Senior Graphic Designer

Job Details

Portland Campus - Portland, OR

$78000.00 - $85250.00 Salary

Description

About Oregon Humane Society

Founded in 1868, Oregon Humane Society is the Northwest's oldest and largest animal welfare organization with one of the highest adoption rates in the nation. We are working toward our vision of a world where all animals are treated with compassion, kindness, and respect. With campuses in Portland and Salem, OHS is an Oregon-based nonprofit that relies on donor support for our comprehensive model of care and support for animals and the people who love them. Visit oregonhumane.org to learn more about how we’re creating a More Humane Society.

The Team

The Senior Graphic Designer is part of the Marketing & Communications team, a crew of storytellers, strategists, and brand champions within Oregon Humane Society’s Advancement Team. Alongside our friends in Philanthropy, Mass Market, Advancement Services, Corporate & Foundation Relations, and Planned Giving, we work to fuel the mission—raising the resources and awareness that keep tails wagging and programs thriving. Our job? To connect hearts to the cause through powerful storytelling, bold design, and creative that makes people stop scrolling and start caring. We’re the stewards of the OHS brand, and we use every channel in the book to attract, engage, and motivate our communities to support OHS’ work protecting and caring for animals.

The Position

The Senior Graphic Designer brings our mission to life through stunning visuals that connect with hearts and inspire people to take action. They use multiple mediums to create original and dynamic visual stories for various digital and traditional channels. This role is responsible for translating creative briefs into original visual ideas, pitching concepts, and executing a wide range of design projects, such as multi-channel fundraising and marketing campaigns, event materials, merchandise, and environmental graphics. As a part of the Creative Team, the Senior Graphic Designer works collaboratively with copywriters and other designers as well as cross-functional stakeholders to deliver exciting, creative, brand-forward visuals.

Essential Responsibilities

PERSONAL LEADERSHIP

Consistently strives to exceed expectations; demonstrates flexibility, resilience, and the ability to maintain positive relationships and composure, even under difficult circumstances.

Maintains high ethical standards, including exhibiting behaviors and actions that embrace and align to our organization and customer service values, while treating all people with respect and dignity.

Demonstrates an awareness of individual personal strengths and development needs, modeling non-defensive behavior and openness to feedback; builds a culture of feedback and learning.

TEAM LEADERSHIP & MANAGEMENT

Manage, support, and provide coaching feedback to team members, and create and sustain a work environment of mutual respect where team members strive to achieve excellence within their own team and embrace their role and responsibilities in advancing shared goals and priorities.

Manage day-to-day implementation and support for key activities including coordination with other teams implementing complementary activities.

Role model inclusive leadership, creating an environment where diverse viewpoints are welcomed and actively engaged

LEARNING

Contributes to regular dialogue and accountability with the leadership team and across the organization to review progress and course correct if necessary.

Utilizes data and insights to identify, understand and articulate the key inputs and metrics that tell the story of the organization/team strategy and its progress.

Builds appropriate feedback loops to measure if we are meeting key milestones and if the impact planned is being felt across the organization.

INFLUENCE & REPRESENTATION

Communicate effectively to executive and other stakeholder groups to ensure they are informed and able to actively engage.

Liaise with and maintain productive relationships with all stakeholders, including other departments, and donors; build mutually rewarding professional relationships inside OHS at all levels.

Leverage our best practices externally and grow OHS’ reputation as a leader in the animal welfare space.

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES

Translate creative direction into brand-forward visual designs that are sure to delight our audiences and inspire them to engage with our mission.

Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including copywriters, marketers, audience leads, and subject matter experts to develop integrated campaigns and make sure the mission shines through in every pixel.

Take the lead on creative design projects—from concept to final masterpiece—across print, digital, and everything in between.

Deliver fresh visuals for fundraising campaigns, corporate engagements, and other marketing initiatives that make people feel something (and act on it).

Dream up and realize visual experiences for our fun and inspiring events, from classy galas to festivals in the park.

Bring new ideas to the table—trend-spotting, mood boarding, experimenting—while staying true to our brand voice and values.

Create and wrangle our visual assets and make them shine.

Oversee the production of custom stock photography and multimedia assets that make our brand pop.

Keep projects on track, on brand, and on time (your calendar game is as strong as your design chops).

Manage Graphic Designers and provide mentorship and feedback—kindness and collaboration are key.

Build and maintain relationships with vendors that inspire them to be partners in our mission-driven work.

