Art Director

About Toptal

Toptal is a global network of top freelance talent in business, design, and technology that enables companies to scale their teams, on-demand. With $100+ million in annual revenue and over 40% year-over-year growth, Toptal is the world’s largest fully remote company.

We take the best elements of virtual teams and combine them with a support structure that encourages innovation, social interaction, and fun. We see no borders, move at a fast pace, and are never afraid to break the mold.

Position Description

Toptal is looking for an Art Director to craft innovative, customer-focused brand experiences. You will collaborate with designers, strategists, copywriters, and cross-functional teams to develop creative concepts and oversee projects through execution.

Let’s make some awesome things together.

This is a remote position that can be done from anywhere. Due to the remote nature of this role, we are unable to provide visa sponsorship. Resumes and communication must be submitted in English.

Responsibilities:

• Work with your partner, Creative Directors, and design team to deliver conceptual creative work.
• Responsible for end-to-end delivery of the creative process.
• Present work to stakeholders.
• Fluency in understanding and interpreting strategy and developing initial concepts.
• Work with the project manager to plan projects for effective delivery while maintaining high standards for the brand.
• Communicate a point of view on design trends and actively bring those references and trends to the team.
• Build and maintain a deep understanding of our products and services to ensure that the work is cohesive and pushes the brand forward.
• Provide 3rd-party vendors with creative direction/art direction.
• Bring the brand vision, look and feel to life across all channels.

In the first week, expect to:

• Get the lay of the land and have a lot of Zoom coffees.
• Start to meet with the team leads.
• Understand the fundamentals of Toptal and what sets us apart.
• Onboard and integrate into Toptal by gaining an understanding of our brand strategy, guidelines, messaging, and governance processes.
• Gain a deep understanding of the roles and priorities of the team and key partners.

In the first month, expect to:

• Begin to work on a variety of creative projects, developing conceptual ideas and providing art direction for campaigns, with an emphasis on lead generation and organic social media campaigns.
• Begin the process of codifying the brand’s look and feel, with proof of concept across a variety of marketing assets.
• Begin to help oversee creative projects in production.
• Begin creative development on a brand campaign.
• Audit existing marketing assets and begin optimizing to make them more memorable and branded.

In the first three months, expect to:

• Fully complete a series of lead generation and organic social media campaigns.
• Present brand campaign ideas to internal stakeholders.
• Complete the codification of the Toptal look and feel.

In the first six months, expect to:

• Complete the production of a large-scale brand campaign.
• Continually be optimizing existing campaigns for maximum creative effectiveness.
• Be fully immersed and familiar with all Toptal processes and tools.
• Be recognized as a creative force within the organization, and someone teams go to for input and advice.

In the first year, expect to:

• Be seen as an integral member of the creative team at the company for all things related to the brand, pushing the limits of what people believe is possible in regards to quality, and consistently upleveling them.

Requirements:

• 5+ years of relevant industry experience.
• Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design, Advertising, or equivalent design-related field.
• Experience working with a variety of cross-functional design tools such as Adobe Creative Suite, Sketch, Figma, After Effects.
• Online portfolio featuring dynamic campaigns in digital, social, experiential, and/or traditional mediums.
• Experience working closely with cross-functional teams (product, strategy, production, retail, etc.).
• Consumer brand experience with an understanding of visual storytelling.
• Additional design skills in related fields including art direction, video, motion design/animation, and digital prototyping with InVision a plus++.
• A strong understanding of marketing and content channels and ability to adapt art direction/design to fit the needs of the audience.
• Great taste, instincts, and knowledge of brand trends.
• Ability to present and sell work to stakeholders.
• Ability to work autonomously to deliver on-brand, on-brief art direction with little oversight.
• Ability to stay calm under pressure.
• Customer-focused thinking.
• Natural communicator, both verbally and written.
• Extremely organized, a keeper of information, and who takes copious notes.
• Ability to take it in stride and can tactfully defuse stressful situations.
• Positive attitude, who is always willing to find a way to make it work.
• A natural builder. Someone who loves a work-in-progress.
• You must be a world-class individual contributor to thrive at Toptal. You will not be here just to tell other people what to do.