Lead ideation and concept development to drive brand, product, and marketing creative direction. Partner with strategy and product teams, mentor designers and writers, explore trends and new formats, build concept decks and presentations, and ensure creative excellence across multi-channel campaigns.
Creative Lead Role Overview
The Creative Lead is responsible for driving the strategic and conceptual exploration of innovative creative directions that support brand, product, and marketing objectives. This role leads the ideation phase, develops breakthrough concepts, and guides teams in discovering fresh, relevant, and high-impact creative opportunities across channels.
The Creative Lead ensures creative excellence, fosters experimentation, and translates insights into compelling creative territories that align with business goals and audience needs.
Key Responsibilities Creative Discovery & Concept Development
- Lead creative discovery processes including brainstorming, concept sprints, and creative workshops.
- Develop original creative territories, campaigns, and storytelling approaches.
- Translate strategic briefs into innovative, insight-driven creative concepts.
- Explore new formats, emerging trends, and technologies to enhance creative output.
- Build concept decks, mood boards, and creative narratives for stakeholder alignment.
Strategic Collaboration
- Partner with strategy, marketing, product, and brand teams to understand objectives and audience insights.
- Contribute to campaign planning by shaping creative direction from early stages.
- Align creative concepts with brand voice, positioning, and long-term vision.
Creative Leadership & Mentorship
- Guide designers, copywriters, and creative team members during ideation and development.
- Foster a culture of creativity, curiosity, and experimentation.
- Provide constructive feedback to elevate creative quality and effectiveness.
Innovation & Trend Exploration
- Stay ahead of industry trends, cultural shifts, and creative innovations.
- Identify opportunities for differentiation and creative breakthroughs.
- Introduce new creative tools, formats, and processes to improve output.
Presentation & Stakeholder Management
- Present creative concepts and rationale clearly to internal teams and leadership.
- Communicate creative vision and inspire stakeholder confidence.
- Incorporate feedback while maintaining creative integrity.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Design, Advertising, Communications, or related field (or equivalent experience).
- 6–10+ years of experience in creative roles, with at least 2–3 years in a leadership capacity.
- Strong portfolio demonstrating concept development and creative thinking.
- Proven ability to lead ideation and creative discovery processes.
- Excellent storytelling, presentation, and communication skills.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience in digital, brand, marketing, or product creative environments.
- Exposure to multi-channel campaigns (social, digital, video, experiential, product).
- Strong understanding of brand strategy and user-centered design principles.
- Experience working in fast-paced, cross-functional teams.
Key Skills & Competencies
- Creative strategy and concept development
- Creative discovery and ideation leadership
- Visual and narrative storytelling
- Trend analysis and innovation
- Leadership and team mentorship
- Stakeholder communication and presentation
- Strategic thinking and problem-solving
Compensation, Benefits and Duration
Minimum Compensation: USD 64,000
Maximum Compensation: USD 225,000
Compensation is based on actual experience and qualifications of the candidate. The above is a reasonable and a good faith estimate for the role.
Medical, vision, and dental benefits, 401k retirement plan, variable pay/incentives, paid time off, and paid holidays are available for full time employees.
This position is available for independent contractors
No applications will be considered if received more than 120 days after the date of this post
Photon San Francisco, California, USA Office
San Francisco, United States
Similar Jobs
Artificial Intelligence • Big Data • Healthtech • Machine Learning • Analytics • Biotech • Generative AI
Lead research and development of large-scale multimodal foundation models for precision medicine using clinical and molecular data. Responsibilities include model architecture, pretraining, representation learning, self-supervised and multimodal learning, downstream clinical applications, scientific publication, technical leadership, and validation for healthcare and life sciences products. The role requires collaboration across research, engineering, regulatory, and product teams.
Top Skills:
PythonPyTorch
Artificial Intelligence • Automotive • Greentech • Information Technology • Machine Learning • Software • Cybersecurity
Field sales professional responsible for retaining and growing revenue from an assigned book of dealer clients. Will perform consultative, solutions-based selling at client locations, collaborate across Cox Automotive teams, leverage Salesforce, and travel extensively (about 80%). Compensation includes base salary plus commission/incentive.
Top Skills:
Salesforce
Artificial Intelligence • Automotive • Greentech • Information Technology • Machine Learning • Software • Cybersecurity
Manages sales of Dealer.com and Cox Automotive products to franchise dealerships across Michigan and Ohio. Builds relationships with dealership decision-makers, consultatively sells and demonstrates solutions, closes complex opportunities, grows territory revenue, and meets sales targets. Provides industry insights, develops consensus among stakeholders, manages existing accounts, and supports territory coverage. This remote role requires the candidate to live in the territory and travel extensively, typically 70% or more.
Top Skills:
CdkDealer.ComDealersocketReynolds And ReynoldsRouteone
What you need to know about the San Francisco Tech Scene
San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area attracts more startup funding than any other region in the world. Home to Stanford University and UC Berkeley, leading VC firms and several of the world’s most valuable companies, the Bay Area is the place to go for anyone looking to make it big in the tech industry. That said, San Francisco has a lot to offer beyond technology thanks to a thriving art and music scene, excellent food and a short drive to several of the country’s most beautiful recreational areas.
Key Facts About San Francisco Tech
- Number of Tech Workers: 365,500; 13.9% of overall workforce (2024 CompTIA survey)
- Major Tech Employers: Google, Apple, Salesforce, Meta
- Key Industries: Artificial intelligence, cloud computing, fintech, consumer technology, software
- Funding Landscape: $50.5 billion in venture capital funding in 2024 (Pitchbook)
- Notable Investors: Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Bessemer Venture Partners, Greylock Partners, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins
- Research Centers and Universities: Stanford University; University of California, Berkeley; University of San Francisco; Santa Clara University; Ames Research Center; Center for AI Safety; California Institute for Regenerative Medicine
