Senior Director of Brand Strategy & Creative

Are you enthusiastic about creativity, making an impact on a brand and enjoy making a positive impact in your job? We are looking for a Senior Director of Brand Strategy & Creative to lead our Hornets Sports & Entertainment (HSE) Creative Services team!

Our team is comprised of brand-focused problem solvers who uphold and evolve HSE brand standards. The team brings creativity, quality, and aesthetics to projects such as seasonal theme and sales campaigns, brand asset development, presentation mockups and decks, and arena marketing creative.

As the Senior Director of Brand Strategy & Creative, you will lead the Creative Services team in supporting all HSE entities including Charlotte Hornets, Spectrum Center Events, Novant Health Performance Center, Charlotte Hornets Foundation, and Greensboro Swarm.

This role will manage all graphic design and print production and play a critical role in shaping and executing the organization’s brand strategy.

The position requires a blend of hands-on design work, cross-departmental collaboration and strategic leadership in a fast-paced sports and entertainment environment.

Keys to success are being able to forge positive internal relationships, lead production efforts timely, identify process efficiencies, and navigate the challenges of design in a dynamic environment across revenue generation, basketball and arena activations and community initiatives.

Essential Duties And Responsibilities

• Lead an enterprise-wide approach to creative and brand strategy, ensuring brand consistency aligned with HSE’s vision and objectives
• Lead and develop a high-performing team, fostering a collaborative and innovative environment that consistently delivers high-quality print, graphic, motion graphics and presentation projects according to the specified timeline, goals and expectations
• Exhibit strong leadership with a focus on ideation, project assignment, project management, and creative business solutions
• Actively participate as a graphic designer and execute projects throughout the business year
• Create and maintain a narrative led design approach
• Develop multi-year uniform, court and team apparel plan
• Annually maintain brand standard guidelines for all properties and identities
• Provide clear, consistent, and timely communication to creative staff, across department lines, with internal and external clients, and with senior management
• Ensure a proactive approach to aligning project execution and campaign direction with department and company goals while always maintaining a sales and branding focus
• Collaborate during meetings including marketing campaign discussions, ticket sales and partnerships strategy sessions, arena branding and production meetings, community impact planning sessions, season ticket services planning sessions, and ticket operations creative needs meetings
• Work directly with fan experience and arena operations team on all Spectrum Center signage and branding projects
• Develop design concepts to support arena branding, theme/ tagline conceptualization, team apparel and court design, retail merchandise sales & initiatives
• Build and manage the Creative Services budget
• Support brand positioning and monitoring
• Serve as primary liaison with NBA, apparel partners or third parties, as assigned by CMO
• Support partnerships solutions design, video production, and digital content with brand standards and brand consistency
• Manage the booking of freelance or agency design services, artists, illustrators, and photographers
• Oversee the Creative Work Order system to effectively track and record all necessary information to complete projects
• Other duties as assigned by Manager

Required Skills, Abilities, Experiences

To perform the job successfully, you will demonstrate the following skills and abilities:

• Hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Graphic Design with at least 8-10 years of design and advertising experience within the business, sports, entertainment, or advertising industry
• Five years of experience leading a team including print and digital or motion graphic designers from concept to completion on projects
• Detailed understanding of the principles of art, layout, copy, and functionality
• Deep understanding of how to leverage creative abilities to meet business objections and goals
• Demonstrated ability to create and execute strategy to meet department and organizational goals
• Lead innovatively to enhance workflow and processes
• Possess excellent interpersonal skills in order to connect with your team, across HSE and with external clients promptly and thoroughly
• Knowledge of Sports & Entertainment field preferred
• Available to work a variable schedule, including holidays, nights, weekends, and game nights when required
• Hold advanced knowledge of graphic designing software in a MAC environment and be skilled in: Adobe Workfront, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign
• Must be adaptable to change, conscientious about delivery deadlines, detail oriented and able to navigate priorities to achieve business objectives
• Able to work through high-volume needs while timely meeting demanding challenges
• Must have an awareness of industry and cultural trends related to sport, design, fashion, music, marketing, experiential branding, photography and social media
• Professionally presents oneself and is capable of interacting with all levels of the organization and external stakeholders and prospects

Additional Information

HSE provides valuable benefits and competitive time off policies to help you and your family lead healthy, balanced lives.

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status

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