It was the last semester of architecture school. We were all just beginning to receive rejection letters or worse—nothing at all. Despair was forming on the horizon. Our professor, a seasoned professional before he came to the university, reflected on his own trajectory, and gave us this advice:

When I was in school I planned, much like you, to be a successful architect. Whatever that meant. And for all intents and purposes I am. I’ve worked for big name, multi-office firms, I’ve taught at Harvard, I’ve had a partner position. But even after all that I can’t say that I’ve lived up to what I thought—from where you’re sitting—success was. I have not become the next Frank Gehry, I’m no Howard Roark.¹

You have a choice. You can go and kill yourself for these internships at international starchitect firms, and after ten years you’ll be in your thirties, you’ll have the same qualifications and the same portfolio as hundreds of other architects, you won’t have any money in the bank because they don’t pay you very much and you’ve been living in Amsterdam/New York/L.A., you probably won’t be in a relationship unless it’s with someone in your office and that’s never good…

Or you can stop right now and ask yourself what kind of life you want to have. Look around you and figure out where you can make a real impact as designers and architects. Become developers, change the zoning laws, get involved in your communities to affect real change, you can do so many things besides being a cog in the starchitecture mega-firm machine. But whatever you do, you need to ask yourself what your priorities are. What do you want your life to look like in ten years? And allow the answers to that question influence your picture of success.

After several years of theoretical exercises and idealistic discussions, this was the realest any professor had ever spoken to us. We were not all going to be superstars. Some of us had already begun to openly admit that we weren’t sure architecture was in our future, but we all were passionate about being designers in one way or another.

For the first time it was okay to admit that I didn’t want what I thought I was supposed to want. I wanted to put my relationship first, I wanted to be home for dinner, I wanted a dog, a social life and opportunities to work on exciting projects with inspiring people—not just what my office dictated.

I realized that wherever I would go I would work hard. Long nights would happen. And that sounded great. As Adam Garcia has so iconically and graphically put it, “The pressure is good for you.” But I knew after weighing my options I wanted to work in a place that put quality of life over an overworked office environment. Lucky for me, startup culture seems to have the same priorities as I do.

It’s not fair to generalize entire fields of the design industry, but I spoke with enough people starting out in architecture—working those coveted internships in New York—to know that it took real passion for the craft to overcome the deficiency in quality of life that an entry-level position typically meant.

My father tells me that his generation got jobs in order to provide for a family, whereas my generation views our jobs as a path to personal fulfillment. So perhaps since the tech industry is being defined by a younger demographic, it is entirely typical of a millennial that I gravitate to a job that offers the a good quality of life.

But whatever it is, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” (-Annie Dillard) and good products come from people who work for companies who are happy with the lives their jobs provide them. Design something cool, go home in the evening, eat good food, surround yourself with good people, enjoy your life. That sounds like success to me.

¹A little Fountainhead reference for ya there, for anyone whose Ayn Rand is a little dusty.

Richard Holmes always gave us ice cream. Whenever my siblings and I would walk down the road to say hello, the first thing he’d do would be to tell us there’s “ice cream in the back.” Although he was just a neighbor who lived down the road, I’m pretty sure he never actually ate any of the ice cream he bought for us. It was just something he did for our benefit.

Surrounded by corn in a small farmhouse about a half-mile off the road, we’d sit in his front living room and gaze out the floor to ceiling windows overlooking the front yard. He’d tell us stories about the war, growing up during the Great Depression, and how he had saved up enough money to buy his first, and only, house in full. My favorites were the ones where he’d talk about his life around the age of 25. He sounded like the type of guy you wished you had as a friend. Adventurous, smart and a good soul.

However, for all his stories, Mr. Holmes didn’t have many tangible items to go along with them. I don’t blame him for not having them—he had grown up without them after all—but hearing his stories just made it more intoxicating to imagine what he was like before disease and years of rigorous work had taken him off a tractor and put a cane in his hand. Aside from a few stoic photographs from his time in the army, the young Richard was left to my imagination.

* * *

When I first began designing, I kept a copy of everything I made. This was partly out of necessity—never sure if I could recreate any given design; it was safer just to duplicate a project folder. Eventually this habit began to permeate into other areas of my life, most notably when it came to keeping a journal.

I started with a simple notebook from the dollar store and a pen I didn’t loath the way ink flowed out. My thoughts weren’t profound; sometimes they had less substance than a tweet, but I continued to write day after day. Not only was I experiencing growth in areas of my life, but I also became acutely aware of how much I had grown over time. Reading back through the emotions of nervousness as I was entering college are almost laughable now that I’m almost through. Laughable in a, don’t-I-know-myself kind of way.

Today, journaling is integral to my life. It is a time for me to step back into my own little world and discuss things with myself. It sounds silly, but the stress that can melt away simply by writing out your thoughts is incredibly rewarding.

I feel that journaling is even more important for me now than when I started. As we’ve seen the meteoric rise of social sharing, I think we lose the incentive to go back into our memories and write down the events from our own point of view. We compensate with pictures and videos and assume those will be enough. There’s nothing bad about browsing through our Facebook albums to relive a memory, but in every situation I’ve wanted to go relive an event it’s the journal entry I wrote for that day which evokes more emotion and sentimental feelings than any other media.

