Creative Operations Lead

About Gusto

At Gusto, we're on a mission to grow the small business economy. We handle the hard stuff—like payroll, health insurance, 401(k)s, and HR—so owners can focus on their craft and customers. With teams in Denver, San Francisco, and New York, we’re proud to support more than 400,000 small businesses across the country, and we’re building a workplace that represents and celebrates the customers we serve. Learn more about our Total Rewards philosophy. 

About Design at Gusto

Design at Gusto is made up of over 80 creative, collaborative people who care deeply about our mission to empower small businesses and their employees. We're a cross-functional group that is always looking for opportunities to build comprehending and empathy for the people who use Gusto. We don't care much about swim lanes and though we care deeply about quality and craft, we are never precious about it. We work closely with cross-functional partners in Product, Engineering, Data, and Marketing to design, build, and ship experiences that make a real difference. We believe great design can make hard things possible, even delightful.

We are building an AI-native design organization — and we mean that seriously. We're looking for designers who are already working this way: using AI to prototype ideas quickly, shorten customer feedback loops, and ship quality UX directly to customers. This isn't a future goal — it's how we work now, and it's changing what the design role looks like at Gusto and across the industry.

About the Role:

The work coming out of Gusto's Creative team has never been more ambitious or more central to our mission. Across brand, campaigns, production, and content, our creative work shapes how we reach, connect with, and serve small businesses and their employees. The volume, variety, and quality bar for that work keeps rising, and we're building the operational foundation to match it. We want world-class creative work to happen predictably and at scale, without the friction that slows great teams down.

We're looking for a Creative Operations Lead who brings genuine creativity to operational problems. The systems don't exist yet—you'll invent them. This isn't a role for someone who follows playbooks; it's for someone who writes them. You'll design and run the AI-enabled systems, processes, and programs that allow our brand, creative, and marketing teams to do their best work, predictably and at pace. You'll also coach and develop a production manager, building shared team capability as the function grows.

In this role, you will rethink our operational approaches from the ground up using an AI-first mindset to rethink and scale how we work:

• Design and run the AI-enabled creative operating system. Build Gusto's complete creative ops infrastructure from the ground up. This includes frameworks for intake and prioritization. Develop resourcing models, briefing workflows, and production systems. Automate what should be automated, and free the team for work that requires human judgment, craft, and creativity.
• Own vendor, production, and budget management: Lead agency and vendor relationships from scoping to payment to performance review. Partner with Finance to own budget tracking, forecasting, and reconciliation. Ensure every production has the right partners, locked budgets, and clear timelines before work begins.
• Improve throughput, quality, and predictability. Build systems and visibility tools. These tools will provide the management with real-time insight into pipeline health, capacity, and output quality. This allows the team to scale its impact without increasing its tension.
• Build cross-functional creative infrastructure: Partner with Marketing, Brand, People, and other functions to align on shared processes, SLAs, and expectations. Create an operating model that gives every cross-functional partner clarity on how to engage the creative team—when, how, and at what cost. Create systems that enable teams to get what they need without bottlenecking through ops.
• Establish asset management and production oversight: Build or improve digital asset management (DAM) systems to ensure creative assets are organized, discoverable, and properly versioned. Define standards for naming, storage, archiving, rights management, and distribution that help the team execute consistently as it evolves.

This is a high-trust, high-ownership role for someone who loves building things from scratch—and believes that great operations is a form of creative care. You'll report into Design leadership and work closely with brand, marketing, and agency partners across Gusto.

We are looking for a creative builder and ops leader with:

• 8+ years of experience in creative operations, production management, or program management within a brand, creative, or marketing function
• Demonstrated success building creative operations infrastructure from scratch or significantly improving an existing system at a scaling company—not just coordinating within one
• Solid production background. Hands-on experience managing large campaigns. This includes video and photo shoots, as well as content programs in different formats.
• End-to-end ownership of agency and vendor management: scoping, contracting, invoicing, payment, and performance review
• Experience owning a creative or production budget, including forecasting, actuals tracking, and Finance partnership
• A genuinely AI-native approach to operations—you use AI to redesign workflows, not just hasten them up, and you can point to specific systems you've built that others now rely on
• Proven ability to work across multiple functions (marketing, brand, people, finance) and build trust as a reliable, anticipatory operational partner
• A natural problem solver who brings creativity and ingenuity to operational challenges—someone who designs elegant systems, not just workable ones
• Robust communicator and systems thinker who can document processes, build shared operational fluency, and make structure feel like an enabler rather than a constraint

Compensation Details

At Gusto, we strive to provide rewards that empower employees to achieve their financial and personal goals. We offer competitive compensation packages with a strong emphasis on equity based compensation (ownership in Gusto). To learn more about Gusto’s compensation philosophy and benefits offerings please view our Total Rewards Approach page.

Our cash compensation range for this role is $172,000/yr to $215,000/yr in Denver & most remote locations, and $202,000/yr to $253,000/yr in San Francisco, Seattle & New York. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors, including candidate experience and expertise, and may vary from the amounts listed above.

Gusto has physical office spaces in Denver, San Francisco, and New York City. Employees who are based in those locations will be expected to work from the office on designated days approximately 2-3 days per week (or more depending on role). The same office expectations apply to all Symmetry roles, Gusto's subsidiary, whose physical office is in Scottsdale.

Note: The San Francisco office expectations encompass both the San Francisco and San Jose metro areas. 

When approved to work from a location other than a Gusto office, a secure, reliable, and consistent internet connection is required. This includes non-office days for hybrid employees.

Our customers come from all walks of life and so do we. We hire great people from a wide variety of backgrounds, not just because it's the right thing to do, but because it makes our company stronger. If you share our values and our enthusiasm for small businesses, you will find a home at Gusto. 

Gusto is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate in hiring or any employment decision based on race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), marital status, ancestry, physical or mental disability, genetic information, veteran status, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or other applicable legally protected characteristic. Gusto considers qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law. Gusto is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans in our job application procedures. We want to see our candidates perform to the best of their ability. If you require a medical or religious accommodation at any time throughout your candidate journey, please fill out this form and a member of our team will get in touch with you.

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Personal information collected and processed as part of your Gusto application will be subject to Gusto's Applicant Privacy Notice.