We believe that in order to create brands that are loved, it takes empathy, critical thinking, and some guts.

Today’s most successful brands understand that it’s not just about leveraging new ways to reach their audiences, but connecting meaningfully with actual people. In order to develop a genuine relationship with anyone, we need to be able to have conversations that matter. And the only way to get there is to first become who we truly are.

We listen hard to what you want, and push even harder for what you need.

We are an interdisciplinary team of strategists and creatives. We come from advertising, marketing, communication design, journalism, information technology, fine art, and education. We work on purpose-driven brands, from global to local.

Starting from yes is overrated. I'm all for starting from no. Without a critique of the status quo, how do you even know what needs improving?

Arndt Klos, Principal

Arndt Klos is a communication designer with a strong creative vision who’s known for his clear strategic thinking and idea-driven solutions.

Born in Germany, he graduated in graphic design and fine arts, and studied communication design at the Folkwang University of the Arts in Essen, Germany.

He began his career at brand design agency BOROS, renowned for emotionally engaging design solutions, along with visceral and, at times, polarizing advertising campaigns. After that he worked at KW43, the corporate identity division of GREY Germany, where he developed brand identities and conceptual campaigns for national and international brands.

In 2005, he moved to Canada, where he served as creative director of BURNKIT, bringing his strategic brand perspective to their design-focused, interactive work. He co-founded Vigilantes in 2012.

His clients have included Porsche Design, Nokia, Loewe, Futureshop, and Hootsuite, as well as carefully chosen small and medium-sized businesses.
As a member of the design community, Arndt does speaking engagements and teaches branding and identity design.

No one will listen to everything you have to say. But, in my experience, everyone wants to know who you really are, and why you're really doing this.

Vanessa Richmond, Principal

Vanessa Richmond focuses on identity. She is known for clear thinking, and emotionally engaging, provocative storytelling.

She comes from a background in education and journalism. She received a B.A. in English at the University of British Columbia, then a graduate degree in education from Cambridge University. She started her career as a high school English teacher where she focused on critical thinking and writing skills. She also coached the debate team, where one student went on to win the Worlds, leading her to create a documentary for CBC called “The Terminator.”

Later, as an award-winning journalist, she focused on values in pop culture in her column “Schlock and Awe” which ran in The Tyee, and was featured in a weekly segment on CKNW and Global TV. Her work also ran in the CBC, Globe and Mail, and Huffington Post.

Now, she brings educational methodology to help her clients have critical conversations, and create engagement and change. And brings journalistic approaches to brand discovery, research, and content strategy.

Her clients have included Hootsuite, Nike, Jim Beam, and purpose-driven businesses.

She has taught journalism and brand building at Simon Fraser University.

We’re always on the lookout for skilled creatives and new collaborators to add to our team or network. If you think you have what it takes, we want to see what you got. Currently, we're specifically looking to add the following roles to our team.

Account manager

Effective client relationship management is a true art. At times it is the most important and difficult job in the agency. You need to be attentive and responsive to ask the right questions, draw out the client’s real needs and concerns, read between the lines, manage expectations and push back when necessary. You need to be a strong internal advocate for the client’s experience, and follow up on everything and review every deliverable to ensure we’re crossing every t and dotting every i.

Account manager

What you'll do

Vigilantes provides our clients with the confident leadership they need to level-up. This leadership starts with an account manager who serves as the face of the agency, managing a portfolio of client relationships, leading internal project teams, and taking responsibility for delivering work and client experience.

The account manager leads our projects through our agency process to client and agency success —on time, on budget, and hitting metrics. You’ll work closely with our growing team to ensure our clients have an exceptional experience and see exceptional results, and that our agency hits our project targets.

Here are some of the tasks. We are very open to candidates who are strong in only some areas of the role:

Act as primary client liaison on agency projects, helping to manage expectations and ensure seamless integration with client teams
Organize and facilitate client calls, meetings, trainings, and strategy sessions
Work in partnership with clients and senior management to onboard new projects, ensuring they are set up for both client and agency success
Be responsible for internal project success, following project process, maintaining communication norms, and efficiently allocating internal staff time
Work with leadership and team members to build timelines and budgets while keeping teams (internal and external) accountable and on track, flagging issues before they come up, and working to find solutions
Ensuring processes and best practices are followed internally, seeing that fellow specialists have everything they need to get the job done well
Report out regularly where your projects are at, what the next steps are, and how you’ll help the team get things done
Help optimize our workflow using digital and analog tools like Slack, Paymo, Google Docs, Google Sheets, etc. and recommend new tools for continuous improvement as we go.

Who you are

The successful candidate for this role will have a healthy mix of the following:

Outgoing and affable, you’ve got great people skills. You know how to develop and maintain strong, genuine client and peer relationships.
Experienced in client service and day-to-day client contact, with a demonstrated ability to address client concerns thoughtfully and effectively (previous creative agency experience with a collaborative team an asset)
Persuasive, and a confident negotiator, you know how to deliver bad news, work with difficult personalities, and bring people around to a different point of view.
Collaborative and quick, you can think on your feet and find creative solutions in stressful situations.
A mix of curiosity, intelligence, and competence that drives you to lean into new experiences, tackle learning curves, and break through hurdles to get the job done
A knack for leadership and the ability to move a team to collectively complete complex and challenging projects with grace.
Resilient: you can work under pressure and extremely tight deadlines while maintaining a good sense of humour, tact and professionalism.
Independent: you are highly motivated and take initiative.
Understanding that details matter as much as the big picture, and knowing how to balance the two
Attentive and organized. You pride yourself on crossing every t and dotting every i. Your written and verbal communication skills are exceptional.
A generalist, you are conversant in the range of products and services we offer.
Experienced with project management software (Asana, Teamwork, etc)
Available to work non-standard hours as needed to complete required responsibilities.

The details

Vigilantes is based in Vancouver, with clients across North America and Europe, and with contractors working remotely from around North America and Europe. Well-qualified, remote candidates will be considered for this role.

The position could be full time or permalance. Pay is competitive with industry.

Vigilantes is committed to diversity and accessibility in its recruitment processes. If you require accommodation to participate in this recruitment, please indicate so in your application.

To apply, please send us a note, and link to your LinkedIn profile or your website, or find some other way to give us a hint about what you’ve done before.

Apply here

The proof of the pudding is in the eating.

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Brand building is as simple as baking bread.

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