Introduction
Metropolitan Life is part of Momentum Group Limited, a licensed life insurer and an authorised financial services (FSP44673) and registered credit provider (NCRCP173).
With a legacy of over 125 years, Metropolitan has been serving and empowering South African communities with accessible financial solutions through the best and challenging times.
We believe that financial literacy, paired with expert advice enables financial progress for all South Africans, one step at a time.You and Metropolitan #TogetherWeCan
Disclaimer
As an applicant, please verify the legitimacy of this job advert on our company career page.
Role Purpose
The Studio and Design Manager leads Metropolitan’s internal creative studio, its people and creative output, ensuring high-quality, strategically aligned and distinctive brand communications across static, digital, motion and video formats. The role combines people and creative leadership, developing a high-performing creative team while establishing the design standards and systems that enable creative excellence and consistency at scale. The role champions Metropolitan’s visual identity, evolves the Studio’s creative capabilities, and partners with Marketing Operations to ensure effective delivery against marketing priorities.
Requirements
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Degree or relevant qualification in Graphic Design, Visual Communication, Multimedia Design, Visual Arts or related field.
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Minimum 7–10 years' relevant creative/design experience, with demonstrated progression into creative leadership and people management.
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Proven experience formally leading and managing creative/design teams, with demonstrated ability to inspire, develop and deliver through others.
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Previous experience as a Studio Manager, Design Lead, Creative Lead, Associate Creative Director, Creative Director or equivalent strongly preferred.
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Proven experience coaching and developing creative talent and managing performance.
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Strong portfolio demonstrating creative direction, conceptual thinking, integrated campaign development and high standards of design craft.
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Experience developing design systems, templates or creative standards that improve quality and consistency at scale.
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Experience within an agency, in-house creative studio or complex corporate environment; regulated environment experience advantageous.
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Demonstrated experience across static, digital, motion and video content, with the ability to creatively direct multimedia work across channels.
Duties & Responsibilities
People Leadership & Team Development
Lead, inspire and manage the Studio team, creating a positive, accountable and high performing creative culture. - Translate business and brand priorities into clear direction and deliver results through effective delegation, coaching and leadership.
- Coach, mentor and develop creative talent, identifying individual and team capability gaps and implementing appropriate development interventions.
- Build creative confidence, judgement and problem-solving capability, enabling greater autonomy and ownership within the team.
- Manage performance effectively, recognising strong performance and addressing performance concerns constructively and timeously.
Creative & Design Leadership
Lead ideation, conceptual development and creative critique to continually raise the quality of creative output. - Provide creative direction on major campaigns and high-impact brand initiatives, ensuring work is strategically sound, distinctive and creatively excellent.
- Guide the team in translating strategy and messaging into compelling creative solutions rather than simply executing briefs.
- Stay abreast of contemporary design, culture, technology and creative trends and use these insights to drive innovation and evolve the Studio’s capability.
- Provide hands-on creative direction and intervention where required, while primarily delivering results through the team.
- Lead creative thinking across static, digital, motion and video, ensuring the Studio continues to evolve its capabilities in line with changing content and channel needs.
Brand Stewardship & Creative Excellence
Act as a champion and custodian of Metropolitan’s visual identity, ensuring consistent and distinctive expression across touchpoints. - Translate the CI into practical design systems, templates, principles and creative tools that enable consistent, high-quality execution at scale.
- Identify opportunities to evolve and strengthen the application of the brand identity while protecting its distinctive assets.
- Partner with Brand to evolve toolkits, guidelines and creative standards in response to emerging business and communication needs.
- Oversee creative quality across integrated campaigns and BAU work, ensuring outputs meet the brief, communication objective, CI and Metropolitan brand strategy.
- Provide creative review and quality assurance on priority and high-impact work.
Studio Workflow & Operational Partnership
Partner with Marketing Operations to implement agreed workflow processes, prioritisation principles and ways of working within the Studio. - Translate the overall marketing calendar and priorities into clear Studio priorities and resource allocation.
- Lead the day-to-day workflow of BAU and ad hoc creative work, ensuring briefs are appropriately allocated, prioritised and delivered.
- Provide Studio input into Marketing Operations planning on capacity, resource requirements, turnaround times and delivery risks.
- Maintain visibility of Studio capacity and proactively flag bottlenecks or conflicting priorities.
- Identify opportunities to improve Studio efficiency, consistency and ways of working and feed these into Marketing Operations.
Stakeholder & Agency Collaboration
Build strong relationships with Brand, Marketing Ops, Channel Activation, Integrated Communications and other internal stakeholders. - Translate stakeholder requirements into clear creative direction and constructively challenge briefs or solutions where this will improve the outcome.
- Partner with external agencies and creative suppliers, providing clear brand and design direction and ensuring work meets Metropolitan standards.
- Build productive collaboration between internal and external creative teams to strengthen overall creative capability and consistency.
Competencies
Skills & Capabilities
Strong people leadership, coaching and talent development - Creative direction and conceptual leadership
- Design systems and visual identity development
- Brand stewardship and creative quality assurance
- Studio workflow, resource planning and prioritisation
- Integrated campaign development
- Stakeholder management and creative presentation
- Strong communication, judgement and interpersonal skills
- Strong working knowledge of Adobe Creative Suite and contemporary design tools
- Understanding of digital design, multimedia, motion and emerging creative technologies
- Strong understanding of motion design, video production and multimedia content, with the capability to provide creative direction and hands-on guidance where required
Essential Behavioural Success Factors
Leading and inspiring others - Developing people and capability
- Producing high-quality output through others
- Demonstrating accountability and empowered ownership
- Giving and inviting constructive feedback
- Collaborating for collective success
- Acting with courage and composure
- Driving continuous improvement and creative excellence