* * *

Mr. Holmes passed away before I finished my freshmen year of college. It was one of the saddest days I’ve ever experienced, and when we removed his beaten-up maroon reclining chair it felt like all the happiness had dried up from the world.

When I got back to college later that day, I went through some of my old entries looking for bits and pieces to remember, and they were there. The time he taught me how to drive stick-shift. The time he told us about the small litter of puppies they had on his base. The time he got his first job and met his wife. They were all there. The stories live on, written with the enthusiasm of a boy who had just been told a most wonderful adventure.

* * *

I often think about how my grandchildren will one day be able to go back through years of data my life has generated online and off. High definition videos, years of blog posts, with tweets and Facebook to fill in the gaps. Perhaps they won’t care, but I can’t even imagine what it would have been like to actually see Mr. Holmes when he was a young man. Maybe the fact that the future generation will be able to see us as young people will help remind them that everyone was at one point in time.

But even if Mr. Holmes had all those pictures and videos, I don’t think it would have changed how I wrote about him. It would have been a luxury, but not a necessity to truly understanding the type of man he was.

It’s for this reason I encourage you to start writing today. Get a 3-subject notebook, open a text file, date the top and start writing. If you’re going to invest in documenting your memories, you owe it to yourself try doing it in your own words. Because no matter how many gigabytes of data you produce over your lifetime, none of it will ever be able to capture you better than you. If not for your benefit, then maybe for someone else’s. I often look forward to the day when I can hand my son an edited version of my years as a teen. See, kid? I went through this stuff too. In fact, some of these entries were written specifically with you in mind. Nobody’s perfect, but what’s important is to capture the story that accompanies imperfection—that’s the one you’ll love rereading the most.

* * *

Mr. Holmes never spoke of a journal, but I secretly hoped I might find something as we cleaned out his house for the last time. I never came across such a memoir, but I take solace in knowing that I’ve helped preserve at least a few of his stories; if only to aid me as I retell them to my own children. And, I’m sure, every now and again they’ll get a little ice cream with story time.

The first movie in a theater I remember seeing was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It was 1983 and I was four years old. I remember being fascinated by the different personalities of each of the Dwarfs, and truly frightened by the evil Queen. As I recall at that young, impressionable age it being my first real experience with the reality and presence of danger in the world. Oh sure—little boys imagine and create dangers in their sandboxes with plastic dinosaurs and action figures, but for me that Queen was real, and she had nothing but cruelty and contempt in her heart. I remember being afraid for the soft, and gentle Snow White, and wanting to help her and come to her rescue. A truly visceral experience for a 4 year old boy, especially considering the film at that time was 46 years my senior (the power of storytelling seemingly timeless). I knew way back then that I was hooked.

There is perhaps no American, living or dead, that has best captured the imagination of an entire culture, country, or people other than Walt Disney. A man of contrasts, he was a devoted husband and father, and a shrewd businessman; a dreamer with intellect and savvy, but plagued by periods of isolation and depression. Obviously, there has been much discourse about who Walt Disney was, his successes, and his shortcomings, his perfectionism and his ability to know what would be more than marginally successful. Before there was a John Lasseter or Pixar, before there was an Apple or Steve Jobs, there was Walt Disney—the forerunner and triumphant amalgamation of the American imagination.

When we talk about design and technology here on Stemmings, there isn’t much that we are talking about that doesn’t owe some thread of gratitude to Walt Disney, whether we are aware of it or not. It might be a bit of technology he developed with his Imagineers that later became some other useful tool or software. It could be the synthesis of an idea like space travel. Indeed, Disney is credited with launching the space race back in 1955! It may simply be that he inspired an entire generation of post World War II children to dream beyond the confines of the playground. He empowered children through their ingenuity and creativity. He cherished the way kids interpreted the world around them, and believed it was something to be celebrated.

Walt wasn’t without his struggles, faults and failures though. It was how he pushed through them that really led to the enormous success that we associate with him today. Walt’s work ethic and his willingness to take calculated risks were defining qualities of his success. A great benefit today’s generation of young entrepreneurs could gain from by adopting these two qualities.

Work Ethic

Walt had a vision. He worked hard to see that vision become reality. There is a stark contrast today in understanding the necessity of work ethic. I realize when I write this, that I am conveniently forgetting the Facebooks, Twitters, and Instagrams of our daily lives and how social media has changed the landscape of how we define community (that’s for another post at another time). Many young men in their twenty-somethings today seem comfortable with just floating along in life instead of grabbing it by the horns and throwing it down in submission. My grandparents generation isn’t called the Greatest Generation for nothing—they purged the world of Nazism at great cost and upon returning home, transformed this country into the modern world we enjoy today. There was a lot of blood, sweat and tears involved in that process.

There is perhaps no greater moment in our nations history than now to fight hard for vision, for dreams, for imagination and ingenuity. Why? Now, unlike in Walt’s heyday, the frontier is a vastly shrinking concept in the American imagination.  We’ve been told there’s no room for it, that every plot of land has already been claimed and now walls and towers must be constructed to defend that plot of land. Rubbish. Limitations didn’t interest Walt Disney. When he bumped up against a wall he didn’t abandon his idea if he knew it was good, he simply found a way around it.

