Mike's talk was advertised by posters put up around the design department recently featuring the word WOW which since the talk I have realised means Words of Wisdom. The date on these was 26th October which was wrong as it was meant to say November. Then someone designed a poster that said D'oh in place of Wow with the correct date on. These were placed next to the ones with the incorrect date on. I don't understand why you would want to highlight someones mistake and it makes a mockery out of that person. It could quite easily have been reprinted with the correct date on.
However, aside from this I enjoyed the talk by Mike. He graduated in 2002 and has been in employment at The Chase, Landor, Moon, Pentagram, Mark Studio and has recently been offered the job as Creative Director at Interbrand in Australia.
Mark spoke of the positives about being in the design industry. He said it is interesting, challenging, no two jobs are the same, you get to go on photoshoots, you go on free awards nights and that their is a strong design community. Also, people are helpful and it is easy to work from home or abroad. Aswell as this you can work for worthwhile causes and help give people a voice.
The negatives were the long hours of unpaid work, the competitive nature of the industry and the amount of pressure put upon you. The negative impacts are overpackaged items which is negative on the environment and also information overload. He then went onto speak about Studio structure and the hierarchy of staff which I think was more for the first and second years.
Moving onto the subject of placements Mike did a 6 month placement at Imagination and then did a placement at The Chase. He says placements speed you up and you become ten times faster than before. You get real live projects and you can gain contacts by networking and going on nights out. His advice for getting a placement was to have 6 solid placements in your book, have good ideas well executed, impress tutors and do well at interview. To get the most out of a placement you should socialize, be enthusiastic and positive. He advised us to not let rejection get to us as it does not mean you aren't good enough and will only make you stronger.
Also starting on a low wage isn't all that bad, Mike started on 13k and left only a couple of years later on 23k. His first project was ironically the project that we worked on at the Liverpool Design Symposium during The Chase's workshop. He achieved what was required and the underlay outsold carpet at the company for the next 2 years which shows what good design can do to sales. With his design he also achieved a 350% store card uptake increase which shows it doesn't have to be a glamorous brief to achieve results.
Aside from design, Mike has travelled the world and advises us to do the same as it is the best thing he has ever done. He then eventually got a job working at Landor in Australia whilst travelling where he was paid more and had amazing views from the studio. He believes british designers are highly exportable due to superior ideas whereas other countries are more strategic. I have found this when showing my work in New York. He is now working at True North until he leaves to travel again before he takes on his new job with Interbrand.
He says a lot of his time is spent producing brand guidelines which show the look, font, colours and tone of voice of a brand. Although he likes to make time to do self initiated briefs and advises us to do them aswell.
Overall Mikes advice to us as students is to broaden our horizons and look at all types of media. Experiment whilst you can and you are in education. Crit and collaborate with other students. Above all belive in yourself.
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