Executive Director, Marketing and Communications

About the role

The nation's most innovative university seeks an experienced and visionary marketing and communications leader to serve as the Executive Director, Marketing and Communications at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts.

Responsibilities

• Responsible for crafting a comprehensive growth plan across degree and non-degree offerings and securing necessary approvals.
• Directs and guides subject matter expert teams in directing and executing integrated multi-channel marketing, communications and recruitment plans, ensuring work is strategically aligned and delivers measurable outcomes related to all advertising, recruiting, outreach, earned media, alumni engagement, and community relations to reach enrollment and revenue goals.
• Leads team to develop and execute multi-channel campaigns across digital and traditional platforms, including social media, paid media, publications, video, collateral, and presentations, ensuring content is compelling, brand-aligned and audience-focused.
• Elevates the institute's profile by coordinating thought leadership initiatives, securing high-visibility opportunities for faculty, and managing rankings strategies to advance the Institute's standing in redefining what an arts and design college can be.
• Advances the institute's brand, shaping and articulating its transformational vision of art and design, ensuring consistency of message, clarity of purpose and effective execution.
• Establishes and maintains strong, collaborative relationships with the Dean and institute leadership to ensure strategies reflect institute priorities. Serve as a thought partner to the Dean, translating leadership vision into inspired action.
• Guides the use of formal and informal market research, data analysis and performance metrics to inform planning, strengthen strategies and optimize outcomes.
• Produces and presents a variety of reports to senior leadership, including creative plans, progress reports and concept proposals. Routinely tracks progress of implementation and progress towards goals.
• Ensures adherence to ASU’s brand standards and maintains high levels of quality, accuracy and consistency across all communications. Leverages the power of ASU's brand and elevates the creative execution of the work of the institute so creative materials are best in class.
• Oversees vendor relationships, ensuring optimal use of resources and alignment with project needs.
• Designs organizational systems, workflows and teams that support integrated marketing and communications across the institute's academic units and museums. Oversees project prioritization, resource allocation and budget management to ensure goals are met and projects are delivered on time and on budget.
• Fosters a team culture of high performance and continuous improvement, collaboration and innovation. Provide mentoring to a team spanning creatives and strategists.
• Leads with transparency, ensuring clear bi-directional communication with leadership and subject matter experts to foster alignment and trust across the institute.
• Acts as the primary liaison to the University’s central teams, including Enterprise Brand Strategy and Management, Enterprise Partners Outreach Hub, Media Relations and Strategic Communications, Learning Enterprise and EdPlus, leveraging central resources to amplify the Institute's reach while maintaining unit-level autonomy and agility.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree and eleven (11) years of experience appropriate to the area of assignment/field including seven (7) years managerial experience; OR, Any equivalent combination of experience and/or training from which comparable knowledge, skills and abilities have been achieved.
• Previous director-level experience working as a marketing director and strategist for large, complex organizations, preferably in higher education or the arts.
• Demonstrated knowledge of strategic communication and marketing principles, with the ability to translate strategy into actionable plans.
• Demonstrated ability to provide inspirational leadership and facilitate teams to create a shared vision to deliver long-term goals and immediate business objectives.
• Demonstrated commitment to creative leadership, strong creative vision, and fluency in the world of creativity, arts and design.
• Strong service orientation, a disciplined work ethic and the ability to instill a high standard of excellence in the overall team.
• Proven strategic planning, creative direction, critical thinking and decision-making skills and a track record of innovation.
• Experience overseeing performance reporting and optimizing campaigns for measurable outcomes.
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to convey complex ideas clearly and persuasively to various audiences.
• Experience with student recruitment, particularly within higher education or arts contexts.
• Experience with product or partnership marketing, particularly within higher education or arts contexts.
• Familiarity with academic program and course offerings and the process of bringing them to market, or equivalent experience from arts or museum institutions.
• Experience working with faculty, or similar, governance and consensus-driven decision-making in complex environments.
• Demonstrated ability to provide marketing expertise and lead strategy across multiple schools, often with competing priorities, and align leadership across units toward shared institutional priorities and execution.
• Highly organized and detail-oriented, with the ability to set priorities, manage multiple high-priority projects simultaneously and drive efficiency in a fast-paced environment.
• Familiarity with project management tools, defined processes and workflow optimization.
• Ability to remain flexible and responsive to new ideas, projects and directions while ensuring alignment with strategic goals.
• Strong client relationship skills and the ability to self-direct while also fostering collaboration within and across teams.
• Hands-on familiarity with core marketing tools and channels, including content management systems (such as Drupal), social media, print and digital mediums, advertising and email communications.
• Evidence of a "hands-on", "roll-up-the-sleeves" mentality and "does what it takes" attitude to drive success.
• Previous experience supervising full-time employees and contracted agency resources.
• Previous experience working with established brands and effectively working within established brand standards.
• Experience designing or managing cross-functional workflows, shared services, or matrixed teams in a complex organizational environment.
• Ability to clearly communicate to perform essential functions.