When Walt set his sights on creating Disneyland he said “I could never convince the financiers that Disneyland was feasible, because dreams offer too little collateral.” So, he pivoted by involving the then burgeoning television industry in his new venture. Every week on the American Broadcasting Channel (ABC) Walt Disney’s Disneyland offered a glimpse into Walt’s little Anaheim project. Not only did he fund the construction, but he also was able to promote the new theme park through this partnership (a seriously ingenious marketing ploy, especially considering the time).

The value of a strong work ethic could not be understated. It’s what made America great, and what has made it the country it is today. We need young men and women to be mentored in this regard, to learn that eventually hard work pays off (be it financial or relational).

Taking Risks

Disney was no stranger to adversity, failure, and risk—his first foray into the animation business, Laugh-O-Gram Films, ended in bankruptcy. In 1941, when Hollywood unionized, he faced a strike outside the doors of his studios, and was also questioned about his patriotism in front of the anti-communist House Un-American Activities Committee, made famous by Senator Joseph McCarthy, in the 1950s. Walt had a certain resiliency to failure.

In 1937 in spite of concerns from both his wife Lillian, and brother Roy, Walt put his company and his own personal fortune on the line to finance Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the first full-length feature animated film. Lillian warned Walt that audiences wouldn’t sit through a feature-length cartoon fairy tale about dwarfs. At that time cartoons were simply animated shorts and considered a novelty, not a serious art form, but Walt could see where animation was headed and in spite of being advised against it, he borrowed all of $1.5 million to produce the film (which quickly grossed $8 million upon public release, a jaw-dropping amount considering our country was in the middle of the Great Depression).

During the post war era the Walt Disney Studios continued to pioneer the animation industry through different technological advances and artistic techniques, all because Walt had a knack for knowing what was on the cutting edge and was willing to bet on it. His risks weren’t without calculation however. Disney used his animated shorts Silly Symphonies as experimentation ground for color animation, an audiences receptiveness to a future feature-length film, and his new invention, the multi-plane camera, which allowed animators to make a flat, animated film appear to have depth on the screen.

Walt didn’t build his empire by himself. He depended on a team of creative geniuses to do the work Walt either lacked expertise in or simply had no time to complete. He was the conductor of the orchestra. What I have always found inspiring about Walt Disney is that he took some pretty big hits where many would crumble and never recover, and simply skipped to the next beat. He had the creative vision to imagine what something could be and assembled creatives to help him transform his ideas into reality.  He worked hard for his dreams, and was more than willing to risk to fashion his dreams into reality.

“Think. Believe. Dream. Dare.” —Walt Disney

It is often said that the real learning and hard work comes when you leave school or university, when you first set foot into the very real world of making a living for yourself, building up a career and becoming everything you ever dreamed of.

This was something I was always told when I was at college and later on at university, alas, as a student you never really believe this so much.

I enjoyed my education, I was definitely more creative minded than I was academic and made the decision during my later years of school to focus solely on Art and Graphics. After achieving good grades in both of these, I went on to study a Foundation Degree and from here went onto University where I studied Graphic Communication. After completing my degree with First Class Honours, I was riding high and genuinely believed that I knew a lot of what I needed to know.

After a few odd jobs here and there, I began work at my current job and it quickly and very suddenly became apparent, shit, I actually don’t know a thing….

“What do you mean I don’t have 6 months to work on this branding?”

“How am I meant to work without any copy?”

“The deadline is tomorrow, why has all this been changed now?”

These were just some of the new challenges I was being faced with. Not to mention other issues like how to present your work to clients, how to structure folders and artwork, how to collaborate properly with a team and how to manage your time effectively.

Now, I can only go by my own point of view here—a 25 year old guy from the UK. This may not be the case in other countries or even perhaps at other universities and colleges in England, but during your school life you are mollycoddled. Whether you think it or not at the time, you really are.

You are given all the time in the world to work on your projects and at University you only have the odd lecture here and there. The rest of your time you have to work on your projects. Certainly much more time than you are gifted in the real world.

On top of this, my main concern is that what students are being taught is all very dated. In my mind, the schooling system and what we are taught in the design area, particularly at University level, needs a shake up. Tutors should be brought up to date on modern standards and goings on within the industry; I would bet my bottom dollar that where I attended they aren’t teaching their students about “Progressive Enhancement” or “Responsive Web Design” still. These are both terms that students will be greeted with when they come out of University, and they won’t have a clue what they mean. I would love to be proved wrong.

There are some, very quick solutions which I believe could benefit and help a student to learn early on what it is like working in the real world. How about setting a project that needs to be completed within the month and a week before hand in, students get an email telling them,

“We need to add/remove all this copy and these images need to go in too”.

This screw up your layout? Tough, deal with it, make it look good again.

I also think that work placements should be made mandatory, rather than being cooped up in a lecture hall and then spending the rest of your day at home—get into a real work place and discover now and then what agency life is really like. The sooner you get yourself into the working environment, the sooner you realise that life is a lot different when you leave education.

