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; therefore, it’s equally important to know that the company 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.

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. It 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 programmes of strategic relevance to create brands that engage consumers and deliver a high‑quality experience.

As a Design Principal, you will have the opportunity to tap into your curiosity and collaborate with some of the most innovative people around the world. Here, you will make an impact by:

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.

Key Responsibilities
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 programmes to local market needs and cultural nuances. Build scalable design systems and toolkits that enable effective localisation 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 (OP).

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.

Cultivate 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 honouring brand intent.

Consumer Insight and Research

Champion consumer centricity; translate ethnographic research, segmentation, and behavioural 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 optimisation.

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 programmes 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

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).

Responsibilities of this position may include direct and/or indirect physical or logical access to information, systems, technologies subjected to the regulations/compliance with U.S. Export Control Laws.

U.S. Export Control laws and U.S. Government Department of Defense contracts and sub‑contracts impose certain restrictions on companies and their ability to share export‑controlled and other technology and services with certain “non‑U.S. persons” (persons who are not U.S. citizens or nationals, lawful permanent residents of the U.S., refugees, “Temporary Residents” (granted Amnesty or Special Agricultural Worker provisions), or persons granted asylum).

To comply with these laws, 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. Failure to provide the necessary information in this regard will result in our inability to consider you further for this particular position.

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.

Pay & Benefits Overview: https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/careers-us/working-at-3m/benefits/

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