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Director, Immersive Experience Design

Kansas City, MO

Merge Storytelling and Technology

We bring together the minds and passions of creative pioneers, tech innovators, and data explorers to help ambitious clients solve business challenges and rise to the top. MERGE has enduring client partnerships with American Express, T-Mobile, LG, Subway, Kate Spade NY, Coach, The North Face, Meta, Adobe, BlueCross BlueShield, Abbott, Astellas, Supernus, CSL, GE Healthcare, Broward Health, Indiana University Health, Nationwide, and Morgan Stanley. With offices in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Kansas City, Montreal, New York City and Los Angeles. MERGE uses a talent-to-task process that enables clients to think higher and feel deeper about their customers. 

Promote Health, Wellness & Happiness

We are committed to promoting health, wellness and happiness in the world by partnering with purpose-driven clients in purpose-driven industries in healthcare, life science, and consumer products. Our deep vertical expertise and category insights stem from decade-long partnerships with our top clients.

Emerge to the Top of Your Career

At MERGE, we strive to create a superior work experience where talented and ambitious people grow. An experience that encourages people to think higher and feel deeper. An experience where people engage their minds and hearts to do the best work of their careers.

Director, Immersive Experience Design 

About the Role

As an Immersive Experience Design Director, you will inspire and lead the creation of extraordinary physical, digital, and hybrid experiences across health and consumer industries. With a strategic mindset and a passion for pushing experience and creative boundaries, you will craft engaging, multi-sensory environments that elevate brand stories and foster meaningful human connections. Your role will bridge strategy, visionary creativity, and practical execution, ensuring experiences resonate deeply with diverse audiences while delivering measurable business impact.

This role is responsible and accountable for:

Strategic Experience and Design Leadership

  • Collaborate with cross-functional teams and apply strategic vision and creative leadership to develop and execute immersive design strategies that align innovative ideas with clear business objectives and customer insights.
  • Own and lead the immersive design process from concept through delivery—guiding storytelling and brand integration while orchestrating cross-functional collaboration with internal teams and client stakeholders to ensure strategic alignment, executional excellence, and memorable, user-centered experiences.
  • Ensure immersive experiences are guided by strong omnichannel integration, seamlessly aligning with and enhancing broader customer journeys to drive consistency and continuity across touchpoints.
  • Uphold delivery quality and consistency by establishing and maintaining high strategy design standards across all touchpoints, while tailoring solutions to meet the unique needs of each client and audience.
  • Contribute to scopes of work, budgets, timelines, and resources, effectively balancing brand and experience aspirations with operational realities.

Cultivate Design Excellence Within the MERGE Experience Team

  • Support ongoing team development and mentorship by fostering an inspiring, collaborative environment and mentoring multidisciplinary project team members to encourage experimentation, growth, and the pursuit of immersive experience excellence.
  • Demonstrate trend and thought leadership by staying ahead of emerging technologies and design innovations in immersive and experiential environments, proactively integrating these insights into creative solutions that differentiate our offerings and contribute to account growth.
  • Model and uphold immersive design best practices—championing design craft, storytelling, and innovation that elevate the quality and impact of project and practice outcomes.
  • Contribute to the continued evolution of the immersive experience design offering by helping define methods, tools, approaches, and expansion ideas that reflect emerging technologies, industry trends, and client needs.

 

Client Relationships and Engagement

  • Serve as a primary liaison with current and prospective clients, understanding their vision and translating it into compelling solutions. 
  • Partner with Client Services, Solution Consultants, and other MERGE leaders on business development, pitches, and existing client opportunities, including solutioning, scoping, and resourcing.

Qualifications:

  • 10+ years of professional experience in immersive, experiential, or environmental design, including at 2+ years mentoring or managing junior team members.
  • Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Experience Design, Architecture, Environmental Design, or related discipline (or equivalent experience).
  • Proven expertise in designing in-store retail experiences, complemented by experience across a diverse range of industries—including health and life sciences, quick-service restaurants (QSR), connected living (e.g., smart home, IoT), and financial services—with the ability to translate cross-industry insights into strategic, high-impact immersive solutions for both B2B and B2C audiences.
  • Proven success conceptualizing and delivering high-impact, large-scale physical and digital experiences.
  • Deep expertise in spatial storytelling, human-centered design principles, and multi-sensory experience creation.
  • Skilled at managing vendors to ensure alignment, executional excellence, and seamless integration across all phases of the work.
  • Strong business acumen with the ability to align creative concepts to measurable business results.
  • Excellent communication, presentation, and influencing skills with senior-level stakeholders.
  • Proficiency in design and visualization tools (Adobe Creative Suite, SketchUp, Rhino, Cinema4D, or similar) and collaborative project management tools (Google Suite, etc.).
  • Experience applying emerging technologies such as AR and VR to enhance immersive and experiential design solutions, with an understanding of how to integrate these tools into storytelling, prototyping, and final execution to create engaging, multi-sensory user experiences.

#LI-VM1

#LI-HYBRID

At MERGE, we’re committed to fostering an environment where our team members can thrive in both their careers and personal lives, ensuring they feel supported and empowered to succeed.

MERGE believes in transparency and equity. In accordance with state regulations, we’re proud to include salary ranges in our job postings to ensure fair compensation practices.

The salary range for this role is $114,000 - $137,000, based on the individual’s skills, experience, qualifications, location, and other relevant factors. The salary pay range is subject to change and may be modified at any time.  

MERGE is proud to invest in benefits that include meaningful Medical, Dental, Vision, Life Insurance, 401K, Lifestyle Spending Account, Employer Paid Life & Disability Insurance, Flexible Time off & Holidays plus many other benefits and rewards.

Applicants for employment in the US must have work authorization that does not now or in the future require sponsorship of a visa for employment authorization in the United States.

And here’s how we live our values at MERGE

  • Ability. Mastering our craft
  • Agility. Delivering with a growth mindset
  • Humility. Collaborating for shared success

MERGE is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer

MERGE welcomes and celebrates diversity regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, veteran status or people with abilities. We believe that the more diverse we are, the more creative our work will be!

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