Brand Design Principal

Brand Design Principal

Collaborate with Innovative 3Mers Around the World. Choosing where to start and grow your career has a major impact on your professional and personal life, so it’s equally important you know that the company that you choose to work at, and its leaders, will support and guide you. With a wide variety of people, global locations, technologies and products, 3M is a place where you can collaborate with other curious, creative 3Mers.

Job Description

This position provides an opportunity to transition from other private, public, government or military experience to a 3M career.

The Impact You'll Make in this Role

The Brand Design Principal is a design leader over one of our iconic 3M brands. This role sets mid-term to long-term brand design strategy, governs visual identity and brand standards, and ensures creative excellence across the full customer journey. This role integrates consumer insight, business strategy, and craft to build brand value, drive growth, and deliver differentiated, culturally relevant experiences worldwide. It combines strategic leadership with hands‑on contribution when needed. The Brand Design Principal will integrate brand design development into business strategies, identify and lead programs of strategic relevance to create brands that engage consumers and deliver a high-quality experience.

Key Responsibilities

Lead the development and stewardship of brand design systems that create emotional connection and meet functional needs.

• Translate consumer insights into differentiated brand experiences across packaging, product, digital, retail, and communications.
• Govern brand standards globally to ensure consistency, relevance, and effectiveness across markets and categories.
• Partner with business leaders to align design strategy to growth objectives, new product innovation, and commercialization.

Strategic Leadership and Brand Governance

• Define and lead long‑term brand design strategy, including visual brand identity, brand architecture, design principles, and multi‑touchpoint experience frameworks.
• Establish and oversee brand governance, standards, and toolkits; ensure adherence across internal teams and external partners.
• Serve as brand steward—owning and evolving the brand system to support new product innovations, portfolio extensions, and entry into new categories.
• Drive design strategy integration into business planning, category roadmaps, and go‑to‑market activities.
• Provide global support and partnership with regional/country teams; adapt brand programs to local market needs and cultural nuances. Build scalable design systems and toolkits that enable effective localization while maintaining brand integrity.
• Explore future trends in industry, technology, socio‑economic and demographic shifts to inform strategy for growth.

Budget Ownership and Design Operations

• Own the design budget for assigned brand(s) or portfolios; forecast annually and manage monthly tracking to the Design Operating Plan.
• Open and manage purchase orders (POs), calibrate spend vs. OP, and ensure fiscal discipline and transparency.
• Balance internal and external resourcing; scope and negotiate agency SOWs; manage vendor performance.
• Develop trusted, long‑term partnerships with external agencies—translating business objectives and consumer insight into inspiring, tightly framed briefs; setting clear creative guardrails; and leading incisive reviews that elevate the work while honoring brand intent.

Consumer Insight and Research

• Champion consumer centricity; translate ethnographic research, segmentation, and behavioral insights into actionable design strategies.
• Partner with Insights teams to frame hypotheses, define learning plans, and validate concepts through qualitative/quantitative methods.
• Establish metrics/KPIs for brand experience performance and tie design outcomes to business results.

Creative Excellence and End‑to‑End Brand Experience

• Elevate creative craft and design intent across all touchpoints—packaging, product, digital, retail, and marketing communications. Ensure creative intent is executed consistently beyond packaging across e‑commerce, retail, and digital environments.
• Guide and partner with CX on creative execution for campaigns, photoshoots, commercials, photography, and styling—ensuring brand coherence and quality.
• Maintain a high level of design expertise; push boundaries through thought leadership, trend scanning, and prototyping.
• Champion the end‑to‑end experience—from strategy and concept through commercialization and post‑launch optimization.
• Partner with Marketing, R&D, Brand Communications, and Sales to align design goals to business goals across complex portfolios.

People Leadership, Coaching, and Culture

• Mentor and coach designers; lead critiques that elevate quality and consistency.
• Model a culture of curiosity, collaboration, and consumer empathy; inspire teams with a big heart for brand strategy and craft.

Your Skills And Expertise

To set you up for success in this role from day one, 3M requires (at a minimum) the following qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree or higher (completed and verified prior to start)
• Seven (7) years professional experience in brand design across multiple touchpoints (e.g., packaging, product, digital, retail, communications) in a private, public, government or military environment

Additional qualifications that could help you succeed even further in this role include:

• Bachelor’s degree or higher in Design, Visual Communication, Brand Strategy, Experience Design, or related field.
• 10–15+ years of experience in brand/experience design with demonstrated leadership of global programs and complex portfolios.
• Proven success establishing and governing visual identity systems and multi‑touchpoint brand experiences.
• Strong financial acumen: budget ownership, PO management, vendor SOWs, and monthly OP reconciliation.
• Expertise in consumer research translation (ethnography, segmentation) into design strategy and commercialization.
• Demonstrated ability to lead agencies and cross‑functional teams; excellent communication, storytelling, and influence skills.
• Experience in CPG, durable goods, or related industries; familiarity with design operations systems (e.g., SAP/Ariba for POs is a plus).
• Portfolio showcasing strategic brand systems and high‑quality execution across packaging, digital, and communications.

Work location

This role follows an on‑site working model, requiring the employee to work at least four days a week at the 3M Center in Maplewood, MN.

Travel

May include up to 10% domestic/international.

Relocation

May be authorized.

Must be legally authorized to work in country of employment without sponsorship for employment visa status (e.g., H1B status).

U.S. Export Control laws and U.S. Government Department of Defense contracts may impose certain restrictions on share of export‑controlled technology. 3M must help assess candidates' U.S. person status. The questions asked in this application are intended to assess this and will be used for evaluation purposes only.

Supporting Your Well‑being

3M offers many programs to help you live your best life – both physically and financially. To ensure competitive pay and benefits, 3M regularly benchmarks with other companies that are comparable in size and scope.

3M does not discriminate in hiring or employment on the basis of race, color, sex, national origin, religion, age, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

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