Ep. 147: Creativity & Career: Designing Opportunities

On May 12, to kick off WantedDesign Online 2021’s online International Schools Show, host Amy Devers sat down with three brilliant, inspiring thought-leaders to discuss opportunities, advice, and insight for design students' next steps. Amy was joined by Natalie Nixon, Founder of Figure 8 Thinking; Diane Domeyer, Executive Director of The Creative Group; and Rosanne Somerson, President of RISD. The conversation looks beyond the portfolio to frame the value of creative training, stresses the importance of curiosity, and reminds us that the career path is itself a creative endeavor. With their creative tool kits, design students have everything they need to design their own opportunities. 

Read the episode transcript here.

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Read the Transcript

Rosanne Somerson: One of the things I have always said is that this creative process, the most difficult creative process is that of your own career.

Amy Devers: Hi everyone, I’m Amy Devers and this is Clever. It’s graduation season and today we’re looking at the ways design students can deploy their creative skillsets to seek out and find their own opportunities in a special program we’re calling Creativity & Career: Designing Opportunities. This program was recorded via a live zoom panel as part of WantedDesign Online 2021, a series of digital exhibitions and programming featuring great design from around the world. This panel discussion kicked off the launch of the first Online International Schools Show on view from May 12 to June 12, 2021 featuring work from more than 180 students from 15 international design schools. To see the whole exhibition, including the winning projects of the Conscious Design Award, visit wanteddesign.online. Now, here’s the show.

Claire Pijoulat: Hi everyone, I’m Claire Pijoulat, co-founder of WantedDesign.

Odile Hainaut: Good afternoon everyone and thank you for joining us for this very special event. I am Odile Hainaut, co-founder of WantedDesign and we are very pleased to host this conversation today with Amy Devers and Claire. A year ago we were hosting a conversation with Amy and President Somerson who is also with us today and the topic was learning during a pandemic. Today, exactly a year later, we are launching our new platform WantedDesign online with the International Schools Show including 15 schools from all over the world and projects from more than 190 students.

First of all, congratulations to the students who received the Conscious Designer Award. One thing we can really say when looking at the exhibition and all the students’ work, is that the schools definitely succeeded in teaching, adjusting the curriculum, providing the right tools, assisting their students during these challenging times. For sure the students succeeded in learning and practicing during those last months.

The talk today is to celebrate this group of talented young designers as they graduate from school and to explore with our guests how they can use their creativity to design their career. Before passing the mic to Claire who is just in front of me, so you know we are social distancing. 

I want to thank all the partners who support the WantedDesign online International Schools Show and the different events related to anchoring this talk. Thank you very much to Be Original America, Clever, the International Interior Design Association (IIDA), the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), Metropolis magazine, and NYCxDESIGN. A huge thank you, Amy, Rosanne, Diane, and Natalie, for being here with us today. Claire?

CP: Thank you, Odile. It's so meaningful for us to kick off this print design celebration with this specific program with Amy today. We have always been passionate about collaborating with design educators and to make WantedDesign a platform that helps students connect with the industry and give them keys to approach the design world after they graduate. More than ever, in 2021 it's a priority for us to put some spotlight on design students and we are proud to launch this new online venue with the International Schools Show and to celebrate the opening with this talk. Right after, go to WantedDesign online and visit the exhibition and check out the Conscious Design Award winners.

Let me introduce you and pass it to Amy Devers, co-founder of Clever and host of this conversation. She's today with Diane Domeyer, Executive Director of The Creative Group. Hello, Diane.

Diane Domeyer: Hello.

CP: We have Natalie Nixon, Founder of Figure 8 Thinking. Hello, Natalie.

Natalie Nixon: Hi.

CP: And Rosanne Somerson, President of RISD. Hi, Rosanne. 

Rosanne Somerson: How are you?

CP: They will discuss creativity and career, designing of opportunities. Amy?

Amy Devers: Thank you, Claire and Odile. Welcome everyone. I am so excited to be discussing this topic with the three of you because I am of the firm opinion that creativity is a superpower and with a little imagination, critical thinking and the skills and training to turn ideas into reality, anything is achievable. In this particular time of extreme uncertainty, rapidly shifting conditions, and urgency around issues of social and climate justice, agility, adaptability, systems thinking, and creative approaches to complex problems are paramount no matter the industry or situation.

