Associate Director, Creative Services

Trilliad

2d•$95,000 - $140,000

About The Position

The Associate Director, Creative Services, is responsible for how the Sandler brand is expressed across every channel and touchpoint. You own the creative vision, brand standards, and quality of Sandler's creative output — ensuring that everything produced by the internal team, our international Marketing-as-a-Service (MaaS) team, and external partners reflects a consistent, strategically aligned, and commercially relevant identity. You translate creative direction into operational plans, manage creative resources across competing priorities, and hold the team accountable for delivering work that is on-brand, on-brief, and on time.

Requirements

Brand identity development and stewardship — You define, apply, and maintain visual identity systems, tone standards, and design guidelines across multiple teams and production channels, ensuring creative consistency without requiring redirection at every step.
Creative brief writing — You translate marketing strategy and business objectives into clear, actionable creative direction that enables designers, copywriters, and external partners to produce work that is strategically grounded and on-brand.
Hands-on design execution — You produce and refine creative work independently when needed, enabling you to model standards, provide precise feedback, and maintain quality when directing others.
Design system development — You build scalable brand guidelines, templates, and design systems that enable consistent execution across multiple teams and external partners at scale.
Creative quality assurance across distributed production — You evaluate creative output from internal teams, MaaS, and external groups against brand standards and strategic intent, providing feedback that improves quality and consistency.
Web creative direction — You apply user experience principles, visual hierarchy, and brand standards to direct website creative updates, ensuring digital brand expression supports user goals and business outcomes.
Video creative direction — You shape video creative strategy, provide direction to production teams and evaluate video output against brand standards and campaign objectives.
People management and team development — You build team capability to ensure the creative services function executes at the level the business requires.
B2B brand positioning and differentiation — You understand how brand identity and creative execution contribute to market positioning and trust-building in professional services and B2B environments, informing the quality standards you apply and the feedback you give.
Marketing campaign mechanics in B2B contexts — You know how creative assets function within integrated campaigns and how brand consistency across touchpoints supports pipeline development and sales effectiveness.
Design production workflows and vendor management — You know how to structure creative production processes, manage external resources, and maintain quality and efficiency when creative work is distributed across internal teams, MaaS providers, and agencies.
Brand refresh and adoption— You understand the operational dimensions of embedding updated brand standards across teams and systems, including how to sequence rollout and manage consistency during transition periods.
6+ years in creative roles with demonstrated experience owning brand direction and creative strategy in a B2B or professional services environment, including accountability for brand consistency across multiple channels and stakeholder groups.
Direct experience leading a brand refresh, developing creative briefs, and directing internal and external creative resources, with accountability for output quality and brand consistency.
Proven experience building and implementing brand guidelines and design systems that were applied consistently across multiple teams, geographies, or external partners.
Experience managing external creative agencies or international production providers, including briefing, quality assurance, and performance accountability.
Demonstrated ability to lead creative teams or functions, including resource allocation, quality assurance, and stakeholder management in environments with competing priorities.

Nice To Haves

Contextual Awareness
Critical Reasoning and Thinking
Data/Analytic Acumen
Empathy
Judgment and Discernment
Moral Courage
Pattern Recognition and Systems Thinking
AI Literacy
Responsible and Effective AI Use
Trilliad’s Business and Commercial Context

Responsibilities

Define, create, and maintain brand guidelines, templates, and design systems — ensuring creative standards are documented, accessible, and consistently applied by internal teams, MaaS, and external partners without requiring senior escalation for every decision
Evaluate creative output from all production sources against brand standards and strategic intent — providing specific, actionable feedback that maintains quality and drives improvement across distributed channels
Lead brand refresh initiatives through execution and adoption — coordinating cross-functional implementation, tracking rollout against milestones, and embedding updated standards across the team and partner ecosystem
Develop creative briefs for campaigns, product launches, and projects — translating marketing strategy and business objectives into clear, actionable direction that guides internal and external creative resources
Oversee website creative direction for site updates and franchise sitelet standards — ensuring digital brand expression is consistent, user-centered, and aligned with brand guidelines
Direct video creative execution — ensuring video content meets brand standards, supports campaign goals, and is delivered to the brief
Manage relationships with external creative resources and agencies — ensuring quality standards are maintained, creative direction is clearly communicated, and output supports business objectives
Allocate creative resources across competing priorities — balancing strategic initiatives, campaign demands, and operational needs to maintain efficiency and output quality
Oversee MaaS design output — ensuring work produced by international creative resources meets brand standards and reflects campaign intent
Develop the internal creative team —building capability and ensuring the team has the clarity and direction needed to execute against business requirements
Integrate team workflows across internal, MaaS, and external creative sources — ensuring production processes are efficient, handoffs are clean, and quality is consistent regardless of who executes the work