Associate Design Director at Hook

WHO WE ARE

Hook is a Creative Production Agency. With a collaborative, maker-centric team, and an emphasis on craft-focused design, we develop creative campaigns, short-form content, and websites for well-known brands.

Our mission is to integrate creative and production to help grow brands faster. But we believe what’s most important are the people who work with us and the experience they have along the way. We want clients to think of us as the best agency they’ve ever worked with, and we want everyone at Hook to feel like this is the best job they’ve had yet.

WHAT’S AN ASSOCIATE DESIGN DIRECTOR AT HOOK?

Hook is seeking a hands-on Associate Design Director to join our team.

Associate Design Directors are design experts and experienced leaders who use their craft competency, theory and insights to exceed client goals while working within or helping to define brand design systems. They operate alongside creative teams—providing a client-facing fluency in visual systems—in order to produce industry-leading advertising content for static, animated, and web mediums. While their performance is often measured by the quality of work produced, their long-term success also comes from leading projects by example and passing on their knowledge to others in order to grow the department and organization as a whole.

The daily challenges range from overseeing and guaranteeing design executions to directly leading conceptual design challenges for national and global brands/campaigns. Pushing for the best visual solutions alongside design, creative, and motion teams will be paramount in producing the best work that clients have come to expect. Given the close proximity to marketing clients, being an excellent communicator and an overall joy-to-work-with will also go a long way toward success.

Please note, this team and client works PST and this person must be able to work around these hours.

WHAT YOU’LL DO 

• Demonstrate a mastery of visual design across several design disciplines
• Lead projects with a focus on storytelling through motion design
• Execute and manage original, persuasive, conceptual and visually compelling design work in line with agency and brand standards
• Apply design rigor to provide mentorship to cross-functional teams with the goal of accelerating skill progression
• Inspire, oversee and provide mentorship to design staff with the goal of accelerating skill progression through a culture of collaboration, experimentation and knowledge sharing
• Fluently speak the language of design with both clients and creatives enabling effective feedback and direction
• Demonstrate emotional intelligence in all meetings and communications
• Work closely with creative staff to ensure design work goes above and beyond the expected
• Maintain and promote an internal awareness of industry design references and standards with a strong focus on processes and tools
• Model a sense of ownership that elevates the standards and quality of all work achieved by the designers
• Demonstrate an ability to work on multiple projects at the same time while maintaining clear vision of priorities
• Lead projects and oversee a team to ensure that work is client-ready at all phases of their projects
• Manage at least two direct reports to help shape and grow their careers as it relates to their hard and soft skill development

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

• Demonstrate a high level of craftsmanship in design, with expertise working on design solutions as it relates to brand identities, campaigns and visual systems across multiple platforms
• Expertise in communicating brand narratives through storyboards/styleframes, web design, illustration, or a combination thereof
• Experience developing novel concepts for motion design, while possessing strong visual design capabilities, with a proven record leading animation projects alongside animators
• Experience creating original illustration work, that follows brand guidelines, while introducing a unique approach and point of view 
• Have outstanding communication and presentation skills
• Be imaginative, collaborative, conceptual and curious
• Have an optimistic outlook toward client revisions, knowing when and how to offer opportunities to push boundaries creatively
• Generate and maintain enthusiasm for ideas within the agency as they move from concept to execution
• Be a master of Adobe’s visual design programs (Photoshop, Illustrator)
• Have a comfortability in Figma
• Additional programs and skills are great to come with (motion/After Effects, 3D/Cinema 4D, illustration, prototyping/Webflow)
• Have direct experience—and an enthusiasm for—team leadership and mentorship

WHAT ELSE

Qualified applicants will include a resume and a statement of interest that lets us learn a little more about you.

We are a remote first organization with a “work from wherever (within the US)” approach.. We're a collaborative group of people who love the internet and want to create phenomenal work. Company benefits include health, dental, matching 401k, paid vacation and holidays, and more. 

At Hook we value what makes everyone different, we look for the best talent no matter the background. We know that great work requires diverse perspectives which is why we strive to create a place of belonging where everyone can express who they are. Come join us!

Hook believes in compensation transparency and equity. We’ve designed a 10-level advancement framework that’s applied consistently across disciplines and departments and aligns to location-based salary ranges. 

This role is leveled as an L7, Associate Director. During the interview process we’ll review your location, skills, experience, and other relevant factors to determine where you fall within our leveling framework and corresponding salary ranges. Please follow this link to learn more.

If you got a message from a recruiter claiming to work at Hook and aren’t sure if it’s the real deal, do a quick check that their email address matches our official company domain @byhook.com. We’ll never ask you for things like IDs or banking information until after you have started with us and typically only extend an offer after you’ve met virtually over Google Meet with a few people from the team. See more tips from our Associate People Ops Director here and if you’re still in doubt, you can always reach out to us directly at [email protected].