The Content + Design Playbook

Building a framework for design-driven storytelling at scale.

2,500+

Custom content experiences across web, social, and print

250+

Clients

50M+

Views

My Role

As Design VP of the Forbes Content & Design Studio, I led the creative direction, design systems, and operational frameworks that allowed the Studio to scale and generate $20M+ YOY across 250+ clients while still producing creative, thoughtful, and innovative storytelling experiences on Forbes.com and social. This case study covers the four pieces of that work: the philosophy I codified, the production system I built, the creative network I shaped, and the direction I led day to day.

The Challenge

As the Studio scaled, so did the gap between intent and output. Designers and editors were operating from different instincts, freelancers needed clearer creative direction, and production was slowing under the weight of inconsistency. We needed a shared creative language, one that could hold across partnership with client brands, across formats, and across the dozens of people who would touch any given project.

A Philosophy, Codified

I developed the Content + Design Playbook to formalize the Studio's purpose: crafting compelling, bold, and innovative content-driven experiences rooted in user experience design. It encompasses the design philosophy, design strategy, and library of storytelling enhancements I've uncovered, cultivated, and built as the Studio's work, scope, and members grew.

At the heart of the playbook is a three-layer design framework that became the shared language of the team:

Content-Driven. Is the design purposeful to the content? Does it help the reader better understand the story? Meaningless flourishes get cut.

UX-Driven. Is the design user-friendly? Is the hierarchy clear? The reader should never have to guess what to do next.

Visual Design-Driven. Is there something striking — in type, color, illustration, motion — that stops a reader mid-scroll? Would you bookmark this for inspo?

The framework became the lens for every brief, every review, and every critique. It gave designers and editors a shared vocabulary for what "good" meant, and it gave me a consistent way to give clarity, raise standards and protect the vision.

A Production System That Scaled

The philosophy needed infrastructure. I led the development of a Figma design system alongside my design team, translating the playbook's principles into reusable components, templates, and patterns that streamlined production across the full range of branded content products the Studio produced.

We leveraged Figma features like auto layout, components, and variants to maintain baseline uniformity with room to flex as needed. This system helped us execute in post-sale as well as across ~1,600 pre-sale mocks in 2025 alone.

It cut handoff friction, standardized quality, and gave designers a foundation they could build on rather than rebuild from scratch. The system became the connective tissue between content-driven design thinking and design execution.

Pre-Sale Figma Template

Post-Sale Figma Template

A Creative Network, Uplifted

Scaling the Studio meant scaling the voices behind the work. Rather than treating freelancers as production capacity, my team and I built our network of illustrators, motion designers, photographers, and other specialists as an extension of the creative team, one whose range of perspectives made the storytelling richer than any single in-house team could produce on its own.

Recreational Boating & Fishing Foundation • Casting Resilience

I led the creative direction, developed the mood board leveraging generative AI, and art directed the photoshoot in the mountains of Boulder, CO with a lean but agile crew given the breathtaking but rough terrain.

Creative Direction: Kristine Francisco
Design Lead: Jenn Ramos
Content Lead: Jessie Militare
Talent Lead: Kari Jones
Photographer: Walis Lárraga Anstis

Creative Direction, Day to Day

A framework only stays alive through the people who use it. My role as a leader was to support and uplift each designer in service of the team's purpose, reinforcing the playbook's philosophy in every kickoff call, review, and critique.

I empowered designers to solve problems autonomously, trained the team to master context, and protected space for curiosity and experimentation through monthly Innovation Labs where I set challenges to refresh parts of our products and/or processes.

The work didn't stop with designers. I trained editors on the playbook so the philosophy lived on both sides of the partnership, and as designers internalized the framework, they began carrying it into their own brainstorms with editors, teaching this way of thinking outward. The philosophy and framework became real in the choices designers made every day.

Selected Works

The work below is just a slice of the campaigns that put the playbook into practice. I led creative direction across each project, guiding designers and editors to balance client goals with Forbes' editorial sophistication, and to push the boundaries with purpose.