Design Lead
At a glance
Senior role at Quatrain Creative. Remote, United States · full-time · $80,000 base.
remoteroles summary, based on the employer's posting.
What you'll do
- Design ebooks, guidebooks, white papers and other substantial marketing pieces, emphasizing clear layouts and readable typography
- Direct freelance designers, check their deliverables and offer feedback that helps maintain strong creative standards
- Write briefs from client needs, then explain design choices and present work during client discussions
- Track design workflows, align projects with client style guides and keep deliverables on schedule and budget
- Refresh the agency website and internal materials while developing templates and standards for design work
What you bring
- A graphic design degree or related study, along with at least five years of professional design work
- A portfolio featuring substantial editorial marketing work, such as ebooks, case studies or slide decks
- Experience guiding designers and leading client conversations about creative direction
- Advanced Adobe InDesign skills, plus working proficiency in PowerPoint and Adobe Creative Cloud
Who this fits
This hands-on senior role suits a designer with a strong portfolio of content-heavy marketing pieces, rather than work focused mainly on branding, websites or advertising. You’ll also guide freelance designers and meet with clients. You must be based in the Eastern or Central time zone and work during Eastern business hours; the position is remote.
From the employer
Design Lead
Quatrain Creative
About the Company
Quatrain is a fully remote, woman-owned content agency that blends strategy, storytelling, and design to create high-impact content. For more than a decade, our team of experienced writers, designers, and content strategists has worked with B2B brands across industries—from education to technology—to craft compelling blog posts, case studies, ebooks, videos, and more. Our values define everything we do, and we are deeply committed to a culture that is positive, transparent, collaborative, and grounded in trust. Our team members enjoy flexible schedules, family-friendly PTO policies, and true work-life balance.
Position Overview
We're looking for a hands-on Design Lead to own the quality and execution of our design work. You'll split your time between creating design work yourself and leading a small team of freelance designers. You'll develop creative briefs, review deliverables, and help ensure projects meet client expectations and high creative standards while staying on schedule and within budget. You will represent our design team in client meetings, confidently communicating with clients and leading design discussions. You'll also contribute to the evolution of our agency's website and internal creative processes.
Please note: This is not a branding, web, or marketing campaign design role. We specialize in designing content-heavy marketing assets for B2B companies, and we're looking for someone with deep experience creating polished, professional editorial-style marketing assets.
Our ideal candidate has an exceptional portfolio featuring ebooks, guidebooks, white papers, case studies, sales collateral, slide decks, infographics, and other editorial-style marketing assets. Many of our projects are +20 pages and require expert typography, page layout, information hierarchy, and production skills in Adobe InDesign and PowerPoint.
* If your experience is primarily in branding, UI/UX, websites, paid media, packaging, environmental design, illustration, or advertising campaigns, this role is likely not the right fit.
Core Responsibilities
- Produce high-quality design work for multiple clients (approximately 50-70% of your time).
- Design long-form marketing assets including ebooks, guidebooks, case studies, white papers, sales collateral, slide decks, and infographics with a strong emphasis on typography, layout, and readability.
- Manage and mentor a small group of freelance designers.
- Write creative briefs and translate client needs into actionable design direction.
- Review and provide feedback on design deliverables.
- Attend client meetings as the design lead and communicate creative decisions clearly.
- Coordinate design workflows and maintain consistency across projects.
- Build and maintain internal style guides for each of our clients.
- Improve and maintain the agency website and other internal creative assets.
- Help establish design standards, templates, and processes as the agency grows.
Basic Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design or related field.
- 5+ years of professional graphic or digital design experience, preferably in an agency or client services environment.
- Experience leading or mentoring designers, freelancers, or creative teams.
- Confidence leading client meetings, advising clients on design direction, presenting creative work, and communicating design decisions to clients.
- Experience developing creative briefs and translating business goals into effective visual solutions.
- Strong attention to detail and the ability to provide thoughtful, constructive design feedback.
- Excellent organization and project management skills, with the ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously.
- Proficiency with PowerPoint and Adobe Creative Cloud, with advanced knowledge of Adobe InDesign.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills.
- Ability to work independently in a remote environment with little direction or oversight.
- Must reside in Eastern or Central time zone and be available to work Eastern business hours.
- A portfolio is required and should demonstrate significant experience designing long-form, content-heavy marketing materials. We're specifically looking for work such as ebooks, guidebooks, white papers, case studies, sales sheets, slide decks, infographics, and other editorial-style business collateral. Experience focused primarily on branding, logos, websites, UI/UX, packaging, environmental graphics, or paid advertising does not align with the primary responsibilities of this role.
Bonus Qualifications
- Experience with web design and tools like Webflow
- Experience with PM tools like Monday, Asana, or Wrike
- Experience designing for B2B clients in tech or education
- Basic motion graphics experience
Benefits
- $80,000/yr salary
- Flexible work schedule
- Fully remote
- 12 days of paid time off for federal/school holidays
- Annual office closure from Christmas Eve to New Years Day
- Unlimited PTO after 90 days of employment
- HRA available after 90 days of employment