Creative Lead Fellow

WITHIN is hiring 8 creatives into an 8-week paid fellowship designed to be the highest-leverage 8 weeks of your career so far.

Most performance creative jobs treat the work as the lesser cousin of brand — the grind you do until you can get into a brand shop. We don't. Performance creative done well is a real craft, and we hire people who already know that.

Here's why this is different from every other job you've looked at:

• More reps than anywhere else. You'll write more scripts, ship more hooks, see more of your work go live in your first 8 weeks at WITHIN than a brand creative gets in their first year somewhere else. Reps are how taste develops. The data tells you within 48 hours whether you nailed it.
• Direct access. For your first 8 weeks, you're on Quinn's team — our Head of Creative. Working on 2-3 live client accounts. Pitching new business. Owning work, not shadowing it. At most shops your level, you'd be three layers down.
• The work mix is 70% performance creative + 30% campaign development and rebrands for brands you'd recognize. The 30% is a real perk — but it's not the reason to take this job. If you don't already think performance creative is interesting in itself, please apply somewhere else.

At week 8, fellows who've shown they can own work at our velocity move into the broader creative team under one of our Creative Directors as full-time Creative Leads.

We're looking for three things we can't train: hustle, taste, and curiosity.

Who you are

• You've made something real. Maybe a TikTok account that grew past 5K followers because the content was actually good. Maybe a Substack. Maybe a spec campaign for a brand you love that they never asked for. The work is public and shows your taste.
• You can write a hook in 90 seconds that makes someone stop scrolling — and you can articulate why it works.
• You think performance creative is interesting in itself. You've thought about hooks, fatigue, iteration, platform mechanics. You read ad teardowns. You watch ads and have opinions about what's working before you check the metrics.
• You're already using AI tools in your creative workflow. Midjourney, Runway, Sora, ElevenLabs, Veo, whichever — and you have strong opinions about which are real and which are hype.
• Either you're a recent grad of a portfolio or design program (Brandcenter, Miami Ad School, SVA, FIT, Parsons, Pratt, Newhouse, RISD, equivalent) OR you've spent the last 1–3 years building an audience and learning to make things people stop for.
• You live in NYC or you're moving for this. This fellowship is in person.

Who you are not

• "I need to ramp up before I can ship work."
• Looking for a senior title and a quiet corner.
• You think performance creative is what you do to pay the bills until you can do "real creative." The 30% brand work isn't going to be enough to keep you happy if you don't already love the 70%.
• Portfolio is beautiful posters with no brand attached, no audience, no result.

What you'll do

• Pitch concepts daily. Ship work weekly.
• Write scripts, draft storyboards, set design direction across video, static, and AI-generated formats.
• Work with a team of designers, editors, motion designers, and AI tools to execute your concepts.
• Sit in on new business pitches and own meaningful sections of the work.
• Watch your work go live within days, not months. Be wrong publicly. Iterate fast.

Program structure

• Weeks 1–2: Onboarding. WITHIN's process, our tools, our standards. Shadow live work briefly, then start contributing.
• Weeks 3–8: Work directly with Quinn (Head of Creative) on 2–3 client accounts plus new business pitches. Real ownership, real deadlines.

End of week 8: Fellows who've shown ownership at our velocity transition to the broader creative team under one of our Creative Directors as full-time Creative Leads.

How to apply

We don't want a cover letter. Send:

1. A link to your work — portfolio, TikTok, Instagram, Substack, YouTube, whatever shows the real version of how you think.
2. A 60-second Loom: pick one ad currently running in market, tell us what's working and what you'd change. Don't script it. Just talk. This is the most important part of your application. We're listening for whether you talk about performance craft with genuine interest.
3. One sentence: what's a piece of work you wish you'd made, and why?

We offer a competitive salary and benefits based on education, experience, and skills level, including: 

• Unlimited vacation policy
• Monthly Phone Stipend
• Comprehensive Medical, Dental, and Vision insurance options
• 401(K) plan with matching
• Dog friendly office
• Hybrid work opportunity
• Professional Development Program
• Bonus Perk - Seamless allowance

Total compensation based on education, experience, and skills level ($45,000-$99,000)

• Level 1 - $45,000-$55,800
  
  • Entry Level - Meets qualifications on a minimum basis
• Level 2 - $55,800-$66,600
  
  • Junior level - Exceeds qualifications on a moderate basis
• Level 3 - $66,600-$77,400
  
  • Middle Level - Exceeds qualifications on a strong basis
• Level 4 - $77,400-$88,200
  
  • Advanced Level - Exceeds qualifications on an extensive or advanced basis
• Level 5 - $88,200-$99,000
  
  • Senior Level - Exceeds qualifications on an outstanding basis