This would position creatives as a valuable addition to any team or operation, even those not specifically labelled as creative. It also means these young creatives are stocked with a toolkit ideally suited to designing their own opportunities and creating a career path that is fulfilling, prosperous, and aligns with their values. Let's start there.

I want to start by looking beyond the portfolio to the raw materials, the actual creative toolkit that these young folks have worked so hard to develop and how its value can be framed in the larger context. The job search or career path is the next design challenge these young creatives will undertake. Whether they plan to get a job or start their own studio, I want to know what your advice is for looking at the career path itself as a creative endeavor. Let's start with Natalie.

NN: Thank you for convening this amazing event. I agree with you that this next chapter, their entrée into this next chapter is a really exciting design challenge. As with all design challenges, we must start with posing really great questions. I think it's very much inside-out work, so I think there has to be a lot of self-reflexive questions that are posed along the way as well as knowing how to frame great questions to those, for those with whom you're going to be working because it's my opinion that you can tell a lot more about the quality of a person's intelligence by the questions that they frame much more so than what they might spout.

The benefits of your design education is that you come equipped with a capacity to see. I think that design and art are fundamentally different, but both fields really equip us with how to see. Whether it's that negative space or reframing, turning things inside out, upside down. That's a real capability that you will need to translate and really this next chapter is really about the act of translation, translating the skills that you've learned in your discreet disciplines into context that maybe wasn't your first pick, may not be your dream job, but you need to maintain that self-reflexive questioning and ability to frame questions with it in mind that it's a chapter. There's going to be something else that it will lead to.

Secondly I would just add in terms of how to leverage what you've just learned and experienced and the privilege of having an education college or graduate education design, is to understand that creativity loves constraints. You all are well aware that there are deadlines. There's a certain point where you have to be done and when you are working in the industry there are constraints because of budget, there are constraints because of client parameters or constraints because of time. Don't be afraid to put those constraints on yourself.

You all are really graduating into a really challenging time, there's no question about that at all and it's highly likely that you won't get your dream job, the dream position. What can you build, generate, even within those constraints? What are the relationships that you can still generate? What are the new ways of seeing and doing that you can still create and design for your life, even within those constraints? That alone will take you miles. That's where I'd begin.

AD: I love that, Natalie. That's a very nutrient dense answer to that question. Rosanne, what do you have to add?

RS: I love this topic because for years I've watched amazing creative people graduate and given many speeches at commencements and one of the things I have always said is that the biggest creative process, the most difficult creative process is that of your own career. I think one of the things that we all know, but perhaps past generations don't quite see the same way, is that it's not as though someone goes to a design school or an art school and learns something then goes out and makes a career. This generation has 10 careers before they're 40. The statistics keep changing. It used to be seven, now it's 10. 

It isn't about one career; it's really about designing a life and a creative practice as much as it is getting a job. If you would ask yourself the question what would I do differently if I were designing a full pathway towards creative practice, you'll probably find different answers than if you ask yourself the question how do I get a job.

I think I agree with everything that Natalie said and I think we all can punctuate it with the fact that none of us knew what we were going into a year ago March, and yet as was mentioned at the beginning of the year about the student projects, we've all found a way to thrive in this and some of those lessons are really important in terms of what Natalie said as translational lessons to translate into the opportunities that one never expected to have to unravel or the new kinds of collaboration or the new forms of research and communication that we've all mastered this year because we've had to.

Those are going to be really compelling components of setting up a good creative practice rather than thinking about it as a job. 

AD: I love that, framing it as a creative practice because it really is the beginning of a journey and it will wind all over. Diane, I know you had some thoughts on that. What is your advice here?

DD: Yeah. Thank you, Amy. It's an honor and a pleasure to be here with Rosanne and Natalie as well. When you think of careers, and I was thinking about your question in particular. One of the biggest limitations that we see from time to time, and I oversee the creative group which basically we're in the position of being able to help thousands of career professionals and hiring managers each year, kinda navigate the landscape.

