Design Manager – AI & Creative

Job Title : Design Manager - AI & Creative

Job Details

• Location: Fort, Mumbai
• Work Mode: Onsite Role
• Employment Type: Full-time / FTE
• Experience: 8 to 12 years
• Reporting To: Head – AI Creative

ABOUT BCCL

Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. (BCCL) is one of India's largest media conglomerates, with a legacy dating back to 1838 and a portfolio that includes The Times of India, The Economic Times, Mumbai Mirror, Navbharat Times, Maharashtra Times, and Vijay Karnataka. Across print, digital, branded content, out-of-home, and experiential platforms, BCCL combines trusted journalism, audience insight, and innovation to shape conversations at scale.

The Opportunity:

The Design Manager will lead the visual design function across print and digital, bringing together strong advertising-agency creative experience with new-age AI-powered design capabilities.

The role will be responsible for conceptualizing and delivering high-quality visual communication across brand campaigns, print advertising, digital campaigns, social media, branded content, events, presentations, editorial-led communication and advertiser solutions.

The ideal candidate should come from a renowned advertising, creative or integrated agency and have a strong portfolio demonstrating exceptional visual craft, conceptual thinking, typography, art direction and brand storytelling.

This is a hands-on creative leadership role. The candidate will be expected to combine traditional design and advertising expertise with AI tools and workflows to create work that is faster, more scalable and more experimental without compromising creative quality.

What You Will Do:

1. Creative Direction & Visual Design

Lead the conceptualization and execution of visual creatives across print and digital platforms.

Translate creative and business briefs into distinctive visual concepts and compelling design solutions.

Establish strong visual direction across campaigns, ensuring consistency in art direction, typography, composition, imagery and brand language.

Develop creative ideas that are culturally relevant, visually distinctive and appropriate to the audience and medium.

Maintain a high standard of visual craft across every stage from concept to final artwork.

Provide creative direction and hands-on design support to the AI Creative team.

2. Print Creative Leadership

Lead design and art direction for newspaper advertisements, magazine advertising, brochures, annual reports, coffee-table books, OOH, event branding, corporate communication and other print formats.

Demonstrate a strong understanding of print production, colour management, typography, grids, layouts, image quality, paper and production specifications.

Ensure artwork is production-ready and meets professional pre-press and printing standards.

Develop visually strong print campaigns that balance creative impact with communication clarity.

3. Digital & Social Creative

Lead visual design across social media, digital campaigns, websites, mobile platforms, presentations and other digital touchpoints.

Develop platform-native creative systems for formats such as Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube and digital advertising.

Adapt campaign ideas intelligently across multiple digital formats without losing the core creative thought.

Create modular design systems that enable rapid adaptation, resizing, localisation and versioning.

4. AI-Enabled Creative Production

Use generative AI and emerging creative technologies as an integral part of the design process.

Explore and implement AI tools for image generation, image manipulation, visual enhancement, concept development, creative adaptation, layout exploration and asset production.

Develop AI-assisted workflows that improve creative speed, experimentation and scalability.

Build reusable prompt libraries, visual references, templates, brand systems and AI-assisted production workflows.

Identify opportunities where AI can improve traditional creative production without compromising originality or craft.

Stay current with emerging AI image, design, video and creative-production tools.

5. Art Direction & Visual Storytelling

Bring strong advertising art-direction thinking to campaigns and brand communication.

Develop visual metaphors, campaign worlds, key visuals and distinctive visual identities.

Work closely with copywriters and creative leads to create integrated copy + visual solutions.

Challenge conventional approaches and exp lore fresh visual storytelling techniques.

Ensure every visual has a clear communication purpose, not just aesthetic appeal.

6. Team Leadership & Creative Review

Lead and mentor graphic designers, AI designers and junior creative talent.

Set creative standards and establish a strong culture of experimentation and craft.

Conduct regular design reviews and provide clear creative feedback.

Guide the team on typography, composition, visual hierarchy, art direction, image selection and AI-generated content.

Build capability within the team through workshops, demonstrations, tool exploration and hands-on mentoring.

7. Stakeholder Management

Partner with Brand, Response, Editorial, Times Experiences, Marketing, Product & Technology and advertiser-facing teams.

Translate business objectives and communication briefs into strong creative solutions.

Present and defend creative thinking to senior stakeholders.

Manage multiple projects simultaneously while maintaining creative quality and delivery timelines.

Work with internal teams and external partners when required.

8. Creative Quality & Governance

Establish high standards for visual quality across AI-assisted and traditional creative output.

Review work for originality, typography, composition, brand consistency, image quality and communication effectiveness.

Ensure appropriate use of AI-generated assets with consideration for copyright, brand safety and authenticity.

Balance AI automation with human creative judgment and professional art direction.

What You Bring:

• Minimum 8 years of experience in graphic design, art direction, visual communication, advertising or integrated creative environments.
• Prior experience with a renowned advertising agency, creative agency or leading integrated agency is strongly preferred.
• Proven experience handling both print and digital campaigns.
• Strong portfolio demonstrating conceptual thinking, art direction, visual storytelling and exceptional design craft.
• Experience working on recognized brands and high-visibility campaigns.
• Experience managing multiple projects and working in fast-paced, deadline-driven creative environments.
• Experience leading or mentoring designers and creative teams.

Must-Have Creative Skills

• Strong understanding of advertising and brand communication.
• Excellent typography, layout, composition and visual hierarchy skills.
• Strong art direction and image-making sensibility.
• Ability to develop campaign key visuals and visual identities.
• Strong understanding of print production and digital design.
• Ability to take a creative brief from concept to final execution.
• Strong presentation and storytelling skills.

AI & Technology

• Hands-on experience with generative AI and AI-assisted creative tools.
• Understanding of AI image generation, image editing, creative adaptation and prompt-based visual development.
• Familiarity with tools such as Midjourney, Adobe Firefly, Photoshop AI, Krea, Gemini, ChatGPT or equivalent emerging platforms.
• Curiosity and willingness to continuously experiment with new AI technologies.
• Ability to identify where AI adds genuine creative value rather than using AI simply as a production shortcut.

Education:

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Graphic Design, Visual Communication, Fine Arts, Advertising, Design, Digital Media or a related discipline.
• However, portfolio quality, advertising experience and demonstrated creative ability will take precedence over academic qualifications.

Equal Opportunity:

BCCL is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace and consider applicants without discrimination based on gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, disability, age, religion, caste, ethnicity, marital status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. Candidates who need reasonable accommodation during the recruitment process may inform the recruiter.