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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Creative Director Assistant

💰 $ - $

CreativeMarketingDesignAdvertisingCommunications

🎯 Role Definition

The Creative Director Assistant supports the Creative Director and creative leadership team by coordinating day-to-day creative operations, managing project workflows, preparing creative assets and presentations, liaising with internal stakeholders and external vendors, and helping ensure brand consistency across campaigns. This role blends project management, art direction support, production coordination, and hands-on creative execution to keep creative programs running on time and on budget.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Junior Designer or Junior Art Director
  • Production Assistant or Studio Coordinator
  • Marketing Coordinator or Social Media Coordinator

Advancement To:

  • Senior Art Director or Associate Creative Director
  • Creative Operations Manager
  • Creative Producer or Project Lead

Lateral Moves:

  • Brand Manager
  • Campaign Project Manager
  • Content Strategy or UX Coordinator

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Serve as the primary point of contact for the Creative Director’s calendar, briefing materials, meeting preparation, and follow-up action items to ensure seamless execution of creative initiatives and timely stakeholder communications.
  • Coordinate and manage multiple concurrent creative projects from brief to delivery, including timeline creation, milestone tracking, resource allocation, and cross-functional status reporting to ensure deadlines and quality standards are met.
  • Translate creative briefs into clear, actionable task lists for designers, copywriters, photographers, and external agencies; maintain and update creative briefs, scope documents and change logs as projects evolve.
  • Prepare high-impact presentations, pitch decks and visual mockups for internal reviews, client meetings and executive leadership using Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, PowerPoint and Figma to clearly communicate creative concepts and rationale.
  • Assist with conceptual ideation and creative development by producing rough storyboards, layout comps, typographic treatments and sample executions for campaigns, social content, and brand activations.
  • Maintain and enforce brand guidelines across all deliverables by reviewing design outputs for visual consistency, copy accuracy and compliance with corporate identity, and flagging deviations to creative leadership.
  • Manage asset libraries and digital asset management (DAM) systems — uploading, tagging, versioning and archiving creative files, photography, video masters and final deliverables to ensure discoverability and reuse.
  • Act as production coordinator for photoshoots, video shoots and studio sessions by booking vendors, securing locations, coordinating talent and crew, arranging permits, and preparing production schedules and shot lists.
  • Oversee vendor and freelancer relationships including onboarding, briefing, contract coordination, deliverable acceptance and basic fee negotiation, ensuring alignment with brand standards and production timelines.
  • Support budgeting and invoice tracking for creative projects, maintaining up-to-date spend forecasts, issuing purchase orders, and coordinating with finance to reconcile vendor invoices against project estimates.
  • Manage internal review cycles and approval processes, scheduling creative reviews, collecting consolidated feedback, and updating stakeholders on revision status to minimize rework and accelerate approvals.
  • Create and maintain standardized templates, production checklists, and process documentation to increase team efficiency, reduce errors, and scale creative output across channels.
  • Coordinate social and digital campaign hand-offs by preparing final files for publishing, writing asset specifications for developers and media teams, and ensuring correct formats, codecs and metadata are delivered.
  • Conduct quality control on final files (print-ready PDFs, web-optimized images, video masters) to confirm color profiles, bleed settings, file sizes and technical specs match vendor and platform requirements.
  • Monitor competitive creative activity and industry trends, compiling inspiration decks, mood boards and short analyses to inform creative strategy and help the Creative Director stay ahead of market shifts.
  • Support copy development by drafting headlines, social captions, and microcopy in collaboration with copywriters, and performing light editing and proofreading to maintain brand voice and accuracy.
  • Prepare analytics and post-campaign debriefs with performance summaries, creative learnings, and actionable insights that help optimize future creative decisions and demonstrate ROI to stakeholders.
  • Facilitate stakeholder workshops and creative briefs by coordinating schedules, preparing background materials, capturing notes and translating conversation outcomes into prioritized action items for the team.
  • Troubleshoot production issues across print, digital and motion projects — coordinating quick fixes with vendors or internal teams to meet hard deadlines while documenting root causes for process improvement.
  • Champion accessibility and inclusive design practices by checking for contrast, readability and copy clarity, and ensuring creative executions meet basic accessibility standards for digital channels.
  • Support talent and casting logistics for commercials or experiential activations by researching talent, coordinating auditions, and managing contracts and releases where applicable.
  • Maintain a prioritized pipeline of creative requests, triaging incoming work based on strategic impact and resourcing, and communicating realistic timelines and expectations to requestors.