It's really interesting when you look at one of the biggest limitations that we often see for those that are early in their career is that they become too focused on a career path. Both Rosanne and Natalie said this, this concept of a design challenge applied to your career is really, really important because a career path is linear or sequential, but if you ask nearly anyone with 15+ years of experience to look back at their career, they would describe it as more of a career journey.

As an example, when I first came out of school I had no idea. I had a degree, but I really didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up and here 25 years later I'm ironically viewed to be a career expert. Careers take lots of different paths and detours and you need to be, much like in a design challenge, open to all possibilities. The advice that I would give to those that are just embarking on that journey is to use your strengths and your values as a compass for the journey, but to be open to any and all possibilities. Not to box yourself in to an exclusive path because some of the most rewarding opportunities in our careers are those that were unexpected or you would have not foreseen on your journey.

AD: That is 100% true because my whole career is something that I did not foresee at all. It took a circuitous route through areas I was not even attempting to go into like TV and now podcasting. What I found in those unexpected places is that my creative education did stock me with the tools I needed to navigate those new learning experiences and those fun detours. They felt like detours at the time, they turned into my career.

Let's wrap our heads around the value of creativity. What's the business case for hiring young creatives and even outside of design specific industries? Is there a demand now for creative thinking in terms of the candidate requirements? 

DD: Well, in my mind there is always a business case for hiring early career creatives and the value of creativity and innovation has never been more valued than it is now and especially in light of what we've gone through globally in the last year and a half. The bottom line is creatives are problem solvers. They bring new ideas and perspectives, solutions, challenges. No matter what industry, above and beyond the practice itself or the design roles themselves, creativity, innovation, and design is taking the lead in challenging organizations to be innovative.

There was a study a number of years back by Adobe and Forrester and most business schools would say that there is a business case for design-led companies. This study in particular cited that design-led companies have 41% higher market share, they have 46% greater competitive advantage, and 50% more loyal customers. And so not only in product design and those types of fields, but when you take organizations like Airbnb which are design-led companies. We all know Apple as a design-led product company, but service and other industries that put design at the head, value it at every level in their organization, have a competitive advantage.

AD: I'm so happy to hear those stats, that data to just back up what I've known all along. I know Natalie; you've made your life's work out of drawing a clear, bold line between creativity and business impact. What is your thought on this?

NN: I started collecting signals on the landscape as a creativity strategist about six years ago, in 2015 when the World Economic Forum claimed that creativity would rank as the number 10 job skill for 2020 and beyond. What was interesting and funny to me is that job skills number one and two were critical thinking and problem solving which, P.S., are bound in creativity. Exactly.

It means that creativity is the number one job skill that all of us will need to be able to leverage, especially in this fourth industrial revolution where technology is ubiquitous, where there will be casualties in the labour market as basic task functions in any arena, in any sector will be taken over by automation, robotics. Whether it's the law, financial service, food and bev, etc. The companies and organizations and leaders who will thrive will be the ones that make room for the human. Amy, as you referenced, I've spent a lot of my time thinking about this and one of the things I write about and I speak about is the business ROI of creativity. 

Just to share three short examples of the business ROI of creativity, one is that when we are more intentionally creative, we naturally have much more inventive thinking and when we have more inventive thinking that leads to radically different business models which leads to new strategic partnerships, which often uncover new revenue streams. That's a direct line between creativity and business impact.

A second thing that happens is that we know that while it may be a pain in the tush to collaborate sometimes because sometimes it's like I can so this so much faster by myself, but the more diverse the inputs, the more innovative the output. When we work collaboratively, because I cannot possibly think of the sorts of questions that everyone assembled on this call today would consider and vice versa, we actually end up generating a lot more interesting nuggets towards solutions, towards future possible scenarios. When we collaborate we end up ultimately boosting productivity, increasing efficiencies, and when efficiencies increase, costs go down. That's the business impact.

Finally the third example I would share is that when we are creative, we are customer obsessed. We must be customer obsessed. It's not about us; it's about what are the needs of the market. By the way, one of the advantages hopefully in your design education is that you become really good at falling in love with people's problems. You're not designing for yourself; you're designing for holes in the market, that negative space that I referred to earlier.

When we are customer obsessed we end up designing services, experiences, processes, products, that are much more meaningful to people, but that builds brand loyalty and hopefully that begins to generate a larger market share. That's a business impact.