These problems certainly don’t just start and stop at designers either. I was discussing this with a colleague just the other day, a developer, whose sister is currently learning how to code and build websites at school. The worrying thing, they are being taught how to code with tables… When he asked her why, her reply was that the teacher simply didn’t know any different.

The same thing happened not so long ago; we had a guy in his final year at University come in to talk to us about our process and we were baffled to learn that they were still being taught using Dreamweaver.

The education system isn’t helping students as much as it could. You are marked heavily on a process which is grade driven. You often find yourself going down a route which will just help you achieve a better grade rather than one that would fully benefit your design choices.

I certainly don’t have all the answers and I fully appreciate that changing the system is a big thing. However, students pay a large sum of money for the course that they take and they deserve to get given the most up to date and relevant information for their expense. The real learning should not start after you’ve finished years of education, it should be distilled into you from the start.

The level of available information we have reached is unprecedented. Anyone with a connection today can reach more resources in seconds than any researcher at any other point in history could pull together in hours from the largest libraries. This is almost scary—and indeed, has potential for serious drawbacks. People increasingly rely on Wikipedia for information, sparking a frustration among professors similar to that inspired by spellcheck in English teachers or by calculators in middle-school math teachers. But, like a calculator, it is a tool that can be used to further our knowledge and capability. It is an opportunity to learn, to grow, to advance—and it’s at our fingertips. But, if you’re reading this, you already know that.

What you may not know is that, while the information that today’s connectivity provides is incredibly helpful, it is not the most important aspect of the internet. The greatest resource that the internet has given access to is people. With online communication, we have access to people we couldn’t dream of speaking to if we were in a similar position two decades ago. Geographic, social, and a myriad of other limitations are swept away by the common denominator of the internet. We call it hyperdemocratization.

All of our current design heroes have email addresses; most of them have twitter accounts, Dribbble profiles, blogs and other forms of communication. There is a world of knowledge to be gleaned from their thoughts and experiences. Whether they are decades or just a few years further along in their career, everyone has something to share—whether it be some bit of experience to pass on to those who are just graduating, going through the process of self-education, or struggling through the first few years and trying to find their footing. Despite their busy schedules, these people we admire often not only find the time to respond to personal communication and questions from those hungry for knowledge, but seek out opportunities to be helpful to those looking for it.

Many busy people I have emailed in the past, hardly expecting a response, have emailed back with solid advice and encouraging words. Logotype master Claire Coullon seeks out those interested in lettering on Dribbble, lending her expert eye by offering insightful feedback. Ryan Hamrick, another great letterer, regularly posts hugely informative, practical advice on his blog. Matt Chase of Design Army wrote a solid article of advice for recent grads on this very site. Instead of simply focusing on their own endeavors, they take the time to help others and give back to the design community. They have acquired an enviable amount of experience and knowledge, through books, professors, colleagues and hard work, but rather than turning up their nose at those who are a step behind them, they go out of their way to pass on this knowledge.

What’s more, you don’t have to be an expert in order to be helpful. There’s always someone out there who would love to know what you know. Granted, anyone should avoid giving advice on something that you don’t have experience in, but for every area you don’t have that, there’s another area that you do. Take some time and offer somebody some advice today. And tomorrow. Make a regular habit of it. It’s not a rat race, in which we try to put others down in order to make ourselves look better. Creative communities grow together.

Don’t be that narcissistic middleweight designer that begrudges every minute of time that it takes to respond to that hungry student’s email. Don’t be the business magazine stereotype of what they call “creatives”—the difficult egotist ignoring everyone you don’t feel is on “your level”. Be greater than that. There’s no better time to begin giving back than right now.

Graduation kicks ass. Big time.

It’s the grand culmination of delayed gratification: a lifetime of academic rigor rewarding you with an open door of opportunity. It’s pure elation cut with relentless optimism. Excitement multiplied by confidence. You are unstoppable, on top of the world, and hopefully still a little drunk.

But as thrilling as it is, the euphoria inevitably dissolves. The party winds down, the dorms release their captives and the campus slowly retreats to a quiet state of hibernation. Reality generously clears the brush from the trailhead and you see, if not yet fully, the path laid before you. Riddled with forks and dead-ends, it isn’t easily navigated, and the only map you have is the twitchy compass of your own intuition.

On one hand, there’s the good news: never before have designers (of any kind) been more integral to molding the culture in which they live. Companies like Apple and Nike have spent the last three decades conditioning the public to crave creativity—to want it, to need it. They did the hard work for you. They pushed the boulder to the top of the hill, and now we get to ride it down the other side.

On the other hand, there’s the bad news: a lot of people want a seat on that boulder. More than ever before—maybe even more than it can safely hold. Securing the spot you want means forcing your way through the crowd, throwing some elbows and, if necessary, wrestling the last person standing in the way.

How do you make sure you aren’t standing in the dirt watching it roll by?

Strike While The Iron’s Hot

Momentum is force to be reckoned with, and it applies to more than physics. Avoid the urge to “take some time off” (that booze cruise will be more fun with a salary) and stretch the adrenaline from your Senior Show as far as you can. Waft in the inspiration and knock out some cover letters before it wears off. There’s a confidence rooted in coming off four long years of personal design evolution; let it carry you through the next few weeks. But don’t get hot-headed: assume that the Design Director who handed you her business card also gave one to six other people. The quicker you act, the more sincerely you demonstrate your interest in the position and the better your chances are of beating Timmy to that open spot. Timmy’s a douche anyway.