Secondary Functions

  • Assist with ad-hoc research requests including audience insights, platform best practices, and creative inspiration to support strategic planning sessions.
  • Track team capacity, resource utilization and upcoming demand to inform hiring and freelance engagement decisions.
  • Help document and refine creative workflow processes, sprint boards and handoff protocols to improve throughput and reduce bottlenecks.
  • Prepare and circulate weekly status reports, creative calendars and high-level brief summaries for senior leadership.
  • Coordinate training and onboarding materials for new creative team members, including access provisioning, tool walkthroughs and brand orientation.
  • Support the evaluation and testing of new creative tools, plugins and collaboration platforms, providing recommendations to streamline production.
  • Collect and organize feedback from client or cross-functional reviews into consolidated, actionable change packages for designers and producers.
  • Maintain vendor scorecards and supplier performance documentation to inform procurement decisions and continuous improvement efforts.
  • Assist with basic video editing tasks (rough cuts, transcodes, captions) to accelerate content turnaround for social channels.
  • Help manage event creative support, including signage, collateral preparation and on-site creative troubleshooting during launches or activations.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Proficiency in Adobe Creative Cloud: Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and Premiere Pro or After Effects for basic motion support.
  • Familiarity with Figma, Sketch or Adobe XD for UI/UX mockups and collaborative design reviews.
  • Strong presentation and slide design skills (PowerPoint and Keynote) with the ability to create executive-facing decks.
  • Experience with digital asset management (DAM) systems, version control, and file naming conventions.
  • Basic project management tools proficiency: Asana, Jira, Trello, Monday.com or Wrike for task tracking and timeline management.
  • Understanding of print production processes, prepress requirements, color management and exporting print-ready files (PDF/X standards).
  • Knowledge of social media platforms and ad specs (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube), and basic optimization of creative for each channel.
  • Familiarity with video production workflows, shot lists, codecs, frame rates and basic editing/transcoding tasks.
  • Competence with MS Office (Excel for budgeting and tracking, Outlook for calendar management) and Google Workspace.
  • Basic knowledge of HTML/CSS or content management systems (CMS) is a plus for asset handoffs to development teams.

Soft Skills

  • Exceptional organizational skills with the ability to manage competing priorities and shifting deadlines in a fast-paced creative environment.
  • Strong written and verbal communication: synthesize feedback, write clear briefs, and present creative concepts persuasively.
  • Collaborative team player who can liaise effectively across design, copy, product, marketing and external partners.
  • High attention to detail and quality control mindset to catch design, copy and technical errors before publication.
  • Problem-solving orientation and calm under pressure: troubleshoot production issues and deliver pragmatic solutions.
  • Proactive mindset with the ability to anticipate creative needs and prepare materials in advance of reviews and shoot days.
  • Discretion and professionalism when handling sensitive or confidential creative content and executive communications.
  • Adaptability and willingness to learn new tools, trends and workflows in a rapidly evolving creative and digital landscape.
  • Time management and prioritization skills to balance strategic initiatives and urgent ad-hoc requests.
  • Constructive feedback giver and receiver, able to mediate between creative vision and stakeholder constraints.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience in Graphic Design, Advertising, Marketing, Communications, Film/Media, Fine Arts or related field.

Preferred Education:

  • BFA, BA in Design, Visual Communications, or a related creative discipline; coursework or certifications in project management or production.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Graphic Design
  • Advertising / Marketing
  • Communications / Journalism
  • Film, Media or Motion Design
  • Visual Arts / Fine Arts

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 2–5 years of experience supporting creative teams in an agency, in-house brand, production studio or media environment.

Preferred: 3+ years working directly with senior creative leadership or as a producer/studio coordinator with hands-on exposure to art direction, production logistics, and cross-channel campaign delivery. Experience with fast-paced agency timelines, vendor management, and end-to-end campaign production is highly desirable.

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