been hiring designers for 10 years this year. 

What started as me needing a job has turned into a labour of love. 

I still love: 

- The buzz of taking on a new client brief.  
- Seeing someone you place get a 30k pay rise. 
- Help a company build a genuine world-class team. 
- Someone change their LinkedIn to the new company. 
- See someone you place becoming your hiring manager.

We're building a new design team in London from scratch for a client, and getting feedback that we've built an interesting team full of great design talent, and everyone is settling in well, is truly rewarding. Nothing beats that. 

Here's to another 10 years.

“We need more designers who wear hats" 

This is the best comment from a CEO recently.

In all seriousness, though, more companies than ever want to hire designers for deep, hard-earned product and interface design skills and are obsessed with their craft (not just visuals), sweat the details, and live and breathe making highly crafted products. No politics, just building.

Bonus points if they wear a hat and smoke a cigar when designing.

A list of live design leadership roles in EUROPE: 

1. PandaDoc - Design Director (EU remote)
2. Bolt - Head of Product Design (Tallinn) 
3. duvo.ai - Head of Design (Prague) 
4. Preply - Creative Brand Director (London/Barcelona) 
5. the LEGO Group - Global Creative Director, Masterbrand (Copenhagen) 
6. Sinch - Director, Product Design (Stockholm) 
7. iChoosr - Head of Product and Design (Amsterdam) 
8. Text - VP of Product Design (EU remote) 
9. AKQA - Product Design Director (London) 
10. Kraken - Product Design Director, Growth (EU remote) 
11. Zoopla - Head of Product Design (London) 
12. HSBC - Head of Product Design (London)
13. OpenTable - Director, Product Design (London) 
14. Nothing - Director of Software Product Design (London) 
15. Vinted - Area Director of Design (Berlin) 
16. The Trade Desk - Creative Director (London) 
17. Pattern® - Creative Director (London) 
18. SS&C Technologies - Product Director, UX & Design (London/Essex) 
19. King - Creative Director (Barcelona) 
20. Rapid7 - Director, Product Design (Belfast) 

All job links are in the comments. I hope this helps!

A live list of design INTERN jobs: 

1. Robinhood - Product Design Intern (NYC)
2. Cloudflare - Product Design Intern (Austin, TX)
3. Anduril Industries - Product Design Intern (Costa Mesa) 
4. Stripe - Product Design Intern (Toronto) 
5. Waymo - Digital Product Design Intern (Warsaw) 
6. Cresta - Design Intern (Toronto)
7. Agoda - Product Design Intern (Bangkok) 
8. Datadog - Product Design Intern (Madrid) 
9. GoFundMe - Product Design Intern (SF) 
10. GitHub - Product Design Intern (US remote) 
11. Microsoft - Product Design Intern (Dublin)
12. Diligent - Product Design Intern (Hungary) 
13. Notion - UX Research Intern (NYC) 
14. Tencent - Game User Research Intern (London) 
15. MongoDB - UX Research Intern (Dublin) 
16. Xometry - UX Research Intern (Waltham, Massachusetts) 
17. Picnic Technologies - Visual Design Intern (Amsterdam) 
18. Edenspiekermann - Digital Product Design Intern (Berlin) 
19. BYBORRE - Visual Design and Branding Intern (Amsterdam)
20. Revolut - Product Design Intern (Europe wide) 

We need to do what we can to help the next generation of designers, so the more intern programmes the better in my opinion. You can't beat learning from people on the job. 

I hope this helps!

Design hiring in 2025 had similar issues: 

- Many companies ran into the same problems. They needed “Super IC” unicorn designers, did not know what top designers actually earn, ran long, outdated interview processes, and were too slow and too vague when selling and closing.

- Many companies tried to hire without a clear view of what they actually wanted. 

- Hiring top-tier designers is not about volume. It’s about being targeted, intentional, knowing what you want and and being willing to pay for it.

Design hiring in 2026 looks like it will be busier than ever. 

I'm here for it.