Those are just three short examples of the bold lines that we can connect between creativity and business impact. I think that combines with what Diane just pointed out, what we know from a lot of story institutions like the World Economic Forum, and some of those examples I've just shared, people should be feeling very encouraged about leveraging creativity and contributing a creativity competency in whatever organization you end up working in.

AD: Wow. I love all this information that's being spelled out for us because it really does make me feel very encouraged that we are not the only ones who recognize the value of creativity. It's starting to be recognized in the larger context. A lot of people who are listening today I'm sure who may be embarking on this next chapter of their life may not be looking to work for someone else. They may be looking to start their own studio or freelance for a while, or start a consultancy even. I'm wondering if there's a case to be made for including designers in the planning stages of projects or the value of art and incorporating original art and design into events, marketing campaigns, activations. Is this something that our listeners can frame into their pitches? 

RS: There's a lot of evidence that shows that when design is an add-on everything has to be redone because design can't be at the end because it's conceptual and it's the framing for a good process. As we've just heard, this notion of creativity as a competency is at the framing, at the origins rather than thinking about design as it used to be pigeon-holed into the way that something looks or the way that something is communicated.

Now it's conceptual framing and it's much deeper than that. I think going back to the argument about the business case, the fact that IBM hired 1,000 designers to really revamp their company, the fact that McKinsey & Company which is one of the main business consulting firms has the design division now is evidence that large-scale companies are seeing the absolute essential nature of design.

Going back to your notion of design as a superpower, Amy, if someone thinks about a creative practice that they can also design the practice of, and the fact that design has been validated by these large companies, there is a really interesting opportunity to think about what doesn't exist and what are my special strengths. 

I think particularly when this was mentioned earlier, the notion of the sense of individual values that are defining our culture at the moment and the unravelling of long held, misguided principles and restrictive practices, are really coming to the point where companies are freaking out. They want to know how to reinvent themselves so that they're relevant because a lot of them are becoming increasingly irrelevant as our culture really advances faster than our business sector. The notion that a creative individual would have something unique to contribute, that comes from a different identity, lived experience. It's something that is incredibly in demand right now and that companies are not able to so quickly pivot to as would a small start-up. 

One other point that I want to make about the value of the kind of design ethos in a business setting is this notion of navigating the speed bumps and the durability of a business. Many businesses fail within the early stages, but one of the things that a design education does is it teaches you to essentially create something of significance out of nothing. It didn't exist before. You put your materials and your hands and your skills together and you create something.

Having that superpower as you referred to it, Amy, means that when you hit a speed bump, when you hit a real challenge or a failure, it doesn't resonate the same way with the creative person as it would with someone who is a linear thinker or who is working to a rubric or a matrix of a business plan. Airbnb which Diane brought up is the perfect example. They've had so many times where they've run up against some really major challenges that probably would have unravelled other individuals and they cite their design education as a reason that they've been able to not just jump over that hurdle, but actually come out better and strong as a company, and more innovative.

I think on so many levels from the notion of the fact that big companies are putting designers in the C suites now, the Chief Creative Officers. The notion of doing that for a company actually is very important, but some of those same competencies can then be taken into startups and individual practices in ways that have the nimble flexibility to deal with the absolute insanely fast moving changes that are happening in all industries right now around values, technology, cultural change, and the fact of rapid speeding fluctuation that are happening in every field and every industry. 

For a creative person, if they can figure out how to jump into that, they're so much better suited than people that haven't had the kind of toolbox that you mentioned earlier in their reach.

AD: I love that you just spelled out how important the adaptability and agility of a creatively trained creative thinker is and how important that is. I'm wondering what are the practical nuts and bolts of framing that if you're just starting out and you want to be able to position this creative thinking, this creative toolkit as valuable soft skills for any position? Even maybe not a creative position, so you might have to be educating or explaining to someone or a client that this creative toolkit is really more valuable than they might realize. What are your thoughts on exactly how to put the language around that in order for them to express this? 

DD: We have done a number of workforce studies specifically around creative and marketing hiring and careers and one in particular, you mentioned the soft skills of creativity, critical thinking, and adaptability. Those are soft skills that are highly, highly valued and as a matter of fact the vast majority of hiring managers say that they place as much or more emphasis on the soft skills than the hard or technical skills. 

