Sr. Manager, Creative Operations - Global HOKA

Global Sports Jobs Limited; United States; Remote; USD 150,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive pay bonuses

Health and wellbeing programs

Career development opportunities

Discounts and perks

Job summary

Global Sports Jobs Limited seeks a Senior Manager, Creative Operations to lead the operational backbone of our creative marketing engine. You will shape capacity planning, workflows, and tools to deliver brand campaigns efficiently.

You will manage the Creative PM team, collaborate with global partners, and drive KPI reporting, cadence, and continuous improvement across regions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in business, marketing, communications, advertising or related field.
• 7+ years in creative operations, project management or marketing operations.
• 3+ years of direct people management experience leading a PM/creative operations team.
• Experience in global, matrixed organizations.
• Experience building scalable creative operations systems and workflows.
• Proven track record managing internal studios and external agency partnerships.
• Ability to translate business strategy into actionable briefs, plans and workflows.
• Experience defining KPIs, reporting cadences and using insights for decisions.
• Strong communication and influencing skills.
• Ability to lead through influence and build trust.

Responsibilities

• Own and evolve the Creative PM operating model and capacity planning.
• Align delivery across creative and marketing organizations.
• Build end-to-end campaign workflows with clear roles and timelines.
• Establish and optimize review and approval processes.
• Directly manage the Creative PM sub-team and mentor staff.
• Develop operational thinking and stakeholder management skills.
• Plan headcount with the Director, Global PM as business scales.
• Translate campaign strategies into actionable creative briefs.
• Bridge regional and global workstreams while maintaining standards.
• Drive weekly and bi-weekly creative cadence meetings.
• Oversee freelancer and contractor operations, budgets, onboarding.
• Deliver reporting on KPIs, timelines, risks with insights for leadership.
• Coordinate with creative agencies and vendors with clear SOWs.
• Maintain source of truth for brand systems and asset outputs.
• Create playbooks for cross-functional engagement with quality standards.

Skills

Creative operations leadership

Project management

Stakeholder management

Influence without authority

Education

Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, Communications, Advertising or related field

Tools

Asana

monday.com

Airtable

Job description

About the Role

The Senior Manager, Creative Operations leads the operational infrastructure that powers HOKA's creative marketing engine, defining how creative work is planned, briefed, tracked and delivered across brand campaigns, content and channel activations. The role evolves the Creative PM function by establishing capacity frameworks, streamlined campaign workflows, clear ways of working, and the tools and rituals that support a high-performing creative team. The postholder directly manages the Creative PM sub-team and serves as the operations bridge between the Director of Global PM, the Brand Creative Production team and HOKA's broader creative and brand partners. The position reports to the Director, Global Marketing Project Management - HOKA.

Key Responsibilities

• Own and evolve the Creative PM operating model, including capacity planning, workload management, prioritisation frameworks, intake processes, creative resourcing models, workflow SOPs, and the tools and systems (such as Asana, monday.com and Airtable) that enable visibility
• Alignment and effective delivery across the creative and marketing organisation
• Build and maintain end-to-end campaign workflows so that timelines are grounded in reality, handoffs are clean, and all cross-functional partners share an understanding of process, roles and what 'done' looks like
• Establish and optimise review and approval processes that reduce friction, create early creative alignment, and protect the team's ability to deliver quality work on schedule
• Directly manage the Creative Project Management sub-team, developing talent, maintaining a strong team culture and ensuring delivery excellence
• Mentor and develop the Creative PM team's project management capabilities, operational thinking, stakeholder management and ability to influence cross-functional partners
• Partner with the Director, Global PM on headcount planning, onboarding and the ongoing evolution of the Creative PM team's structure as the business scales
• Partner with Marketing and Brand teams to translate campaign strategies and business goals into clear, actionable creative briefs that reflect team capacity, delivery requirements and creative standards
• Serve as the operational bridge between regional and global creative workstreams, ensuring market-specific adaptations align with global brand standards and process
• Drive weekly and bi-weekly creative cadence meetings, ensuring the right people are aligned, blockers are surfaced early and decisions are made at the right level
• Manage end-to-end creative freelancer and contractor operations, including talent sourcing coordination, interview processes, contract execution (direct and agency-supported) and budget tracking, to ensure timely onboarding, resource continuity and spend within plan
• Deliver consistent and regular reporting on creative operations KPIs, resource utilisation, workstream timelines, delivery health and risks, proactively surfacing insights, recommendations and options to support decision-making by the Director of Global PM and senior marketing leadership
• Manage day-to-day coordination with creative agency and vendor partners, ensuring process accountability, clear SOWs and on-time delivery within agreed scope
• Maintain the creative operations 'source of truth', ensuring brand systems, design standards and creative toolkits are operationalised consistently across all workstreams and asset outputs
• Build frameworks and playbooks that enable cross-functional teams to engage effectively with Creative while upholding quality and craft standards across the full annual asset volume

Required Experience & Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, Communications, Advertising or a related field
• 7+ years in creative operations, project management or marketing operations within a consumer brand
• 3+ years of direct people management experience leading a project management or creative operations team
• Strong brand experience operating effectively in complex, matrixed, global organisations
• Experience building and scaling creative operations systems, including infrastructure, workflows, governance models and tools, to enable team growth and operational maturity
• Proven track record managing internal creative studios and external agency/vendor partnerships within a global brand environment
• Demonstrated ability to translate business strategy into actionable creative briefs, operational plans and executable workflows
• Experience defining operational KPIs, establishing reporting cadences and using insights to drive decision-making and continuous improvement
• Strong communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to influence, educate and gain alignment across cross-functional stakeholders
• Ability to lead through influence without authority, building trust through credibility, clarity and calm problem solving
• Creative empathy and understanding of the rhythm, culture and ways of working within creative teams
• Strong team leadership skills, inspiring learning, collaboration and operational excellence among team members
• Strong understanding of creative development, campaign workflows, design processes and production lifecycles
• Strong data and reporting discipline, with the ability to define KPIs, establish reporting rhythms and communicate insights to leadership
• Ability to exercise independent judgement, prioritise competing needs and make thoughtful operational decisions

Preferred Skills

• PMP certification
• Footwear, apparel or sportswear industry background
• Background in campaign development, content creation or brand marketing operations
• Experience with digital asset management (DAM) systems

Workplace

• Remote, United States
• Applicants must reside in one of the following approved states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah or Washington

Salary

• Individual pay is determined by location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience and relevant education or training; the recruiter can share more about the specific salary for a preferred location during the hiring process

Benefits & Perks

• Competitive pay and bonuses, with a variety of compensation programmes designed to foster career development and reward success
• Financial planning and wellbeing plans that help protect income, pay for expenses and invest in the future
• Time away from work plans supporting family time, health and recharging
• Extras, discounts and perks, including generous discounts and community-based programmes
• Growth and development opportunities and support for personal and professional development
• Comprehensive health and wellness programmes and offerings supporting a healthy lifestyle

About the Company

We believe that when different perspectives are brought to work, we are truly Better Together.