The design hiring market has been wild. I’ve spoken about this from a candidate’s point of view. There’s a huge juxtaposition, and it’s not getting be

Open article: The playbook to hiring designers in 2026 by Tom Scott • 9 min read

I used to spend hours scrolling Dribbble back in the day. I found SO many world-class designers, a lot of them I still I work with today. 

Where is the design community these days?

I miss when Dribbble was good. Read.cv was the nearest thing before it got shut down. 

It seems like we have X where designers are posting cool things and Substack is growing. We need a place again for a great design community.

Hiring designers is constantly evolving, so it's important to share what I am observing to help people find great work. 

I thought I would put together a list of reasons I’ve seen candidates not pass recent interviews at a range of companies. 

TL;DR:

1. Not enough real product work
2. Weak craft
3. No product sense
4. Incoherent storytelling
5. Tied to old playbooks
6. Low ownership signal
7. Lack of technical depth
8. Not thinking like a product designer
9. Slow pace
10. Not enough experience in AI tools

If anyone has any additions to this, I would love to hear! Let's share and learn.

Open article: 10 reasons designers do not pass interview processes by verifiedinsider.substack.com

10 reasons designers do not pass interview processes

Most of the proposals for Hatch Conference have been from outside of Europe, mainly the US. 

Europe's start-up scene and the level of design quality is incredible at the moment, but we need to be better at talking about ourselves more. We need to share the work. 

Hatch is an incredible opportunity built for European Designers. 

The call ends February 15th. I know most submissions will come in the last 24 hours, but let's not wait. 

I've had a lot of messages about people wanting to submit proposals, do it. 

Help Damian Martone find the best facilitators and speakers in Europe, tagging them here so they apply.

10 observations on how to attract and hire great designers: 

(From working and interviewing world-class design teams) 

1. They seek to understand the market first
2. Spend time crafting hiring materials
3. Double down on top of the funnel
4. They don’t get on a call unless they are excited
5. Test for the right signals
6. Test for craft early in the process 
7. Focus on live work
8. High agency is a must
9. Everyone leads through the work
10. They double down on storytelling

Open article: How to attract and hire great designers in 2026 by verifiedinsider.substack.com

How to attract and hire great designers in 2026

Bill Rattner

Creative Endeavors and Misadventures

Retired

XUX Coaching LLC

UX Coach

ExamSoft (Acquired by Turnitin)

Sr. Director, User Experience

Turnitin,LLC

Turnitin,LLC empowers students to do their best, original work. This is done by upholding academic integrity to ensure original work from students and address even the most sophisticated potential misconduct. Turnitin also strives to give instructors tools that streamline manual grading processes, so they can spend more time teaching. 

The current UX team is approximately 30 people; UX Researchers, UX Designers, Product Writers, and Localization experts and is 100% remote and globally distributed.

Texas Instruments

As a UX Strategist at TI, my research / analysis / design process aims to facilitate and improve the alignment of digital business systems to its business plan and strategy, while bringing customer insights and intelligence into service delivery.

User Experience Strategist

RealPage, Inc.

RealPage is the leading provider of property management software solutions for the multifamily, commercial, single-family and vacation rental housing industries. The solutions enable property owners and managers to increase revenues and reduce operating costs.
Their products assist approximately 10,000 customers with managing the operations of over 9.5 million rental housing units and over 200 million square feet of commercial office, retail, industrial and mixed use properties.
I lead the UX/UI group for RealPage as we are bring an innovative, collaborative team structure to the global organization while integrating UX/UI talent holistically. We are bringing our customer experience  principals, methodologies, and processes to deliver a consistent customer experience for all 67 SaaS product offerings.

• Property Management: Automate the leasing, renting, management and accounting of conventional, single-family, vacation, affordable, tax credit, student living, senior living and military housing properties, and all flavors of commercial properties.

• Sales & Marketing: Through multichannel managed marketing, owners can originate, syndicate, manage and capture leads more effectively and at less overall cost.

• Applicant Screening: Reduce a community’s exposure to risk and liability with our risk mitigation systems.

• Revenue Management: Optimize rents to achieve the overall highest yield, or combination of rent and occupancy, at each property.