Don’t Let May Day Signal Mayday

For the most part, graduations occur over a pretty standard period of a few weekends. Employers have May circled on their calendars for a reason; they’ve got their hawk eyes narrowed (for interns or otherwise) and you want to be poised to cruise into their periphery. Assuming their talons ensnare you, have a plan should a potential discussion come into play. The nuances of mastering a job interview are enough to constitute an almanac, but a couple of universal guidelines apply:

Know your work inside and out. Re-remember why you made specific typographic considerations or chose a certain format. An interested employer will want to discuss projects that caught their eye: they want to make sure you can do it again. Focus less on describing what the project is and more on the process by which you conceptualized the final outcome. Bring up that brick wall you ran into and then show them how gracefully you scaled it.

Have questions to ask back. A new employee is an investment; design studios are banking on your dedication to their company. Expressing genuine interest in their work culture, project schedules, client presentations and concepting process are all indications that you’re going to hook them up with some serious ROI.

Plan Ahead. Consider and determine your start-date availability, future travel plans and willingness to relocate prior to the interview. In the time that you’re “getting back to them on that,” the hawks are already circling another meadow.

15 Minutes Seconds of Fame

First impressions are everything. Curate your portfolio as carefully as you would a mix tape for that girl in your Lit class (“Creed? How did that get on here!?”). Whether hurriedly scouting over their lunch hour or foraging through application submissions, employers have a very limited amount of time to spend looking through portfolios. You’ve got fifteen seconds to snag their attention, so make it count:

Trash the trash. Weezer’s Blue Album had maybe ten songs but, let’s face it, they were all solid. A small portfolio of immaculate work trumps a mega-site that begs you to sort out the mediocrity from the gems. This is true every day of the week, ten times out of ten. It only takes a few bad projects to rust the chrome off the good stuff. Think of it like those mixed bags of Halloween candy: you don’t want to be the kind where you’re digging through a pound of lemon drops to find the last piece of chocolate. You’re 100% cacao or you’re on clearance come November.

Be versatile, be original. A brief scroll through Dribbble will yield a hundred logos for coffee shops, letterpressed typographic slogans and movie posters that have been predictably deconstructed into vector objects. Even if your iterations of these things are leagues better than the next guy’s, you still have a site full of the same stuff. As a student bound to the curriculum of your professors, there’s admittedly a certain degree of inevitability regarding what you produce. But: those limitations only reach as far as the classroom door. If there’s a project you want to do, that you know will diversify your body of work and give you an edge over your peers, then do it. Having a (good) project under your belt that none of your classmates do is like bringing a shotgun to a knife fight. Pull the trigger on those ambitions.

Photograph your work (and not with your iPhone). As pervasively simple as it is, a JPEG comp simply doesn’t hold a candle to a real image. Not only does a photograph add visual tactility to a piece, it proves that you actually made the thing and offers you a chance to supplement the work with a little photo art direction. Just finished an illo for The Economist? Cool. Prop the image with a briefcase and black-rimmed glasses and shoot it on your coffee table. Suddenly, it’s a piece of a narrative. Keep in mind that you don’t need a 5D or pro lighting equipment. A few drawing-board size sheets of newsprint and any SLR camera will do the trick. Shoot RAW and fix everything in post. You can absolutely do this while watching Mad Men.

Consider a physical self-promo. E-mails get deleted, inadvertently skipped, relocated to spam folders and just plain ignored—all the time. If you have a creative idea for a mailed promotion piece, by all means, put it together. You’re going for inexpensively creative: something that won’t leave you out of pocket but will shout over a stack of Pizza Hut coupons. Skip a bar night and re-appropriate the beer money for printing. Remember: it’s an invitation, not the party itself—you’re only selling them on the idea of checking out more of your work. Don’t pass the whole bottle, just offer a sip.

Lose the moniker. You’re not a brand, you’re a person. Just a guy or a gal with a first name and last name. Don’t go by anything you wouldn’t want someone shouting across the table at a client meeting. No one wants to hire “Luke B. a.k.a Digital Design Prophecy.” Same goes for your e-mail address. BabyCakes69 is getting an internship at Hooters, not Apple.

Bold that “Contact Me” button. Seems like common sense, but you wouldn’t believe how many designers hide their e-mail links in places that no one’s going to look. Even if it’s drowning in a sea of RISD accolades, if an employer can’t figure out how to get in touch, you risk getting left behind.

Does This Tie Bar Match My Pajamas?

The freelance vs. studio debate has gained revived traction the last few years, with more and more designers and illustrators foregoing the 9-5 in favor of a Netflix-filled idyll absent of staff meetings, account reps and the groaning nag of omnipresent Art Directors. It’s a perfectly legitimate path, but unless you’re strutting across the stage having already commandeered a serious list of steady clients (this situation could potentially apply to illustrators), it’s one you probably shouldn’t be heading down just yet. You want a real job. The prospect of blasting out of the gates and making a name for yourself can be tantalizing, but in skipping the studio (or in-house) life, you’re depriving yourself of an invaluable experience and very likely stunting your career potential. At the very least, a studio atmosphere is going to afford you an opportunity to learn from people who have been doing what you want to do for longer than you’ve been doing it. Say that last sentence slowly and repeat it until you’re convinced. I’m not out to shatter any egos, but regardless of how good you think you are, there’s an infinite expanse of shit you simply do not know. Stuff you didn’t even know that you were supposed to know. And there’s no better way to learn up than on someone else’s dime. Think of a studio as a cooler version of your design class that you get paid to go to.

Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe

There’s a very real truth to the notion that not all jobs are created equal. The basics (quality of work, salary, dental insurance, etc.) aside, there are hordes of other factors that separate the dream jobs from the nightmares. Dividing the two is a daunting task, made all the more difficult considering that one designer’s paradise can be another’s living hell. Ask yourself the right questions and you’ll help ensure that your first big step is in the right direction. Here are a few things to consider:

A place that does great work is not, by mere definition, a great place to work. It’s easy to distill the entirety of a studio’s worth into what kind of projects they’re pumping out, but if you’re seriously thinking of joining the ranks, their portfolio is just the tip of the iceberg. There’s a lot more to creative fulfillment than cranking out award-winning work, and at the end of the day, that’s what you want: a place that fills you up without spilling over or leaving you half-glassed. Getting a handle on the inner workings of a place can be tricky, so consider contacting a few current and former employees to solicit a candid opinion of the studio. They’ll be honest, trust me.

Try and define the kind of work you think you want to do. It’s tough as a recent grad—and you don’t want to pigeonhole yourself before you really get out there—but if you know for damn sure you don’t want to work with layouts, you probably want to steer clear of studios known for their annual reports. Similarly, if you know you absolutely want to be involved with branding, don’t get your hopes up on a place with only a handful of identity projects. Larger studios typically dabble in a bit of everything, while smaller firms often compete in relatively specific arenas. Find your sport and track down the teams you wanna play for.

Don’t write off the in-house lifestyle. People always seem to look these guys over, and while their portfolios may sometimes lack diversity, that’s a blessing in disguise to someone eager to work with a specific, defined range of projects. You know what you’re getting up-front and there’s at least a modicum of comfort to be had in knowing your job security doesn’t partially depend on new client acquisition.

Trust your gut. In the end, your own intuition is the best map you have. Let it lead the way.

There’s probably a lot more to be said here, but the bridge from academia to industry can’t be built on an essay. There’s no master blueprint to a fulfilling career, no crystal ball. A piece of advice is only as good as the experience that birthed it. So, keep this in your back pocket, but remember to carry a pencil—make your own edits, alter the rules, write in the margins or scratch it out altogether.

You’re the author now.

It’s surprising how bad people are in the memory department, at least in the details. It’s even more surprising given how we think we are awesome at remembering experiences, life, products, friends, etc. The brain is an elegant machine designed for a purpose, specifically to recall important lessons and experiences. Even so, there is so much to remember and such an unfathomable number of details to take in; the brain must have a system of shortcuts to do it. How could it not? Part of the shortcut methodology is aimed at distilling all of the sensory input and experiences into useful data. In other words, memory is trying to summarize rather than record verbatim.

Recently, there has been an explosion in popularity of user experience (UX) as a subject and even a separate discipline. In product and software development, you can’t take two steps without hearing the term “user experience” or some variation thereof. Despite this focus, it feels like no one understands what the anatomy of an experience is. I hear about details like button colors, rounded corners, verbiage, screenflow, icons and so on. Certainly, details contribute to great experiences. However, almost 100% of these details need to be condensed and associated to form the memory of the experience.

An exercise I have always loved in product design is word-subtraction. Write out a description of a product in say 500 characters. Now do it with 300, 200, 100 and so on. It forces removal of increasingly less important details to distill the principal meaning of the description. Memories aren’t much different. It really makes me think about what details I choose to focus on when designing. This model means that the user experience is the memory of using the product not the process of using it. It’s an important distinction.

It means a button’s shade of blue doesn’t exactly affect the experience. It means having a mind-blowing on-boarding process with poor follow-through is still a bad memory. Events that happened even a week ago are shockingly vague and inaccurate. How was that Michelin-rated steakhouse you went to last week? It’s likely that the details of how good the server was or what kind of plates the restaurant had are lost to time. As long as those details weren’t notably terrible or disruptively out of place, they were probably forgotten or filled in with past memory data. The memory says the place was quiet and classy; the wine selection was thoughtful; the steak was good enough; and the cotton candy served for dessert was a fun surprise. In short, experience is cumulative.

I am not saying that all the little details aren’t important. They are. Details contribute to cohesion. Details are only remembered if they tripped the shortcut flags in the memory. The iPhone is an excellent example of details that add up to powerful memory. The rendering style of interface elements and small decisions such as smooth transitions and features that “just work” add up to a positive experience. Cohesive experiences require that every element is contributing to a team effort. Teamwork demands smart and thoughtful compromises. It sounds good to say that every piece must be 100% awesome but if everything is on the same level than no hierarchy or contrast exists.

