Creative Director, Head of Creative Powerhouse

Our Purpose

Mastercard powers economies and empowers people in 200+ countries and territories worldwide. Together with our customers, we're helping build a sustainable economy where everyone can prosper. We support a wide range of digital payments choices, making transactions secure, simple, smart and accessible. Our technology and innovation, partnerships and networks combine to deliver a unique set of products and services that help people, businesses and governments realize their greatest potential.

Overview

The Services team is a key differentiator for Mastercard, providing the cutting‑edge services that help our customers grow. Centered on data‑driven technologies, innovation, and scalable solutions, this team delivers consulting, marketing, loyalty programs, and analytics to financial institutions and merchants globally. Within Services, the Marketing Services team develops and executes the programs that help our clients achieve their marketing goals. The Advisors Creative Desk (ACD) is the in‑house creative engine responsible for crafting creative strategy, ideating and delivering engaging, forward‑thinking, brand‑consistent creative solutions across digital, social, experiential, content, and campaign formats.

As Head of Creatives / Lead Creative Director, you will steward the overall creative vision, operational excellence, and organizational health of the Creative Desk team. You will be accountable for end‑to‑end creative leadership - from concept development, team culture, and quality governance to cross‑functional alignment and commercial impact. You bring strong creative intuition, operational discipline, and a passion for elevating craft while scaling creative capability across Europe and globally.

Role & Responsibilities

1.

Executive Creative Leadership:

• Own the creative vision, quality standards, and output across all ACD workstreams.
• Translate Mastercard's business strategy into clear creative direction, structures, and operating principles.
• Act as the final decision-maker on creative feasibility, prioritization, and standards.
• Champion innovation and push creative boundaries while ensuring alignment with brand, strategy, and client goals.
• Represent the Creative Desk at senior stakeholder forums, ensuring strong creative positioning and credibility.
• Managing a team of Creative Leads located in Creative hubs (Lisbon and Warsaw).

2.

Creative Governance & Quality Control:

• Oversee development of creative strategy and ensure strong conceptual grounding across all client deliverables.
• Review, challenge, and elevate creative work at key milestones without micromanaging; coach teams to reach excellence.
• Ensure all creative meets strategic intent, brand guidelines, industry best practices, and innovation benchmarks.
• Guarantee smooth handovers between concepting, art direction, copy, production, and post‑production teams.

3.

Team Leadership & People Management:

• Lead through a team of Creative Leads (4 direct reports), Senior Art Directors, Copy Leads, and Heads of Craft (approx. 30-40 ppl total)
• Define roles, responsibilities, performance expectations, and growth paths across creative disciplines.
• Conduct senior‑level performance management; ensure high morale, clear direction, and a culture of accountability.
• Hire, develop, and retain top creative talent; identify skill gaps and future capability needs.
• Foster a culture of curiosity, collaboration, and creative bravery – paying attention to team's needs and personal performance, being a present leader and partner (incl. Creative hubs presence – across Lisbon and Warsaw).

4.

Creative Operations & Delivery Oversight:

• Partner closely with global Leadership Team, Creative Project Managers and Creative Operations to align creative ambition with delivery realities.
• Own capacity planning, resourcing decisions, and workload allocation across the full studio.
• Identify roadblocks, especially capacity and capability concerns, early and drive solutions.
• Improve processes, workflows, and creative systems that enable excellence without bureaucracy.
• Ensure efficient management of multiple briefs across categories, markets, and channels.

5. Strategic Partner to Business Development & Account Teams

• Support pitch development with creative framing, storytelling, and concept direction.
• Provide feasibility assessments for new opportunities and ensure scope aligns with effort and creative integrity.
• Act as a creative authority in senior client conversations as needed.
• Ensure ideas sold by the business can be delivered sustainably and with quality.

6.

Financial & Commercial Accountability:

• Maintain high‑level understanding of creative cost structures, utilization, and commercial impacts.
• Partner with Operations and Leadership to define pricing, budgeting, and resourcing models that protect creative quality.
• Balance creative ambition with commercial viability and operational sustainability.

7. Cross‑Functional Alignment & Collaboration

• Serve as the connective tissue between Creative, Project Management, Business Development, Product, and Leadership.
• Drive unified operating rhythms, clear communication flows, and friction‑minimizing processes.
• Ensure creative teams are aligned with business objectives, timelines, and client expectations.

All About You — Required Profile

Experience

• Extensive experience as a Creative Director, Executive Creative Director, or Senior Art/Design Lead in a creative agency, in‑house studio, or brand consultancy.
• Proven track record leading large (20–40+) multidisciplinary creative teams.
• Demonstrated ability to operate at executive or near‑executive level with senior stakeholders.
• Strong experience in client management, creative strategy, and delivering multi‑market, multi‑format work.

Skills & Competencies

• Deep mastery in at least one core creative discipline (art direction, design, writing, strategy).
• Exceptional leadership, decision-making, and people management skills.
• Strong conceptual skills with ability to generate, evaluate, and articulate creative ideas.
• Expert at defining briefs and presenting concepts to clients and senior internal teams.
• Highly resilient, comfortable working under pressure, and capable of navigating ambiguity.
• High emotional intelligence—trusted by creatives, project managers, and executives.
• Operational fluency: ability to balance craft, process, and commercial constraints.

Education

• Bachelor's degree required; postgraduate qualifications in creative disciplines or digital marketing preferred.
• Languages: English (full business proficiency), Polish/Portuguese. Any additional C1 language is a big plus.

Corporate Security Responsibility

All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information, and networks comes with an inherent risk to the organization and, therefore, it is expected that every person working for, or on behalf of, Mastercard is responsible for information security and must:

• Abide by Mastercard's security policies and practices;
• Ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the information being accessed;
• Report any suspected information security violation or breach, and
• Complete all periodic mandatory security trainings in accordance with Mastercard's guidelines.