The Position:
Summit Search Group has proudly partnered with Johnston Group on the search for their next Creative Director, Marketing. Johnston Group provides employee benefit solutions to companies from one employee to 10,000 or more.
Johnston Group ensures whether you’re a sole proprietor, part of a large organization, or an association with thousands of employees, they have an employee benefit solution for you. “Let us do what we do best, so you can go back to doing what you do best – growing your business.” They call Winnipeg home and believe strongly in giving back by contributing to local health, arts, sports, and other community organizations. Over 30,000 Canadian businesses trust them with their employee benefit needs.
About the Role:
The Creative Director, Marketing is responsible for defining and leading Johnston Group’s creative vision across brand, marketing, and sales enablement initiatives. Working under the direction of the Vice President, Marketing, this role ensures a consistent and high-quality brand presence across digital, print, and experiential channels while supporting business growth, lead generation, and client engagement.
The Creative Director provides strategic creative direction, leads concept development and production, and collaborates with Marketing, Sales, and external partners to deliver compelling and on-brand creative work. A key focus of the role includes supporting the marketing and promotion of Chambers Plan, one of Johnston Group’s flagship programs.
Key Responsibilities:
Creative Strategy & Brand Leadership
- Translate business and marketing objectives into clear creative strategies and campaigns.
- Act as brand steward, ensuring all creative outputs align with brand standards, tone, and positioning.
- Provide creative direction for campaigns, launches, and major initiatives.
Concept Development & Creative Execution
- Lead ideation and development of marketing campaigns, sales collateral, digital assets, and presentations.
- Guide creative work from brief to final delivery, ensuring messaging clearly communicates value propositions.
- Review and approve creative work to ensure quality, clarity, and alignment with objectives.
Team Leadership & Collaboration
- Provide direction and mentorship to internal creative resources while fostering a collaborative environment.
- Deliver clear briefs and feedback to designers, writers, and external partners.
- Partner with Marketing, Sales, Product, and leadership teams to align creative initiatives with business priorities.
Project, Workflow & Vendor Management
- Oversee creative workflows, timelines, approvals, and revisions to ensure projects are delivered on time and within scope.
- Manage multiple initiatives simultaneously while maintaining strong quality standards.
- Build and manage relationships with agencies, freelancers, printers, and production partners.
- Ensure quality across print, digital, and multimedia deliverables while optimizing production approaches and spend.
Qualifications:
Education and Experience
- Post-secondary education in Graphic Design, Visual Communication, Marketing, or a related field, or equivalent experience
- 7–10 years of progressive experience in creative, design, or brand leadership roles. Applicant should have held a role of Creative Director or similar.
- Demonstrated experience leading hands-on creative teams and major brand initiatives.
- Experience delivering large-scale programs such as brand refreshes or enterprise marketing rollouts preferred.
- Experience in professional services, financial services, or other regulated environments is considered an asset.
Knowledge & Skills
- Deep understanding of branding, visual identity systems, and creative strategy.
- Strong knowledge of integrated marketing, sales enablement, and plan-based product marketing.
- Exceptional creative direction, design judgment, and visual storytelling capabilities.
- Strong communication, presentation, and stakeholder management skills.
- Proficiency with industry-standard design tools and creative workflows.
Key Competencies
- Ability to lead strategically while remaining actively involved in execution.
- Strong organizational skills with the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
- Confident decision-making and the ability to provide clear, constructive creative feedback.
- Highly collaborative with the ability to work effectively across teams and levels of the organization.
- Strategic, pragmatic, detail-oriented, and adaptable in a growth-oriented environment.
For more information, or to submit your resume and portfolio, please reach out to Jessica Willis or Erin Steeves at:
Jessica.willis@summitsearchgroup.com
Erin.steeves@summitsearchgroup.com
Summit Search Group has a strong commitment to Diversity, Equality and Inclusion. We strive for continuous development, modeling, inclusive behaviors and proactively managing bias throughout our process.
