Creative Director, Affinity

This role will lead the Affinity Brand & Creative team that works closely with marketing, product, and community partners to launch and build Affinity’s next chapter - delivering bold, beautiful creative that wins the hearts and minds of professional creatives everywhere. Affinity is a professional suite of creative tools, including photo editing, vector illustration, and layout design - built for speed, precision, and power. Since joining Canva in 2024, the team have been reimagining Affinity to bring even more innovation and performance to creative professional creatives around the world. Affinity gives professional creatives the freedom to craft with industry-leading tools, and then scale their impact within Canva’s ecosystem. Together, we’re making world-class creative tools more accessible than ever, while maintaining the control and quality professionals demand.

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Main Responsibilities

• Success in this role will require hands-on creative leadership, proactive ownership of high-impact deliverables, clear communication, and the ability to set and maintain direction under pressure. You will be expected to work in ambiguity, navigate shifting priorities with resilience, and create clarity for your team at every stage of the process.
• This role will need to lead on a large range of projects from brand identity, brand system building, campaigns, product editorial, product launch UI, storyboards, social content, art direction, experiential, activations and more.
• The Creative Director will work closely with our Global Canva Creative & Brand team to ensure adoption of best practices and alignment to ways of working.
• Affinity Creative Leadership.
• Lead the creative direction for Affinity’s advertising for our Pro Creative audience.
• Oversee the development and execution of integrated campaigns across TV, digital, social, OOH, and performance channels.
• Create bold, culturally relevant campaigns that connect with audiences and drive growth.
• Embed insights, trends, and data into creative work to increase impact.
• Brand and Campaign Excellence.
• Raise the bar on storytelling and design to help Canva stand out in a competitive market.
• Shape messaging and creative platforms that resonate locally and stay aligned globally.
• Encourage experimentation and learning from what works (and what doesn’t).
• Drive innovation across formats and platforms, from traditional media to emerging channels.
• Product Launch Creative Ownership.
• Define the creative direction for the way the Affinity product shows up in Marketing.
• Ensure consistency across all channels: product editorial, product launch UI, storyboards, social content, art direction, experiential, activations and more.
• Agency and Production Management.
• Manage Affinity UK creative resourcing across in-house, agency, and specialist partners.
• Shape and evolve our global agency partner model to enable seamless collaboration and top-tier execution.
• Work closely with central ops to scale creative systems while maintaining quality and speed.
• Team Leadership and Development.
• Build and lead a high-performing Affinity creative team in the UK.
• Create a culture where people feel safe to take risks, grow, and do their best work.
• Provide mentorship and creative guidance to regional creative teams.
• Cross-functional Partnership.
• Collaborate closely with marketing, growth, and product leaders in the UK and globally.
• Sit on the Affinity Marketing Leadership team.
• Translate business goals into creative strategies that deliver results.
• Align global and regional teams to ensure consistency without losing local nuance.
• Triage Creative requests across all of Affinity marketing & ensure team are set up with clear briefs.

Skills & Experience

• 12+ years in senior creative leadership roles, across both agency and in-house.
• Proven success leading major advertising campaigns.
• Experience mentoring and managing creative teams across multiple markets.
• Strong understanding of the Pro Creative community.
• Strategic mindset with the ability to connect creative ideas to business impact.
• Empathetic mentor with a collaborative, people-first approach.
• Confident communicator and presenter, comfortable influencing at all levels.
• Thrives in fast-paced, global environments.
• Culturally aware and globally minded, with a passion for creating resonant work across markets.

The Ideal Candidate?

Flexible leave options that let you recharge or take time to give back Affinity is a professional suite of creative tools, including photo editing, vector illustration, and layout design - built for speed, precision, and power. Since joining Canva in 2024, the team have been reimagining Affinity to bring even more innovation and performance to creative professional creatives around the world. Affinity gives professional creatives the freedom to craft with industry-leading tools, and then scale their impact within Canva’s ecosystem. Together, we’re making world-class creative tools more accessible than ever, while maintaining the control and quality professionals demand. This role.

Why Join Us?

• Champion inclusion, collaboration, and regional empowerment across Canva’s global creative teams.
• Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard—but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connection, and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a range of benefits to support your success inside and outside work:.
• Equity packages – we want our success to be yours too.
• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers.
• Annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more.
• Flexible leave options that let you recharge or take time to give back.

Salary

Negotiable.