A product is going to be boiled down to the memory impression it leaves. This is characterized by mental shortcut flags. The most common are first impressions, “WOW” moments and endings. An average customer’s mind is working to make important associations with these endpoints to recognize practical patterns and potentially useful details. A simplification would be that short-term memory needs to make decisions about what information is valuable enough to make it into long-term memory. These shortcuts can be powerful. Imagine this scenario: a customer is checking out of a hotel. Until check-out the stay has been ideal. The customer reviews the final invoice and discovers that an amenity which he thought was free was not. Now an extra few hundred dollars has accumulated. He asks the manager to remove the charges but the manager is unable to do so. The customer begrudgingly pays the invoice and goes on his way. Its likely that this customer will use the ending as a memory marker and will not recall it with fond sentiments.

Most anything can potentially become part of a customer’s experience. However, focusing on the parts of the process that are far more likely to be remembered and effectively define the experience helps make it clear what elements should be in focus, what battles are worth fighting and what compromises are valuable. Remember, “user experience” is just a fancy term for a memory. What will your customer remember?

Photo via  Ulf Bodin

I have a markerboard in my office. I also have a Macbook Air with as many prototyping and design creation apps as you can think of. But I prefer to kickoff most projects on the markerboard.

Sometimes, instead of the markerboard, I’ll even use some scrap paper – either from my printer, or from a little pile of cut up sheets of paper I have on my desk.

You’re probably thinking, “WAIT – YOU DON’T HAVE A MOLESKIN FOR YOUR SKETCHES?!?!”

Yes, of course I do. Relax. But I prefer the scrap paper over the moleskin for sketching out rough ideas.

Do you know what the markerboard and the scrap paper have in common that my Moleskin and various software applications do not?

Temporality.

They start with the assumption that what you create on them will be disposed of, not saved. I believe this is the best assumption to use when starting most projects: that your initial ideas will be disposed of, and replaced with better ones. Iterations.

They also share another common thread, related to their temporal, disposable nature: they facilitate discussion, not execution. In other words, they are about solving the “what”, not the “how”.

Too often we as designers instinctively start with execution, then worry about the content or the strategy after an idea for execution (style or visual treatment) has been established. What happens is we end up creating a visual framework first, then fitting the strategy into our design – which in reality is putting the cart before the horse.

Starting with disposable mediums lends itself to keeping initial ideas and direction to the strategic level. It facilitates the discussion that must take place before a visual framework for execution is ever considered.

Of course, they do blend together at times. Is it possible to use a disposable medium like a markerboard or scrap paper to start hashing out your visual execution? Of course.

I’m not proposing these tools should never be used for the purpose of brainstorming specific visual treatments or other execution related details. What I am advocating for are two things:

1. Start A Discussion First

View your work through the lens of a problem solver creating a solution, not just as a designer creating a visual work. Start to think of yourself as creating conceptual solutions that just happen to be manifested through a visual skin, and you’ll begin to understand the necessity of solving the problem independent of the visual design you create for the solution.

The benefit of using a tool like a markerboard or scrap paper is that it forces you to start to abstract yourself away from the design details we designers tend to get caught up in due to fidelity. The low-fi nature of those tools tends to force us to think more broadly about the solution we are trying to accomplish, as opposed to the rounded corners or drop shadows we tend to get caught up in with more hi-fidelity tools.

Either way, the point is NOT that you need to use a markerboard or scrap paper to start your projects. The point is that you need to use your conceptual thinking cap first, starting a discussion about the nature of the problem and what the solution should be like independent from the visual nature of your work.

2. Prepare Yourself To Iterate

The other benefit in tools that produce disposable work is that they help us to realize where we are in the process: the beginning. Often we stumble on a singular piece of the puzzle and try to use it to craft the rest of the solution.

In reality, there are many aspects to a good solution that must all come together to form the final product. You can no more design an entire web application based on a single button treatment than you can design an entire building from a certain style of staircase.

Far too often we treat our projects this way, finding some isolated piece of inspiration that serves to dictate the tone of the entire user experience. But in reality we need to be willing to let go of initial inspirations as the creative process uncovers challenges and solutions unique to our own project.

In short, we need to be willing to iterate – something which is much easier when we hold ideas loosely as concepts, rather than tightly as finely imagined pixel perfect Photoshop comps. There is a place for the later, but it’s seldom at the beginning of the process.

Problem Solving Thinking

Markerboard mentality is really just about problem solving thinking. That’s why it’s important.

In an age where design aesthetics are finally being taken seriously as a part of strategic business decisions, we risk our craft being taken as a mere marketing commodity if we don’t push to keep advancing it as an essential business skill.

Let us be diligent and willing to approach every problem as something to be solved, something to discuss, and something to iterate on.

When I started out in design, all I knew is that I was passionate about it; no direction, no long term plan, I just wanted to be creative and make stuff. I drifted along for a few years and, after seeing 37Signals release Basecamp, it dawned on me: this is what I wanted to do—I wanted to build products. Marketing work had grown tiresome and I felt a burning passion to build things people actually used instead of things they just looked at.

Jump forward a few years and we find ourselves in the middle of the technology boom. People aren’t just building fun little apps, they are building thriving businesses, pushing technological boundaries and making a dent in the universe. The environment is extremely creative and inspiring. This is evidenced, in part, by the fact we see an influx of young founders who respond to the electricity they see in this space. It is an incredible time to be alive and working in this industry.