If you think about creativity, critical thinking, and adaptability and specifically the impact that Covid has had on organizations in the last year, companies have had to change their product, their delivery, they've had to shift campaigns and messaging and even business models have had to change. Those organizations and individuals that were most adaptable contributed greatly to those organizations. 

I don't know if any of you had the opportunity to watch My Octopus Teacher, but I think it's such a great lesson in creativity and adaptability. If you haven't watched it I would highly recommend it, if you watch it this octopus basically uses creativity to survive without the benefit of a mother or father to teach them and it's adaptability for survival. 

If you think of adaptability and how do you frame that, especially if you're early in your career, is to always be thinking about not only the work that you do, but what is the customer or business challenge and what is the impact of the work that you are doing. If you can frame that in the context of the challenge and how you had to adapt to the situation and what impact you made, and you can articulate that, you have to have examples. The best advice that I would say is whether it be in your portfolio, whether it be in an interview, to be preparing your story around what was the challenge and what was the impact and how did you adapt the work that you did to those situations.

If you can speak in those terms of telling a story, you'll be in a better position to demonstrate your adaptability, your creativity. It's not just assumed that you have it; you have to discuss it in the context of something that would make sense to a potential employer.

AD: I want to hear Natalie. You were nodding in vigorous affirmation to that. I want to hear what you have to say because you talked earlier about framing questions and framing the right question says a lot about you. Diane, you sort of mentioned storytelling as a really important framework for discussing adaptability. Natalie, how do you build on that?

NN: I don't want to forget this point. You mentioned that we don't want to not include those people who want to immediately start on an entrepreneurial journey and someone said maybe you don't want to work for other people. You're always working for someone else. I'm an entrepreneur, I was a professor for 16 years, I worked in the fashion industry before I became an academic. You are always working for someone and if you don't have clarity on that you'll be in trouble. You're always working for your clients even if you are an entrepreneur.

Having said that, fundamentally everything still goes back to deep rooted curiosity because wherever you land you need to be able to leverage your design education to be able to talk about how you have a capacity to reframe. Given the incredibly VUCA environment that everyone has been going through that is volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous, everyone needs help in re-framing. 

What business do we think we're in? What's the business that we actually should be in? Is this nugget that we've been making for the past 23 years, does it still make sense? Are we in the transportation business or the mobility business? Are we in the insurance business or the comfort business? Right. That all stems from what you've learned about framing a design challenge. Curiosity is really key.

In the space of design thinking which is a space I worked in and did a lot of work on and wrote a book about, we talk a lot about empathy. Empathy. Empathy. Empathy. You must first have empathy for the people who are using your stuff, your services, your experiences, your products. It was in the process for me of writing The Creativity Leap that I realized we actually don't have that quite right. 

Before you can empathize with anyone you must be curious. You must be curious about why do they sit over there and not over here. Why do they do it that way and not our way? Once we are able to really master curiosity and understand that curiosity is actually as my pal Warren Burger likes to say, asking questions is a way of thinking. Sure, it's a signal of ignorance, but so what? It's the beginning of exploration and discovery. 

First starting with curiosity, that leads to empathy which can lead to insight and action which fundamentally, if we're lucky, that leads to equity. There's also a nice pull through from curiosity through empathy, action, all the way to equity. Your ability to demonstrate that your training, your education, your skills development, has equipped you with an ability to reframe, that's fundamental to strategy. In my view, strategy is creative because the best strategists know how to look at a problem inside out, upside down, anticipate what's about to happen next by asking and generating different questions.

I think that again that act of translation which is a lot of what Diane was talking about with the story that you're telling by identifying with the nugget of the challenge, what was the impact, what were the steps that you took, how can you demonstrate the ways that you collaborated, how can you demonstrate the ways that you improvised? 

By the way, we all improvise every day, it's not something to be intimidated by and the best leaders know that they need better improvisers in their organizations. The best clients know that they need help and thought partnership in improvising. I go back again to curiosity so that you can translate that to whoever you're talking with about your value in terms of being able to reframe.