SUPERVISOR RESPONSIBILITY

Supervises: Graphic Designers

ACCOUNTABILITY

Reports Directly To: Director, Creative

Often Engages Directly With: Other teams within Marketing & Communications and Advancement, as well as key stakeholders across the organization.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills

We are interested in finding the best candidate for the job, and that candidate may be one who comes from a less traditional background. We welcome applicants who bring a diversity of identity, culture, experience, perspective and thought. We encourage you to apply, even if you do not believe you meet every one of the qualifications described. You are also encouraged to address how your professional and lived experience, scholarship, mentorship and/or service will contribute to Oregon Humane Society.

You have at least 7 years of experience leading brand-forward design work in an in-house or agency setting.

Your portfolio shows off a wide range of work that’s beautiful, strategic, and impactful (we can’t wait to see it).

You’ve built campaigns that turned heads—and maybe even brought in a few tears (the good kind).

You know how to stay within brand guidelines while still bringing fresh, creative energy to the table.

You've designed successful fundraising materials—print and digital—that moved people to give, attend, support, and share.

You understand the emotional nuance and visual strategy behind a compelling ask.

You’ve led projects solo and also thrived on collaborative teams where everyone is working on a piece of the puzzle.

You’ve mentored or managed other designers and helped guide freelancers or vendors.

You’re not afraid of a tight deadline, a big ask, or a challenging creative brief—you live for the challenge.

You are Fluent in Adobe Creative Suite—Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign are your power trio (but bonus points for Premier Pro or After Effects).

You have a great eye for layout, typography, color, and hierarchy—you speak fluent visual language.

You’ve designed for both print and digital—because you know your way around bleeds and banner ads.

Your communication and time management are stellar—you keep things flowing without losing your cool (or your creative spark).

You’re a team player who loves feedback and isn’t afraid to ask, “What if we tried it this way?”

You have experience in nonprofit, advocacy, or cause-based work or you know that no matter where you honed your skills, they can bring OHS’ iconic, uplifting, and approachable brand to life.

You are able to exercise sound judgment and maintain a professional demeanor during all interactions with the public, partner agencies, donors, staff and volunteers.

You possess excellent verbal and written communication skills - able to communicate with a diverse population in a consistently informative, respectful and professional manner.

Work Environment Conditions & Physical Requirements

This position interacts and collaborates will all levels of the organization, including OHS staff, executive team members, donors, general-public, external vendors, volunteers, and supporters. Contact and communication are carried out through face-to-face, telephone and digital interactions. Excellent customer service skills are essential to success. Communication must be clear, understandable, professional and respectful in all circumstances.

WORKING CONDITIONS

Work is performed in an office and medical center/animal shelter environment.

Travel between the two campuses may be required.

Working at both campuses may be required.

Occasional weekend and evening work may be required.

Animal contact and related injuries may occur.

Noise exposure varies and sometimes includes uncontrolled barking and other animal vocalizations.

Pace of work is active and demanding, requiring a high degree of multitasking and ability to adapt to changing priorities while managing concurrent projects/tasks to completion.

This position primarily resides within Oregon Humane Society campus which is open to the public. Contact with emotional people may occur.

PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS

Occasional use of hands and arms at or above shoulder level.

Prolonged standing, sitting and/or stooping may occur.

Must be able to remain in a stationary position for prolonged periods.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Achieving our mission begins with how we build our team and work together. Through our commitment to enriching our organization with people of different origins, beliefs, backgrounds and ways of thinking, we are better able to leverage the collective power of our teams and address and overcome complex challenges and barriers. We strive for a culture of integrity, respect and compassion where every member of our community contributes their perspectives and authentic selves and where everyone reaches their potential as individuals and teams. We recognize that striving for diversity, equity and inclusion is a journey, and we are committed to learning, listening and evolving to become more diverse, equitable and inclusive than we are today.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Oregon Humane Society is an equal opportunity employer that does not tolerate discrimination on any basis. We actively seek out diverse backgrounds, perspectives and skills so that we can be collectively stronger and have sustained impact.

We are committed to providing an environment of respect and psychological safety where equal employment opportunities are available to all. We do not engage in or tolerate discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender identity, gender expression, religion, age, sexual orientation, national or ethnic origin, disability (including HIV/AIDS status), marital status, military veteran status or any other protected group.

At-Will Employment

This position description in no way states or implies that these are the only duties performed by the employee occupying this position. Employees will be required to follow any other job-related duties required by their supervisor. This document does not create an employment contract implied or otherwise, other than an “at-will” relationship.