Critical Mass is seeking an Associate Design Director to lead performance marketing initiatives, balancing visual language, narrative structure, and design processes. This role involves developing client relationships, communicating concepts, and leading a large creative team. The director will be hands-on in designing and evolving digital design systems, driving strategies for customer needs and business goals across digital channels, and fostering professional growth within the team. Strong knowledge of campaign development, brand development, UX/UI, and scalable design systems is essential.

Must Have

• Lead the design of a digital design system
• Be a hands-on creative lead
• Build and maintain creative culture within the design team
• Understand skillsets and personalities of team members
• Drive strategies that address customer needs and business goals across digital channels
• Contribute creative solutions and innovations
• Develop & deliver innovative proposals
• Promote continuous improvement and accountability
• Perform strategic account planning with senior management
• Conceive and create experience design solutions
• Proficiency in Figma
• Effectively communicate creative ideas and strategies to all project stakeholders
• Lead and partner with multidisciplinary teams
• Provide regular team leadership and constructive feedback
• Develop, monitor, and modify business unit creative department staffing strategies and plans
• Develop, implement, and monitor quality standards across all creative artifacts and deliverables
• Continuously improve Creative methods, problem-solving models, and best practices
• Proactively manage the success of production scope, schedules, and budgets
• Engage and inform practice leads from media, technology, marketing science, usability, and quality assurance
• Support and lead Human Resource initiatives
• Understand, embrace, and communicate corporate mission and values
• 4+ years visual communication education or equivalent experience
• 8+ years design, marketing, or communications interactive work and design leadership experience
• 4+ years’ Design Systems experience
• Experience in a lead design role within a project-based strategic, creative, or technical agency environment
• Substantial experience managing and bringing to life performance social creative
• A solid understanding of storytelling with the use of video – editing, pacing, motion design excellence
• Passion for design and eagerness to collaborate with other creative people
• Solid understanding and appreciation for the distinction between creative expression and commercial reality

Perks & Benefits

• Global maternity and parental leave
• Competitive benefits packages
• Vacation
• Compassionate leave
• Wellness days
• Flex days
• Access to online services for families and new parents
• Early Dismissal Friday’s (off at 3:00 PM local time every Friday)
• Diversity and Inclusion Board with 13 affinity groups
• Internal learning and development programs
• Enterprise-wide employee discounts

Associate Design Director

As an Associate Design Director, you bring a strong creative opinion, informed by strategy and past results to lead performance marketing initiatives. Balancing visual language, narrative structure and design process, you develop client and interagency relationships by clearly communicating and justifying concepts. Visual and systematic design woven together with a performance lens is your bread and butter—but you’ve also got strong working knowledge of campaign development, brand development, UX and UI principles, and scalable design system development—all essential in your role.

You’re looking to hone your management skills directing the collaborative efforts of a large creative team. And the environment you build for your team fosters professional growth and inspires others to exceed expectations. Most importantly, you embody and embrace our values—to be honest, inspired, driven, passionate and real—in everything you do.

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You Will:

• Lead the design of a digital design system, both building from established patterns and iterating on new design components to evolve the system
• Be a hands-on creative lead with the desire and capability to bring the best out of a design team
• Build and maintain creative culture within the design team
• Understand skillsets and personalities of team members to find areas for opportunity or improvement
• Drive the strategies that address customer needs and business goals across digital channels
• Contribute creative solutions and innovations that strengthen both the agency brand and market leadership position
• Develop & deliver innovative proposals to capture both account growth and new business opportunities
• Promote continuous improvement and accountability by driving Creative discipline and operational excellence and lending industry vertical expertise
• Perform strategic account planning with senior management in vertical marketing groups
• Conceive and create experience design solutions that fulfill strategic business objectives
• Be just as comfortable in the work as leading it. Figma is an extension of your creativity
• Effectively communicate creative ideas and strategies to all project stakeholders
• Lead and partner with multidisciplinary teams, including all creative disciplines, technology, planning, account and program managers, partners, clients and more
• Provide regular team leadership and constructive feedback on all accounts
• Develop, monitor, and modify the business unit creative department staffing strategies and plans, including team composition, performance, skills, training, and mentoring
• Develop, implement, and monitor quality standards across all creative artifacts and deliverables
• Continuously improve Creative methods, problem-solving models, and best practices
• Proactively manage the success of production scope, schedules, and budgets
• Engage and inform practice leads from media, technology, marketing science, usability, and quality assurance to maximize results and ensure satisfaction
• Support and lead Human Resource initiatives with a focus on performance management
• Understand, embrace, and communicate corporate mission and values

You Have:

• 4+ years visual communication education or equivalent experience
• 8+ years design, marketing, or communications interactive work and design leadership experience
• 4+ years’ Design Systems experience
• Experience in a lead design role within a project-based strategic, creative, or technical agency environment
• Substantial experience managing and bringing to life performance social creative
• A solid understanding of storytelling with the use of video – editing, pacing, motion design excellence
• Passion for design and eagerness to collaborate with other creative people
• Solid understanding and appreciation for the distinction between creative expression and commercial reality

What We Offer:

• Global maternity and parental leave
• Competitive benefits packages
• Vacation, compassionate leave, wellness days, and flex days
• Access to online services for families and new parents
• Early Dismissal Friday’s (off at 3:00 PM local time every Friday)
• Diversity and Inclusion Board with 13 affinity groups
• Internal learning and development programs
• Enterprise-wide employee discounts

Our new hires & employees are the future of our organization, and we want to set you up for long-term success. In an effort to do so, we expect our team to work from an office a minimum of 3 days a week.

Critical Mass is an equal opportunity employer.

The Critical Mass Talent Acquisition team will only communicate from email addresses that use the URLs criticalmass.com, omc.com and us.greenhouse-mail.io. We will not use apps such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, or Google Hangouts for communicating with you. We will never ask you to send us money, technology, or anything else to work for our company. If you believe you are the victim of a scam, please review your local government consumer protections guidance and reach out to them directly.

If U.S. based: https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/job-scams#avoid

If Canada based: https://www.canada.ca/en/services/finance/consumer-affairs.html

If U.K. based: https://www.gov.uk/consumer-protection-rights

If Costa Rica based: https://www.consumo.go.cr/educacionconsumidor/consejospracticos.aspx

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DE&I Questionnaire

Voluntary Self-Identification

At Critical Mass, we are dedicated and determined to build a workforce that reflects the diversity of the communities in which we live and work. It is crucial that every team member can thrive and reach their full potential.

With that said, we’d like to know a little more about you. We ask all applicants to fill out the below voluntary self-identification questions in order to evaluate and improve our recruitment and diversity efforts. Answering is completely voluntary and will not affect the outcome of your application.

The data collected may be reviewed by the Critical Mass Talent Acquisition Team, Human Resources, our Diversity, Equality and Inclusion team, and our executives, but they will neither be reviewed by nor disclosed to anyone else. All the information that you share with us pursuant to this survey will be stored on our secure network servers located within Canada and the United States. We will only retain this information so long as it is necessary for the purpose that we have described here or as may be required by applicable laws. Thereafter, we will either anonymize the information or delete it entirely. If you elect to complete this survey, and at any point in the future you wish to retract or amend your responses, or otherwise have any questions about your data, you may contact our Talent Acquisition team at accommodations@criticalmass.com.

As set forth in Critical Mass’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

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