Creative Operations is kind of a niche function, but at the same time vital for any organization. Sounds ironic, and it is. It usually sits within Marketing on an org chart, but it can be its own department too. Either way, Creative Ops exists to solve a pressing business problem: originality. In doing so, it streamlines the creative process to enable organizations to better communicate internally and message out to customers externally. It bridges art and organization, or in other words, brand strategy and business objectives. It’s an orchestration of:
- people: stakeholders, teams, departments, leadership, etc.
- process: structured workflows, resource allocation, project management, systems thinking
- tooling: data, technology, software, AI
Having roots in Mathematics, I thought it would be fun to come up with a way to display Creative Ops as a formula. Here’s what I came up with:
(C x M) + PPP(mgmt)Agile + OPSAI
There are three parts to this formula. Reading from left to right:
- Creative and Marketing working together which has a multiplier effect PLUS
- The process of project, program, and portfolio management which can be exponentially multiplied with Agile methodology PLUS
- An operational system of support which can be exponentially multiplied with AI technology.
This formula may change as the field evolves, but I think as of this writing in 2025, it captures the essence of Creative Ops’ focus on people, process, and tools. More on the formula below.
Figure The Field
The Creative Ops field is relatively new—in its teenage years compared to its adult years counterpart Marketing Operations. There’s still plenty of trailblazing to be done. How to define it now and especially where its heading is evolving.
Seen as a living system that’s evolving and in a constant state of experimentation, you’d ask what is the system designed to produce? Creative Ops is not designed to produce the same thing in every organization. Some organizations care about scale, some story, and others might prioritize impact. Creative Ops should be able to address all three, adapting to business objectives and shifting priorities.
The field is made up of Creative Ops managers, coordinators, directors, project managers, designers, copywriters, videographers, photographers, and other creative professionals. Who I’d argue are all feeling many different emotions regarding AI. I’ve personally decided to cautiously embrace this technology and stay informed about its evolution.
My hope is that we as creative professions figure out a way to leverage AI for automation, mechanical work, and to supply us with data that frees us up to strategize better, work together better, and double down on great storytelling.
Finance the Function
The Creative Ops function largely depends on where its positioned in the org structure. If it sits within the Marketing function, it might mainly serve Marketing. This is a natural fit because the two functions largely speak the same language and Creative Ops is supplying the creative that feeds the Marketing engine.
Marketing can also support Creative with data to better inform the creative process. This is the (CxM) part of my formula. Marketing and Creative working together in support of people, process, data, and tools can have a multiplier effect.
The Creative Ops function can also live outside of Marketing and support all other areas of the business. Everyone needs creative content. In this way, Creative Ops can level up every department and align all creative work with business goals. When positioned in the org structure as its own department, its function might be more specifically focused on ideation, innovation, originality, novelty, impact, and setting up environments for creatives to be ultra creative.
Regardless of positioning, the Creative Ops function should be seen as strategic, tactical, and operational servicing. This again aligns with the people, process, and tools theme. Find the good friction that creates conversation and gentle debate to bring forth the best creative ideas from the team, but then try and eliminate the bad friction that slows down the process. Once again, the irony.
Resource the Role
The Creative Ops role, whether its one person or a team, has a list of duties and expectations that roll up to the goal of the function (to remove friction from processes). Perhaps not surprisingly, they are aligned with the three major themes of people, process, and tools.
The Creative Ops role works well with people, facilitates collaboration, cross-functional work, and communication in general. This helps create an environment where processes can be evaluated, streamlined, and set up to evolve. Project, program, and portfolio management come together here. This is the PPP(mgmt)Agile part of the formula. The Agile exponent is my reference to Agile Methodology which I believe is the best fit for creative production. Particularly in regard to Agile workflows and ceremonies that help facilitate a creative environment and an empowered team. Agile creates a good vibe. There, I said it.
The role of Creative Ops also scales from project management and tactical work to more strategic work. By zooming out to a systems level view of the organization, Creative Ops looks at what kind of tools, technology, and data are needed to continuously improve operations. This is the OPSAI part of the formula where operations can be exponentially multiplied with AI support.
Risk the Responsibility
The Creative Ops responsibility:
- facilitate alignment on vision
- create a roadmap for implementing it
- resource the project
- ensure that everyone involved in the project understands the objectives
- keep creative concepts aligned with the overall strategy
- anticipate obstacles and mitigate risk
- find creative solutions to keep projects on course
- set up and run a complete environment that allows for creative teams to be creative
- keep assets and tools organized for storage and distribution
- optimize workflows
- manage approval process
- quality control and regulations
- provide data performance reporting
- continuously improve processes with supportive operations
Profile a Professional
Creative work is ultimately a conversation with the audience that is meant to convey an idea, elicit an emotion, or inspire an action. This is especially true about creative work produced for a brand to engage with its customers.
The Creative Ops Professional understands this. They leverage data to make better informed decisions on types of creative content will resonate with the audience. In this way, data is seen as a partner that enables conversation. Having data in their system, along with people, process, and tools, the Creative Ops Professional facilitates customer feedback. Two-way conversations are better than one, that’s for sure.
The Creative Ops Professional has affinity for the creative process – likely being a creative themself and understanding the steps of production. They also have affinity for business operations to support it. In this way, the Creative Ops Professional balances their creative brain and operations brain. With their creative brain, they have the ability to ideate, problem solve, empathize, strategize, design, and layout.