AD: Thank you for that and I will second the power of asking good questions. I truly believe that framing interesting questions signals where your mind is going, how you're processing the information, but it also lets your counterpart know how deeply you're listening and how observant you are to everything that's going around. A lot of times those questions will also signal that you've processed the information and have now moved forward to the problem.

Let's talk about the detective work involved in this first stage of going from being a student to needing to earn your own livelihood, lining up opportunities. I know that there are the obvious places to look, the job listings and the want ads, but what are some creative ways to go about the search and discovery process and how to stay open. We all talked about the path not being linear. How to stay open to unconventional opportunities or opportunities that might not be what you were looking for, but are the right opportunity for you in that moment. 

RS: It's really complicated because there isn't a simple answer which is the point of the question. The point is that everyone has to be a kind of intrepid explorer on their own and find the things that they're generally drawn to that match their skills and their values. That's not always so easy, but there lots of networks that are available. 

When I have observed long careers of people that have been incredibly successful and have starting something on their own and new, they've created almost their own apprenticeship first or they've gone to work for a company which they call their day job and then at night they're slowly building the capacity for their own career or their own entity. I've seen many incredibly successful companies built that way and the point of the day job gives you the practical experience, it's a wonderful experience to see how a successful company operates, whether it will match what you plan to do or not. 

It also gives you the security to make sure that when you do your thing you've gotten to the point where you can take the risk and so it well. It's very hard sometimes when you just start without resources unless you have a trove of resources behind you which a lot of young people don't. You need to set up this duo system for a while until you can finally make the change from one to the other. In the process of finding that day job piece, it's very important, particularly if you're not necessarily interviewing with a designer, to really show the depths of your surprising different way of thinking with concrete examples.

In a job interview, if you can think about what were your aha moments when you were creating your portfolio. The portfolio is going to show proficiency but it's not necessarily going to show how you think or how you differ from someone else with a beautiful portfolio. 

But, if you can remember some of your own aha moments and say to an employer I was doing this and then all of a sudden this occurred to me and I played with this new material and I tried this new challenge or I found this new technology or whatever and actually demonstrate the thinking and then show the outcome, that's going to be really powerful because that's a process that the interviewer most likely doesn't have on their own. They're suddenly seeing instantly your value.

If you're interviewing with a design professional then that's important too, but you also have to demonstrate your proficiencies. If you're going into an industry that's not necessarily a design driven industry, that ability to wow someone through communicating your aha moment to them so that they can experience it and see the potential that you could bring to an environment is incredibly powerful. 

A lot of design students as they exit school don't even realize how awesome they are because to them it's just them and they've seen their peers do amazing things. But the outside world is not that awesome in terms of coming up with innovative solutions. Just having the confidence to actually walk through a process and show how you made a discovery, how you overcame a challenge, how you had a flash of intuition that turned into something, is really powerful for an interviewer or an employer.

AD: I think it's so important that you brought up. So many people who are just emerging from school don't realize that they were in this water that not everybody else is in. They're like fish that don't recognize their environment and then they go out into the more deluded, regular world and realize that that familiarity with the creative process is actually really, really valuable. 

Sometimes you might find a company or a client or a person even in just passing that maybe fits with your values or with your culture or is doing something that you really want to do with them, but there's not necessarily a convenient job opening to stuff yourself into. What are some ways, some creative ways that you might turn what starts as a culture or value fit into an opportunity? Even if you're nurturing that for a while and it's not an immediate thing.

DD: It's interesting because even as you asked Rosanne that previous question like how do you turn things into opportunities and where do you start, above and beyond applying on the job boards, you can never underestimate the value of the network. To your point, when you find those connections, if you foster those connections even if it doesn't appear to be an immediate opportunity, that connections fostered can lead to lots of different opportunities.

The importance of organizational fit, cultural fit, etc. has never been more important. Nine out of 10 creative professionals that we surveyed said that they would not accept a job offer with a company whose values did not match their own. We did a research study back in 2018 about organizational culture, the make or break factor in hiring and retention, and it's even more important now. It is a two-way street for employer and employee as to whether there is that cultural fit when assessing an opportunity or assessing an individual.

Even if there's not that career opportunity today, when that magic strikes and there is alignment it is typically recognized by both partners and if it is fostered it will lend itself to either an opportunity down the road or a referral because that's the power of that network.

