Creative Operations Manager

Precision Strategies; Washington (District of Columbia); Hybrid; USD 105,000 - 135,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

Annual bonus

Hybrid work

Retirement plan

Job summary

Precision Strategies seeks a Creative Operations Manager to own and advance the process that gets creative work made, collaborating with our creative, paid media, research, video, data, and account teams.

The role is based in Washington, DC or New York, NY and reports to the Executive Creative Director. You’ll build intake, scheduling, resourcing, freelancer management, and budget tracking to keep launches on track.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree preferred in a creative field but not required.
• 5+ years in creative operations, project management, or production in an agency or in-house team.
• Proven ability to manage competing priorities and forecast capacity with senior stakeholders.
• Experience building intake, trafficking, and resourcing processes across multiple clients.

Responsibilities

• Build and run an intake process for all incoming creative assignments; set priorities and resolve deadlines.
• Maintain visibility into team workload; assign work and identify freelance needs early.
• Own schedules, reviews, approvals, and delivery for projects of all sizes; manage budgets and scopes.
• Escalate changes with account teams to protect budgets and timelines; manage freelancers and vendors.

Skills

Project management

Stakeholder management

Forecast capacity

Budget tracking

Freelancer management

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Job description

Precision is an integrated strategy and communications firm advising companies and organizations at the intersection of policy, reputation, and public opinion. The firm combines senior bipartisan political and communications talent with proprietary data and AI platforms to develop and run integrated campaigns that help clients seize opportunities and solve their biggest challenges. Precision’s integrated model spans strategic communications, corporate advisory, public affairs, reputation management, crisis and litigation support, data and analytics, paid media, and creative. The firm is backed by a bipartisan, 50-State Network following its acquisition of Firehouse Strategies. ABRY Partners is a strategic investor in Precision.

Position Overview

Precision is seeking a Creative Operations Manager to help our creative team do its best work, by owning and advancing the process that gets that work made.

At Precision, Creative sits at the center of nearly everything we do. Our Creative team works hand in hand with paid media, research, video, data, and account teams to build integrated campaigns for our clients. Our work is growing, and we’re creating this role so our team can grow with it.

In this role, you’ll build and run the systems that keep our creative work moving: intake, scheduling, resourcing, freelance management, and budget tracking. You’ll be a trusted partner to creative leaders, paid media and account teams, and a steady hand on the fast-moving launches our clients care about most.

This role is a great fit if you’re a current or former creative professional, an experienced agency operator who enjoys bringing order to busy environments, and can balance competing priorities with confidence and clarity. The position can be based in either Washington, D.C. or New York, NY, and will report to the Executive Creative Director.

What You Will Do

• Build and run an intake process for all incoming creative assignments. Set priorities across clients, new business pitches, and internal requests, and resolve competing deadlines before they become conflicts.
• Maintain clear visibility into team workload and capacity. Assign work to team members and identify freelance needs early.
• Own schedules, review rounds, approvals, and delivery for creative projects of all sizes, from routine web requests to complex multi-stakeholder productions.
• Anticipate creative needs from account plans. Manage creative requests and other stakeholders so ideation, production, review, and approval move seamlessly.
• Act as the connective tissue between client leads and specialty practice leads during high-profile/high-stakes launches that are top firm priorities.
• Consolidate and manage feedback on complex projects, protecting senior creative leaders’ time and the client experience.
• Catch scope creep and unplanned demands early. Escalate and negotiate changes with account teams before they affect budgets or timelines.
• Build and maintain a ready bench of vetted freelancers and vendors, reducing reliance on costly last-minute staffing.
• Deliver regular reporting to Creative and firm leadership on utilization, capacity, pipeline, and delivery risk.
• Partner with Paid Media and Finance to track creative production budgets. Provide creative specifications and cost inputs for SOWs and MSAs, and oversee creative billing and tracking.

How Success is Measured

In this role, success means a Creative team that delivers more, on time, with less strain. You will be measured on:

• Creative utilization and overall team capacity
• Project cycle time and on-time delivery rates
• Freelance spend and prevention of scope leakage
• Team wellbeing, including reduced after-hours and weekend work
• Strength of Paid Media partnership and availability of cross-practice support

What We Are Looking For:

• Bachelor’s degree, preferably in a creative field, preferred but not required
• 5+ years of experience in creative operations, creative project management, or production at an agency or in-house creative team
• Direct experience in a similar creative operations role, with both creative-side and people or process management experience
• Proven ability to manage competing priorities, forecast capacity and push back constructively with senior stakeholders
• Experience building and running intake, trafficking, and resourcing processes across multiple clients or business lines
• Experience managing freelancers and vendors, including rates, contracts, and onboarding
• Working knowledge of production budgets and scoping, with experience contributing to SOWs or similar agreements
• Excellent organization, communication, and stakeholder management skills

• Experience supporting integrated campaigns that combine creative and paid media
• Familiarity with video, digital, and web production workflows

What We Offer

• Competitive salaries
• Annual bonus opportunity
• Flexible hybrid remote/in office plan
• Retirement plan with automatic 3% safe-harbor contribution from Precision
• Healthcare coverage - medical, dental and vision with 90% of costs covered by Precision
• Paid vacation, sick leave, and floating holidays
• Paid parental leave
• Professional development stipend

The annual salary range for this position is $105,000 - $135,000. Actual compensation and starting salaries are determined by various factors, including the candidate’s education, experience, knowledge, skills, and internal equity. Once at Precision, movement through pay bands is based on performance. Base annual salary is just one component of Precision’s total compensation approach.

We currently work in a hybrid model and require staff to work in the office 50% of working days each month.

Precision is an equal opportunity employer.