How we turned a stream of urgent executive requests into a dedicated, always-on function, and kept it ahead of growing demand.
Title: Global Head of Presentation Graphics (earlier: Art Director who along with head of Impact scoped the role)
Organization: ION Group | Impact
Timeframe: Scoped 2022 to early 2023; led from Oct 2023 to present
Scope: C-suite, sales, legal, and HR across 5 verticals and 32 sub-brands; team of 6 designers
The situation
As Impact’s brand and design team grew, a pattern became clear: a large share of requests came from the C-suite, department heads, sales, project management, and marketing, often urgent and often presentations. They needed specialists, not generalists. I worked with the head of Impact and team leads to scope a dedicated presentation role, and through 2022 and early 2023 the function was split into graphic design and presentation graphics under Creative Services.
My role
I moved from Art Director into the Global Head of Presentation Graphics role in October 2023 and set the function from the ground up. Four designers moved to my team and I hired two more, for a team of six. I occasionally guide the graphic designers when needed.
What I built
- Direct access for executives: custom intake workflows so C-suite requests reach the right designer fast.
- An urgent-response path: a defined way to handle requests that cannot wait.
- 24x7 coverage for the highest-value, highest-demand group. A small rota across three time zones, with a named on-call designer for each shift and a one-hour first-response commitment on urgent requests.
- A PowerPoint style guide so every presentation follows one standard (see project 2 in Brand governance and automation)
- A template system so common presentations can be built on-brand without a designer
Results
- Demand grew from about 1,600 tickets (2023) to over 3,000 (2025), +90%
- 96% of requests came to us rather than being chased
- The team handled about 25% of all Impact tickets and was its most in-demand
- Average turnaround fell from 4 days to 1.5 days for priority requests
- 94% of stakeholders rated the service 4 or 5 out of 5
What I’d do differently
I would set up the coverage rota and the urgent-request criteria earlier, before demand peaked, and publish the criteria so stakeholders know what counts as urgent. Without that, almost every request felt urgent and the team carried the pressure.