Creative Resource (Traffic) and Operations Manager in Manchester

Tangent Agency is a growing creative agency looking for a Creative Resource & Operations Manager to join the team and work across a truly exciting and ever-growing global client portfolio. The successful candidate must be comfortable working in a fast-paced environment, an excellent communicator, highly organised, process-driven and have an eye for detail. As an entrepreneurial company, our culture is very important and you will need to be a team player, committed to delivering accurate and exceptional work and be able to use your initiative to problem solve.

As our Creative Resource & Operations Manager, you will act as the link between our Client Services team and the Creative department. Your mission is to ensure that the right people are working on the right projects at the right time. You will manage the ebb and flow of daily studio life, balancing high-priority deadlines with the capacity and productivity of our creatives. Beyond the daily "Tetris" of resource scheduling, you will oversee the systems, tools, and workflows that allow our teams and business to thrive. Identifying operational friction and building the processes to remove it, ensuring the agency scales without losing its creative edge.

Key Responsibilities:

• Workflow & Resource Management

• Capacity Planning: Own agency-wide resourcing across all projects, overseeing the daily and weekly allocation of resources across the agency. Being responsible for approving and managing team holidays.
• Predictive Forecasting: Analyse the new work pipeline to predict future resource needs (3–6 months out) rather than just reacting to immediate briefs.
• Traffic Management: Chair daily "stand-up" meetings to review progress, identify potential bottlenecks, and re-allocate tasks as priorities shift. Actively manage day-to-day clashes, changes, and pressure points.
• Brief Validation: Ensure all incoming creative briefs are complete, actionable, and have realistic timelines before they are assigned to the studio.
• Conflict Resolution: Act as the primary mediator between Account Management (who want it now) and Creative (who need time to think), finding solutions that satisfy both.
• Skill Mapping: Maintain a "Skills Matrix" of the internal team to ensure projects are assigned based on specific passions and expertise, not just availability.
• Utilisation Strategy: Aim for an optimal billable utilisation rate, identifying when the team is "over-servicing" clients at the expense of agency margin and escalating to senior team members to look at potential solutions.

• Own and evolve the agency’s freelance model: Identify gaps in internal skills or capacity and manage the end-to-end recruitment of freelance talent.
• Onboarding: Ensure freelancers are properly briefed, have the necessary kit/access, and understand the agency’s creative standards.
• Budget Tracking: Negotiate rates and manage freelancer costs in line with project budgets, ensuring we remain profitable while meeting delivery goals.

• Training: Work with CS and Creative Leads to identify skill gaps and any training we need to be offering team members as the agency and industry evolves.
• Onboarding: Lead the operational onboarding for all new hires, ensuring they understand our ways of working, file structures, naming conventions, and time-tracking expectations.
• Tool Stewardship: Maintain and champion our project management software (Float and Paprika) to ensure data accuracy.
• Reporting: Provide weekly and monthly reports on studio utilisation, highlighting over-servicing or under-utilisation to the leadership team.
• Workflow Architecture: Define and document the "Agency Way of Working"—from the moment a lead comes in to final file archiving.
• Process Auditing: Regularly review internal workflows to eliminate "double-handling" of tasks and unnecessary meetings.
• Maintain Profitability: Work closely with leadership and finance to support agency profitability and ensure resource plans align with project budgets and fee models. Flag risks to profitability early and help put solutions in place. Support project leads with practical guidance on resourcing within budget.

• Take ownership of the day-to-day management of the studio: Act as the go-to person for office and studio-related needs. Manage facilities, suppliers, equipment, and systems.
• Culture: Work closely with our Business Director to ensure we are introducing and implementing policies and practices that create a supportive, fun and exciting studio to work within.

About You:

• Agency Experienced: You have 5+ years of experience in a traffic or resource role within a fast-paced UK creative or integrated agency.
• A Master Communicator: You can say "no" or "not yet" firmly but fairly, maintaining strong relationships across the business.
• Influence: Ability to manage "up" to Directors and "down" to junior staff with equal confidence.
• Data-Driven: You enjoy the "Tetris" of a complex schedule and have a keen eye for logistics and spreadsheets.
• Cool Under Pressure: You remain the calmest person in the room when a priority job lands five minutes before 5PM.
• Market Knowledge: Familiarity with creative industry standards, freelance rates, and local workflows.

What we offer you:

• 24 days holiday plus all UK bank holidays.
• Christmas shutdown (Christmas Eve until 2nd January).
• Training opportunities both within the company and via external courses.
• Predominantly office-based role with one day a week work-from-home flexibility (additional flexibility available when needed).
• Discretionary annual bonus based on company performance.