When you operate in an environment such as this it can be tempting to accept certain pre-conceived notions about what it means to be a founder or an entrepreneur. It’s easy to accept the path others have taken and assume the same should be true for you. You can look at other successful people and think that just doing what they did will lead to the same happiness. This just isn’t the case.

It can be so easy to get caught up in the parts that don’t matter and lose focus on what it is that you really wanted to do in the first place. For some to be happy, they need to follow the familiar script of founding a company, bringing on Venture Capital, obtaining viral growth, and seeing a massive exit. For them this is the ultimate dream, and I applaud them; for others, the dream might be different altogether. I find a lot of inspiration in people like Drew Wilson, David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried. These guys are hell bent on building businesses that are bootstrapped and profitable. They seem to have little interest in businesses grown on venture capital, and prefer to follow a path that doesn’t get as much fanfare.

I think it is important to ask yourself, “What got you into this industry? What keeps you up at night? What is your dream?”. No matter what happens, you still have to wake up every day and find a way to be happy. Are you going to be happy when you realize you just spent a chunk of your life pursuing a dream that was never yours in the first place? Did you chase something that seemed like a good idea just because it was the popular route to take? At times I have fallen into this trap and it left me feeling unfulfilled. I set out to chase a passion, but somewhere along the way I lost sight of my own ideas and started pursuing the dreams of others. Chasing the dreams of others is simply a waste of time. In their book “Rework“, David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried touch on this idea:

“You don’t have forever. This is your life’s work. Do you want to build just another me-too product or do you want to shake things up? What you do is your legacy. Don’t sit around and wait for someone else to make the change you want to see. And don’t think it takes a huge team to make that difference either”

I now find myself in a place of maniacal commitment to doing the things I am passionate about. What originally drew me to this business was the desire to build something useful, to do something new. I recently described my dream as simply “wanting to build products that people are willing to trade their money for”. Nothing complicated, nothing grandiose, just building something that provides real value, no matter the scale. For me, nothing makes me happier than to chase that story line. How about you?

We all have them—busy schedules and digital distractions. I know with absolute certainty that I do. For me, both have seeped into being central to my world, but they don’t have to be.

One of my dearest friends who I consider a brother is getting married the first week of May. As a “last hurrah” of sorts, four other guys and I went on a ten-day adventure. Escaping the frosty spring mornings of Chicago, we traveled south to the tropical Nicaraguan coast to surf, eat tacos and share stories accompanied by a beer (or two or three or four). As I was packing for the trip, I was encouraged by my wife to disconnect + disengage from work and happenings back home for the entire week and a half trip. Power down. Leave everything off. No emails, no Instagram, no client calls, no texting.

I’d just come through an incredibly busy winter season, buried in work with endless deadlines and commitments both in and out of the office. One would think that I wouldn’t have a problem saying good riddance, but being honest, I was having a hard time stepping away from the busy trap. I’m so grateful for my wife’s encouragement (er, mandate)—powering down was one of the healthiest and sobering things I’ve done in a good while. Unknowingly, my brain and soul desperately needed it.

I woke up with the sun and quietly enjoyed my coffee, checked the surf, went swimming and ate a late breakfast. I actually made time to read, savoring every literary afternoon spent in a hammock outside. Late afternoon swims turned into games of cards, glasses of rum and reminiscent evenings of classic stories and hearty laughs. Without my phone I realized how present I could be, undistracted by my self-inflicted necessity to be perpetually connected and available. I was disengaged from the crutch of social media, email, and my checklist mentality. I was able to listen, respond, and intentionally just be. And I really enjoyed it.

Landing back in Chicago nine days later, I powered my phone on. In trips past, I would arrive home greeted by the all too familiar feeling of anxiety of being hurled back into the hustle. But this time, it was different. Something clicked. I realized that it’s all about an intentional shift in perspective and communication. How do I want to do life with others? How connected and available do I want to be? What does it look like to engage more in the present tangible tasks at hand and physical relationships versus being overly immersed in the digital social world?

I’ve since been making an effort to stay less busy and power down more frequently. Sure, life gets crazy. Seasons come and go in which being connected is seemingly necessary, but I’ve been guilty of perpetuating the behavior. What’s profound is that by clearing my schedule I’ve become more focused, driven, and refreshed—both at home and in the office. My work now seems more purposeful. Each project is less of another thing in the queue and more of an opportunity to share a story. By not conceding to the notion that I’ll consistently and unflinchingly be busy, I’ve been able to work with a reignited passion. I’m working and living with an authenticity rooted in truly caring and observing what’s around me.

The final question I’ve been asking myself is how can I sustain this idea of reduced busyness and digital distractions? I have to believe it’s by making an intentional choice to be present and aware in both my work and personal life. I want to live without with my face illuminated by my phone 24/7. I want to look up, keeping my gaze where life is happening around me with those who I love, admire, and hold dear to my heart. And I truly believe my relationships will grow, my work will be richer in purpose, and I will be there to see and experience it in a way possible only by putting my phone in my back pocket—or maybe even leaving it behind at home.