Associate Director of Creative

We're building the future of advertising and are looking for the minds to help us do it.

Darkroom is a progressive omnichannel growth marketing agency focused on retail, e-commerce, and consumer businesses. We have been recognized as one of the fastest growing private companies in America by Inc. 5000 (2023), a top 1% digital advertiser by Varos (2023), and our founders were named Forbes 30 Under 30 recipients for Marketing and Advertising North America (2024).

We are looking for an experienced and talented Associate Director of Creative to join our team.

The Associate Director of Creative is a player/coach designer who will work as a manager of a pod of Designers, as well as delivering your own AI-powered Creative Direction, Marketing Design, and UI/UX Design engagements at high bar of client services and visual quality. You bring expertise in integrating AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Midjourney into your workflows to drive efficiency. You thrive on finding new ways to use AI to break barriers and being on the cutting edge of this paradigm shift.

**Management Responsibilities**:

- Manage a team of designers, starting with 1-2 direct reports and expanding as the team grows. Provide support in strategy, project management, design feedback, performance evaluation, and handling escalations.
- Conduct weekly 1:1s with direct reports to assess client health, offer feedback, and oversee career development.
- Ensure high-quality work output from direct reports, focusing on visual craft, UX expertise, and meeting deadlines.
- Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including marketers, strategists, developers, and clients, to develop project plans, understand business objectives, and address client issues.
- Refine internal processes for client work in coordination with the Director of Creative. Provide training and feedback to enhance the skills of the design team.

**Senior Individual Contributor Responsibilities**:

- Be a champion for AI-powered work, holding trainings on best practices for the team and building efficient workflows for the team in partnership with the Director of Creative.
- Lead Creative Direction engagements focused on transforming paid or organic marketing channels through deliverables like content calendars, creative briefs, and strategic proposals.
- Lead 1-2 UI/UX engagements as capacity allows, focusing on creating branded e-commerce websites. Emphasize branded UI, conversion-focused UX, and clarity in design approaches.
- Present design and creative direction work to clients, explaining choices based on effective reasoning and UX principles.
- Manage design projects independently from discovery to hand-off, adhering to timelines and collaborating with developers to ensure feasibility.
- Develop component systems and maintain design guidelines for consistency.
- 3-6+ years of senior-level design experience, with at least 1 year of people management experience preferred. Must have experience in creative direction, marketing design, or responsive web design.
- Digital portfolio showcasing web design, marketing design, and branding skills, including color theory, hierarchy, composition, and typography.
- Self-motivated, proactive, and detail-oriented with a strong sense of ownership.
- Experience working with AI tools and producing client-ready assets powered by AI outputs is required.
- Experience collaborating with developers and documenting designs for development hand-off.
- Comfortable with client-facing responsibilities in English, including leading discovery calls and resolving client feedback.
- Capable of providing constructive internal feedback and guiding direct reports to improve their work.
- Ability to tackle ambiguous problems, understand business challenges, design solutions, and execute them effectively.
- Proficiency in Figma, including features like Auto Layout, Components, and Variants, is essential.
- Experience with Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator) is required.