Studio Manager

Freeman; City of Westminster; Hybrid; GBP 45,000 - 65,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, Dental, Vision Insurance

Life, Accident and Disability

Retirement with Company Match

Paid Time Off

Job summary

The Freeman Company in London is seeking a Studio Manager to streamline workflow across the EMEA Creative team. You will guide briefs from intake through production to delivery, ensuring on-time, high-quality outputs while maintaining visibility of all active work.

The role blends planning with hands-on coordination in a hybrid London setup. You will collaborate with the Executive Creative Director, Creative Leads and the Resource Manager to optimize capacity, prioritise requests and escalate

Qualifications

• 3–5+ years in a studio, traffic or workflow management role within a creative, design or in-house creative team.
• Strong organisational skills, comfortable balancing multiple concurrent creative jobs and shifting priorities.
• Confident communicator, able to coordinate across designers, Creative Leads and account or production teams.
• Proficiency with workflow or project management tools (e.g., Monday.com, Asana).
• Experience within experiential, events, exhibition or brand experience agency is a plus.
• Understanding of the creative process and what 'good' looks like at each stage.

Responsibilities

• Own the day-to-day flow of work through the creative team, from brief intake to final delivery.
• Maintain live visibility of every creative job's status, priority and deadline.
• Keep the queue of live briefs sequenced by priority and deadline, with visibility for allocation.
• Flag capacity conflicts to the Resource Manager and escalate workflow bottlenecks early.
• Own and maintain the creative team's workflow/traffic tool, and ensure it stays current.

Skills

Organisational skills

Communication

Project management

Prioritisation

Stakeholder coordination

Tools

Monday.com

Asana

Job description

Great creative only succeeds when it is delivered on time, in full, and without anything being lost between handoffs. The Studio Manager keeps the creative team moving smoothly, guiding each brief from idea to final delivery without missing a beat. This is a workflow role: the focus is on how work moves once it reaches creative, from brief intake through production to final delivery. You'll work closely with the Executive Creative Director, Creative Leads, and Resource Manager to keep the right work moving at the right pace, with nothing lost along the way. This position will support our EMEA Creative team and is eligible to work a hybrid schedule, generally requiring work in-office one day a week (typically Wednesdays) at our London location.

Workflow & Traffic Management

• Own the day-to-day flow of work through the creative team, from brief intake to final delivery
• Maintain live visibility of every creative job's status, priority and deadline
• Keep the queue of live briefs sequenced by priority and deadline, giving the Resource Manager full visibility to allocate people accordingly
• Flag capacity conflicts to the Resource Manager rather than resolving them directly - who works on what sits solely with the Resource Manager
• Flag workflow bottlenecks and deadline risks early, and escalated where needed
• Own and maintain the creative team's workflow/traffic tool, keeping it current and accurate

Briefing & Handoffs

• Ensure every job entering the creative team arrives with a complete, actionable brief
• Track that PO paperwork for creative freelancers is raised and approved ahead of their start date, chasing whoever owns it if it's at risk of holding up the work - freelancers won't raise these themselves, so this is a workflow gate, not a finance task
• Coordinate handoffs between creative disciplines (for example, concept to design, design to motion)
• Run regular traffic meetings with Creative Leads to review priorities, status and risks

Quality & Process

• Build review and approval checkpoints into the workflow so work is checked before it moves downstream
• Maintain and refine SOPs for how work flows in, through and out of the creative team
• Identify and implement process improvements that increase creative throughput and quality

Team Coordination

• Act as the day-to-day point of contact for the creative team on workflow questions
• Support new creative team members in onboarding to workflow tools and processes
• Coordinate creative team meetings, reviews and internal presentations

Qualifications

• 3-5+ years in a studio, traffic or workflow management role within a creative, design or in-house creative team
• Strong organisational skills, comfortable balancing multiple concurrent creative jobs and shifting priorities
• Confident communicator, able to coordinate across designers, Creative Leads and account or production teams
• Proficiency with workflow or project management tools (for example, Monday.com, Asana, or similar)
• A clear understanding of the creative process, and what \"good\" looks like at each stage
• Experience within an experiential, events, exhibition or brand experience agency, nice to have
• Familiarity with design software workflows (Adobe Creative Cloud, Figma) sufficient to understand handoff requirements
• Background in traffic or workflow management within an in-house creative team or agency studio

Certificates, Licenses, Registrations

Sparks is a leading global brand experience agency, specializing in the design and execution of award-winning experiences that forge deep connections between brands and audiences. Recognized by Adweek as Experiential Agency of the Year, we bring a unique blend of strategic insight and execution excellence to every brand activation, corporate event, trade show exhibit, and immersive experience. Our commitment to creativity, innovation, and flawless execution drives us to craft impactful experiential marketing solutions that deepen relationships, inspire action, and build trust-all around the world.

Diversity & Inclusion

At The Freeman Company, our commitment to diversity and inclusion is helping us to create not only a great place to work, but also an environment where our employees, our customers and our communities around the world can reach their goals and connect with each other. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, veteran status and other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.

Benefits

• Medical, Dental, Vision Insurance
• Life, Accident and Disability
• Retirement with Company Match
• Paid Time Off