Creative Director - Strategy & Operations

Mélange Digital; Goa; On-site; INR 1,500,000 - 1,800,000; Full time

Job summary

Mélange Digital seeks a Creative Director to own the thinking behind campaigns and ensure it ships as intended. You’ll translate insights, data and cultural context into strategic direction while leading a talented creative team in Goa and coordinating with global partners.

With 8+ years in advertising or brand marketing, you’ll drive strategic outcomes, manage resources and timelines, and defend decisions in client discussions. Expect travel and a dynamic, fast-paced creative culture.

Qualifications

• 8+ years in advertising, digital, creative agencies or brand marketing, with experience leading teams.
• Experience owning strategy and running the operational side of a creative function.
• Ability to present to clients and defend strategic decisions.
• Experience managing resourcing, timelines and quality across multiple campaigns.

Responsibilities

• Own creative strategy across destination, digital, social, influencer and integrated campaigns — the thinking every brief is built on
• Own the quality gate on every campaign before it reaches the client. If it's not right, it doesn't ship
• Translate insight, data and cultural context into strategic direction the whole team can work from
• Lead and mentor the creative team, setting the standard for how strategy and craft work together
• Own the operating rhythm of the creative process: workflows, timelines, resourcing, quality control, so good ideas don't die in execution
• Present strategic recommendations directly to clients and hold the room
• Partner with client servicing, production and performance to keep campaigns moving without dropped threads
• Own our branded entertainment IP formats end to end, including the episodic destination format, from concept through creative execution
• Build and refine the systems that let the team scale without losing quality

Skills

Strategic thinking

Leadership

Data interpretation

Client presentation

Operational discipline

Campaign development

Mentoring

Cross-functional collaboration

Job description

Creative Director - Strategy & Operations

Goa Full-time Travel comes with the job

Reports to

Founder / CEO (this seat owns the quality gate, so it does not sit under Delivery)

Compensation

15-18 LPA + performance bonus

Team

Leads creative strategy and owns the operating rhythm of the creative team

THE SHORT VERSION

We're specialists in destination marketing for the Indian outbound traveller. National tourism boards from Singapore to Hong Kong to Zambia run their India strategy through us. What we don't have yet is one person who owns the thinking behind every campaign and makes sure it actually ships the way it was meant to. That's this seat.

You'll take a brief and ask the questions everyone should be asking: what's the real problem, who are we talking to, what does the data say, what's culturally alive right now. Then you'll build the strategic thinking, and the operating discipline, that gets the team from idea to execution without losing the idea on the way.

WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING

• Own creative strategy across destination, digital, social, influencer and integrated campaigns — the thinking every brief is built on
• Own the quality gate on every campaign before it reaches the client. If it's not right, it doesn't ship
• Translate insight, data and cultural context into strategic direction the whole team can work from
• Lead and mentor the creative team, setting the standard for how strategy and craft work together
• Own the operating rhythm of the creative process: workflows, timelines, resourcing, quality control, so good ideas don't die in execution
• Present strategic recommendations directly to clients and hold the room
• Partner with client servicing, production and performance to keep campaigns moving without dropped threads
• Own our branded entertainment IP formats end to end, including the episodic destination format, from concept through creative execution
• Build and refine the systems that let the team scale without losing quality

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE IN 6 MONTHS

• Every major campaign has a clear strategic backbone the team can point to, not just a deck, a decision
• Zero repeat quality errors reaching an anchor client. What ships is right the first time
• The Founder/CEO is out of the creative approval chain entirely, on every account
• The team runs on a predictable operating rhythm: fewer fire drills, fewer missed handoffs

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

Minimum 8+ years in advertising, digital, creative agencies or brand marketing, with experience leading teams, owning strategy, and running the operational side of a creative function, not just contributing to it.

• A track record of strategic thinking that shaped real campaigns, not just supported them
• Comfort with both ideas and data — you can build a strategy deck and read a performance report
• A process and systems mindset — you build the operating structure that lets a team do its best work
• Confidence presenting to clients and defending strategic decisions
• Experience managing resourcing, timelines and quality across multiple concurrent campaigns
• A real read on creators, culture and how people consume content today

Travel, tourism or lifestyle experience is a strong plus.

MORE IMPORTANTLY

We want someone curious, with opinions, who can walk into a room with a strategist, a performance marketer, a filmmaker and a client, and get all of them aligned on the same plan. Someone who believes strategy makes the idea smarter, and that a team without operational discipline burns good ideas on bad execution. Someone who still gets excited when a plan comes together exactly the way it was supposed to.

WHY MÉLANGE?

You'll work from Goa, alongside a team across Mumbai, Singapore, Dubai and London, on destinations, travel, creators and campaigns that can actually take you places. There will be shoots, FAM trips, last-minute changes, and probably a WhatsApp message at an inconvenient time. There will also be good people, good work, and the chance to build the structure this team runs on. We're building a creative culture, not just filling a position.