Design Director
Erie, Erie County, Pennsylvania, 16501, USA
Listed on 2026-02-20
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Creative Arts/Media
Digital Media / Production, Creative Design / Digital Art, Creative Advertising / Marketing, Graphic Designer
Bentley Systems
Location: Home-based or hybrid, United States – Eastern time zone.
Position SummaryAs a Design Director, you help shape and elevate Bentley’s brand through world‑class brand systems, marketing campaigns, and event‑led experiences. Reporting to & working closely with the Executive Creative Director, you translate brand strategy into bold, emotionally compelling creative that performs across campaigns, platforms, and live moments. You collaborate intimately with the team around you, mentoring wherever possible. You manage both up and down acting as the conduit between the ECD and Designers.
You are equal parts creative leader and hands‑on designer, setting direction, refining ideas, and ensuring everything produced by the studio meets the highest creative standard. You lead through clarity, and collaboration, partnering deeply with strategy, marketing, and leadership.
Responsibilities- Lead Brand, Campaign & Event Creative
- Define and evolve Bentley’s visual language across brand and marketing campaigns, product launches, social, digital, and event‑led experiences.
- Set the creative bar for storytelling, craft, and consistency across physical and digital brand touchpoints.
- Partner with Strategy and Marketing to translate insight into powerful creative narratives.
- Direct & Elevate Creative Work
- Identify, shape, and refine ideas in close collaboration with the Executive Creative Director.
- Provide clear creative direction across campaigns, brand systems, and experiential work.
- Personally review and elevate work from concept through execution.
- Champion AI‑Driven Creativity
- Actively explore and apply AI tools across ideation, concepting, visual development, and production workflows.
- Stay deeply informed on emerging AI technologies and assess their creative and practical value.
- Help the team adopt AI responsibly and creatively to work faster, smarter, and more imaginatively.
- Mentor the Team
- Mentor Senior and Mid‑level Designers, developing strong creative thinking, confidence and approach.
- Foster a culture of excellence, curiosity, and constructive critique.
- Act as a conduit between ECD and the design team, ensuring clarity and momentum.
- Collaborate, Present & Execute
- Build strong narratives, lead presentations, and run workshops with internal stakeholders and partners.
- Confidently defend creative decisions while embracing feedback.
- Own Delivery & Process
- Maintain awareness of scope, timelines, and resourcing required to deliver exceptional work, especially for high‑visibility campaigns and events.
- Balance ambition with practicality, ensuring high‑quality output at scale.
- This is an individual contributor role.
- This is a full‑time role expected to work 40 hours per week.
- This role requires communication with Managers, peers and other colleagues of the company in person, and/or by utilizing Microsoft Teams chat, calling and meeting functions.
- Requires sitting or standing at will while performing work on a computer (or any other physical requirements).
- 8–12+ years of experience in brand design, with leadership experience.
- A portfolio showcasing brand identities, marketing campaigns, and event or experiential work.
- Exceptional taste across typography, layout, and visual systems.
- Deep interest in AI and emerging creative technologies, with hands‑on experience using AI tools in your workflow.
- Strong ability to translate strategy into cohesive, scalable creative.
- A collaborative, confident leadership style with a strong sense of ownership.
- Tools
- Core:
Figma, Adobe Creative Suite (Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign), Click Up - AI & Emerging Tools:
Hands‑on experience with AI‑powered design, ideation, and production tools - Bonus:
Touch Designer, Glyphs
- Core:
- A great Team and culture – please see our colleague video.
- An exciting career as an integral part of a world‑leading software company providing solutions for architecture, engineering, and construction - watch this short documentary about how we got our start.
- An attractive salary and benefits package.
- A commitment to inclusion, belonging and colleague wellbeing through global initiatives and resource groups.
- A company committed to making a real difference by…
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