Design Director

Description

The company is a global experience and innovation agency. It studies shifts in culture, technology and social behavior, and turns those signals into systems that help clients build distinctive experiences across their brand ecosystem.

The company works as a boutique service with the reach of a global network. It is rooted in making and producing, and combines emerging media and technology to create new work.

This role is a senior leadership position in design. You are responsible for the quality of creative output, the growth and wellbeing of your team, and the commercial results of the work, balancing craft with client and business outcomes.

You will build long-term client relationships and help the agency grow, and you will bring your own design perspective and interests into the work.

Responsibilities

• Set and maintain quality standards across the design discipline.
• Develop new design approaches, systems and frameworks that keep work consistent and fresh.
• Oversee several projects or accounts, giving guidance and critique to raise the level of creative output.
• Make sure the team's work supports both strategic and business goals.
• Manage and grow Leads, Seniors and Intermediates through regular coaching and structured feedback.
• Lead learning and skill building across the discipline, building accountability and inclusion into the culture.
• Balance team workload and utilization while supporting engagement and retention.
• Plan succession and development paths for emerging leaders.
• Oversee the creative and strategic quality of client work, making sure design delivers measurable results.
• Build senior client relationships and advise executive stakeholders.
• Represent design and innovation in senior conversations and pitches.
• Keep key accounts satisfied, retained and growing.
• Own team utilization, profitability and the discipline's contribution to the agency P&L.
• Lead improvements in efficiency and quality across processes and delivery models.
• Work with leadership to develop and refine productized offerings or accelerators.
• Shape the culture and reputation of design inside the agency and across the wider network.

Requirements

• You have 10+ years of design work, with a portfolio of standout campaign, digital and experiential projects.
• You bring exacting craft and care to everything you produce, and you move across brand identity systems, art direction, interface design and motion design.
• You use AI tools to speed up ideation and production, including Nano Banana, MidJourney, VEO/Flow, Runway, Kling 3.0, Pika, Claude and others.
• You have deep knowledge of visual design theory, methods and techniques, and you build modern brand systems for 2D and 3D digital experiences.
• You have worked across brand identity, brand systems, graphic and communications design, user interface design and design systems.
• Art direction experience is desired, such as campaign concept generation, campaign production, campaign treatment, visual narrative treatment, and content and experience storyboarding.
• You direct illustration, typography, animation, motion and design production.

Conditions

The salary range is $200,000 - $230,000.

Where local law allows, company policy requires you to work in the office at least three days a week, unless your agency or manager directs more in-office days.