Associate Director, Design
Overview
The Atlantic Council is a rapidly growing policy organization based in Washington, DC that publishes articles and reports and holds events on international affairs. The person in this role will lead design for the Council’s broad range of products and platforms, including publications, events, videos, and social media. For an individual with the right creative and collaborative mindset and design skills, this is an opportunity for growth and promotion.
The post will be within the Engagement team. Working with internal clients across the Council and within its programs and centers, the designer will focus on managing the day-to-day production of visual design products, as well as contributing to the development of visual strategy for the organization as a whole.
The role is non-supervisory but will work with the Digital Production Assistant and other members of the Digital, editorial and events teams. They will work largely independently and collaboratively with teammates and clients to fulfill requests for design needs based on organizational processes and tickets that come up during the day.
In particular, the high volume of graphics necessary to support the Council’s events, digital content production, and social-media engagement requires high-quality graphics-production work in collaboration with program staff, communications team staff, contract consultants, and others. We are looking for someone with a record of working collaboratively with a team approach and mentality.
We frequently outsource design work for high-profile events and publications, and the person taking on this role should feel comfortable managing the work of external designers from initial brief to project completion.
The designer, while not directly responsible for producing each individual piece of visual content for the organization, should strive to be fully accountable for quality design production processes and products for the Council’s Engagement team. This requires that the designer have the communications skills necessary to successfully coordinate the efforts of others who do not directly report to them.
We expect to grow our use of design in the Council’s work, and the designer will be asked to help develop a strategy for the organization’s visual style and imagery, to project a more coherent, attractive, and striking visual language and sensibility for the Council, and to help us develop a more rationalized approach to the use of internal and external design resources.
Job Responsibilities
- Engaging with clients: Communicate clearly and effectively with clients to quickly and efficiently arrive at a shared understanding of design requirements in order to effectively produce desired products as specified and to minimize the number and extent of necessary revisions.
- Visual design advisor: Advise the Engagement team and programs on design across all media—web, social media, video, physical production displays, and print.
- Visual content production: Produce high-quality designed products (including event graphics, video graphics, animated graphics, logos, custom imagery and graphics for editorial work, and other elements of visual identity, physical signage, etc.) quickly and efficiently across multiple media and toolsets, balancing clients’ requirements and branding guidelines. Ensure that text within graphics is correctly and consistently typeset and free from grammatical errors, and that it uses correct formatting and follows style guides.
- Help improve standards: Help implement, refine, and further develop a consistent visual identity for the organization and its elements. This may involve tutorials, templates, and other products to guide the work of others in the organization.
- Advocate for design: Advocate effectively for design decisions by communicating clearly and effectively in writing and in meetings the underlying reasons for those decisions.
- Navigate our organization: Understand and be comfortable with the Council’s organizational identities. Build strong relationships with Engagement and program staff through direct and clear communications and being highly attentive to client needs.
- Build accountability for design: Help position the Engagement team as accountable for the organization in the area of visual design and as a steward of the Atlantic Council brand.
- Bill accurately: Account for time spent on client work by themselves and by external contractors. Ensure invoices from contractors are received, processed, and paid.
- Other: Perform other duties as assigned.
Qualifications
- An undergraduate degree in design, communications, or other relevant field and three to five years of relevant design experience.
- Strong sense for design and a demonstrated passion for one area within it: graphic design, video design, print design, illustration.
- A demonstrated ability to multi-task across a set of projects operating often on short and flexible deadlines and for multiple clients.
- Preferred experience with content management systems, particularly WordPress and its Gutenberg block system.
- Strong experience with and knowledge of HTML and CSS.
- Knowledge of JavaScript and other scripting languages are a plus.
- Strong experience with and knowledge of Adobe Creative Cloud applications and other common graphic-production tools, such as Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. Knowledge of Premiere and After Effects is a plus.
- Professional experience working with think tanks, non-profit, or advocacy organizations is a plus.
- Knowledge of HTML, Illustration, and/or Video a plus