With their operations brain, the ability to measure, analyze, connect, collaborate, execute, and implement. A Creative Ops Professional is thus highly skilled, specialized, and dynamic in the way they create and run a complete environment that streamlines the creative process. An environment that is disciplined and vulnerable at the same time.
Likely having roots in Design, Brand, Marketing, and Project Management, the Creative Ops Professional is an exceptional communicator, constantly curious, seeks connection, collaboration, and community. They understand that the whole system is greater than the sum of the parts. They need these skills to build better process – and adapt when needed. They understand that process helps you more efficiently reach business goals, but there are times when the unexpected and unplanned happen and process gets in the way. The Creative Ops Professional will keep everything on track, with a calm and cool demeanor.
The Creative Ops Professional embraces technology as a means for leveling up tools, processes, and operations. They might specialize in or have keen interest in leveraging AI to exponentially change the way folks work in their system. They see AI as a partner that can absorb mechanical and tactical work, provide us with better data to make informed decisions, and craft better strategy. The Creative Ops Professional embraces the strategic, tactical, and servicing nature of their role.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the Creative Ops Professional understands that creatives – and people in general – are dynamic. Sometimes we want structure, sometimes we want to be free. Sometimes we need to be goals focused, sometimes we need no rules. The Creative Ops Professional practices system design thinking.
Voice the Vocabulary
Creative Operations has an amazing list of vocabulary. Awhile ago, I started making an alphabetized list of all the buzz words that I would pick up from work, books, podcasts, and other research. Interestingly, alphabetizing them brought to light some themes across the various letters of the alphabet. This is not an exhaustive list but shows there are around 200+ keywords that mean a lot to the field.
Accuracy
Agency
Agile / agile methodology / agile team
AI
Alignment
Allocation
Analysis
Analytics
Approval / approval tools
Art
Assets
Automation
Bottlenecks
Brand / on-brand / brand strategy
Briefs
Business / business objectives / business case / business problem
Bridging
Budget
Campaign / marketing campaign
Change / change management
Client
Coaching
Collaboration
Communication
Community
Compliance / compliance tools
Conception
Connection
Consensus
Consistency
Content / content innovation / content strategy / content storage
Continuity
Contribution
Coordination
Conversation
Copy / copywriting
Cost / costs
Creative / creative process / creative production / creative production process / creative workflow / creative strategy / creative team / standout creative
Creator
Cross-functional
Culture / culture of success / culture management
Curiosity
Customer / customer journey / customer value / customer outcomes / customer loyalty
Dashboard
Data / data collecting / data driven decision making
Deadline
Decisions / informed decisions / decision making
Delivery / deliverable
Demand
Department
Design / graphic design / designers
Develop / development / developer
Digital / digital asset / digital asset management / digital campaigns / digital marketing
Distribution
Documentation
Dynamic
Effectiveness
Efficiency
Element
Empathy
Enable
End-to-end
End user
Engagement
Enhance
Environment
Equipment / tools / technology
Evaluation
Evolve
Execution
Executive
Expectations
Facilitation
Finance
Focus
Friction
Function
Go-to-market
Guidelines
Human / Human Resources
Ideas / ideation
Implementation
Industry
Influence
In-house
Initiative
Innovation / novelty / resonation / originality
Intake
Integration
Insights
Iteration
Key Performance Indicators KPIs
Kickoff
Labor
Leader / leadership
Lessons / lessons learned
Logistics
Management
Map / road map
Marketing
Measurement
Meetings / types of meetings / meetings vs email
Messaging
Methodology / methodologies
Metrics
Mission / mission-driven
Negotiation
Novel
Operations
Optimization
Orchestrate
Organize / Organized / Organization / Organization structure
Originality
Overseeing
People
Performance / performance measurement
Plan / planning
Platform
Portfolio
Positioning
Practices / best practices
Principle
Priorities
Procedure
Process / process that provides space / process that provides space to help the idea realize its full potential / process
Procurement
Product / production / productivity
Production
Productivity
Professional
Program
Project / project management / pm tools / project intake / project delivery
Protocol
Realization
Recruitment
Refinement
Relationship
Requirements
Resonate
Responsibility
Resource / resource management resource allocation
Review
Risk
Road map
Quality
Scale / scalability
Schedule
Scope
Seamless
Servicing / servicing teams / servicing organization
Silos
Skillset
Software / software tool / cloud software
Speed
Stakeholders
Stage / stages
Status
Strategy / strategic
Streamlining
Structure
Success
Support / supports entire business
Synchronizing / asynchronous meetings
Synthesis
Systems / Systems thinking / systematic
Tactical
Team / team work / agile teams / efficient teams
Techniques
Technology / technology stack
Timeline
Tools
Transform
Turnaround
Value / values
Vibe
Vision
Website
Workflows
Continued Reading
Project Superhero Monopoly
Comic book superheroes explain what it takes to run a project across the board
Cohesive Storytelling
Shoots & Ladders
Who are you? What’s your story? How are you telling it? When and where? To who? Your story is your strategy.
Creative Positioning
Fortune
Call on your four elements to creatively positioning yourself in the job market to stand out.
Clue to the
Messaging Suite
A creative framework for expressing your brand story, from essence to depth. Eight rooms await.
The imagery for On Creative Operations comes from my original artwork, Cranium Carnival.
🎟️ Book a Free Session
🪬 Explore Services
Leave a Reply