• Spend Management: Simplify purchasing, invoicing and vendor management with RealPage’s total spend management solution.

• Utility Management: Increase collections and reduce delinquencies.

• Renter’s Insurance: Eliminate losses on renter-caused damage and create new revenue streams, in the form of marketing fees.

• Resident Services: Increase resident satisfaction and retention through online billing and payments, maintenance requests, package notification, and more.

VP, User Experience

CapTech Consulting

Over the past few years, we have seen our clients face new challenges in an increasingly omni-channel digital market. Projects intended to address mission critical infrastructure needs are now being viewed as or superseded by projects that are vital to customer engagement. To help meet these new challenges, CapTech has recently established a Digital Solutions offering.

Digital Solutions leverages key competencies from CapTech’s traditional offerings in web, mobile, and user experience (UX) validation and combines them with emerging capabilities around digital strategy, visual design, and customer experience (CX). This unified offering will help our clients solve strategic and tactical business challenges from inception through design and delivery across appropriate digital channels.

We’re excited about our new offering, and we look forward to sharing our approach to this customer-centric space with you and hearing your thoughts about how these services apply to current and evolving business models.

Clients Include: Lbrands, GS1-US, Virginia Retirement System, Christian Broadcasting Network, Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control, Dorsey Wright, Missouri Department of Labor & industrial Relations, Dominion Resources, Virginia Department of Forensic Science, Virginia Department of Behavioral Health & Development Services.

Director

Capital One

Creative Director, Selling Lab (Contract)

Optaros

Optaros is a full service provider of agile solutions that flexibly combine Content, Commerce, and Community. With greater business agility, our clients are better positioned to achieve aggressive targets for multi-channel revenue growth.


Fox Studios, Los Angeles: Project Lead to design and build foxconnect.com, a companywide initiative to consolidate all ecommerce into a single online store
Walmart, Brisbane, CA: Lead Design and User Experience for new Walmart Health & Wellness initiative on walmart.com
Dow Jones / Wall Street Journal, New York: Lead User Experience team to design and build customer self-service system for all Dow Jones media properties and partner stores (i.e.: wines.wsj.com) 
PaulDirekt, Munich, Germany: Lead project to build additional ecommerce stores for German consumer electronics retailer. Additional stores included apparel, jewelry, and travel all within a shared CMS
Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, Purchase, NY: Project Lead to design and build a customer education system that addressed the needs and concerns of Morgan Stanley brokerage customers and Smith Barney brokerage customers as those companies merged into a new joint venture, mssb.com. Also served as Acting Creative Director for mssb.com for six months
1&1, Karlsruhe, Germany: Project Lead to design and build Partner ecommerce stores for Germany’s largest internet hosting company. These partner stores would be incorporated into the 1&1 site to cross-sell products and services to existing customers
US Oncology, Houston, TX: Blueprint Patient Portal Project that allows nationwide oncology patients to get medical information, schedule appointments, pay bills, and allow access to Personal Health Records.
Pfizer, Madison, NJ: Lead team to develop Direct-to-Consumer online marketing strategy for a newly acquired OTC drug. Delivered a strategy for optimized marketing campaigns, engaging educational video and community components and a critical mobile compliance component.

Director, User Experience Architect

circuitcity.com

Direct online marketing team and operations. Develop strategic marketing endeavors. Guide company’s embrace of emerging technologies/media. Supervise team of 27 copywriters, graphic designers and information architects. 

Position Highlights:
•Implemented YouTube Fanalyst marketing campaign. 
•Increased output by 50% and reduced delivery time by 25% by developing/launching Service Delivery Model and operational processes for Digital Creative Group. 
•Drove circuitcity.com to first-place rankings in purchase process, organization and navigation, site performance, and price clarity. 
•Overhauled online functionality that increased average order value and close rate while decreasing the number of abandoned shopping carts.

Creative Director: Circuitcity.com & Online Marketing

Retired.

Work was fun. 

This is better.

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The Battle

Tom Scott

Bill Rattner

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taplio

The Battle

Tom Scott

Bill Rattner

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Tom Scott's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreTom Scott's LinkedIn Performance