I do want to offer just a few things as it relates to how can you assess company culture or culture if you are presented with an opportunity. A lot of it is about doing the research on the company site and the review sites and what you find in terms of who works there. You can look on LinkedIn. It's interesting because this last year for many companies the concept of organizational culture was turned on its head where you might think of it as a mission statement or a work environment. 

Culture is more about values, purpose, people, the actions. You can ask questions like what do you like about working here or what do you wish you would have known before starting here. Again, even if there's not a career opportunity and you're just networking and you're asking these questions of someone in your network, you're going to understand more about them but also about the organization. How is this organization different from the competition, what would you change about this company if you could. 

Always coming with those questions and Natalie's comments about curiosity, can uncover by asking those questions. Not only can it uncover whether there is a match, but it also can uncover when that lightning strikes of that connection, something that can be fostered for future opportunity.

AD: Thank you for that. 

NN: Can I build on that a little bit?

AD: Oh, for sure.

NN: Because maybe it's because I'm an African-American woman, I have a background in anthropology and fashion, I think we have to revisit that phrase 'culture fit'. It can be a very coded phrase in my experience.

AD: Okay.

DD: Good point.

NN: It's often a place of privilege to be able to wind up in a company that is a total fit. I think for most of us that's really, really rare. I just wanted to add my perspective that instead of thinking about... Having a slight paradigm shift, instead of it being a culture fit, it's about a culture add. I actually first learned that phrase from Danielle Lessler. Just want to shout out to her and credit her for that because it's so succinctly framed what my experiences have been. 

I just wanted to recommend that it's been my experience that rarely will you get a job by answering a help wanted ad. Number one, they're putting the ad out because legally they are bound to do that so they don't show bias. The way you get a job is by not only by who you know, but by people knowing about you. Fundamentally it goes back to part of what Diane said, it's about network and the best way to build your network especially when you're starting out, is by informational interviewing. I can share a link later about an Ink article I wrote about that.

It's easier to get a job when you have a job. I have experienced that one must take one's hands off one's hips, get the job, hustle as you referenced, Amy. It might be your side hustle, it might be something that you're doing, the apprenticeship model. When you are not doing your dream job and you're still interviewing and you're still networking, number one you show off a very different level of energy, you don't show up desperate. 

You also show a type of work ethic. It says a lot about a person that you were working along steadily in something. Even though it wasn't your dream thing that you wanted to do and over on the side you were steadily building this other part of your practice, it speaks volumes about your character, your drive, and your commitment to your dreams.

I can't emphasize that enough, that we have to be adaptive. It's part of the way I define creativity which is about toggling between wonder and rigor to solve problems. The rigor is often very steadfast, very rudimentary. It's not sexy, it's very solitary, and it is fundamental as is the wonder. But, it's not only about the wonder. It's the wonder and the rigor that we have to practice in a very intentional way and designing your life and your career. That's your first opportunity, start doing that.

AD: I love that, and thank you for helping us adjust our language. Culture add is much more relevant to today and makes a lot more sense. I really appreciate that. I don't want to end this conversation before we talk quickly about presentation. By that I mean there's the portfolio, resume, cover letter. Then we also have presentation in an interview and how you conduct that, and then also before you even get to that place there's probably going to be presentation online in your online presence and people will see that.

Since that's the area that is maybe the first touchpoint, why don't we all just add what you have to say about online presence and then we'll head straight into the Q&A. 

DD: Your online presence, which is the combination of your portfolio, which also typically includes your resume, which also includes not only things like do you have a LinkedIn profile and what is your social media presence, but it's how you interact. Our research shows that the majority of employers have passed on employees because of something they found in their online presence. Much like the care that you take in putting on your resume, putting on your portfolio, putting on your Instagram page, that you're equally as careful about your 360 degree brand. Googling yourself, taking a look at what conversations are you engaged in.

I loved what Natalie said, it's not just who you know, but what they know about you I think is what you said, Natalie. A lot of that is based on your interaction online. So, if you are actively engaged in organizations, if you've done the side hustle that Rosanne speaks to, that says something about you. If you've volunteered and been engaged, engage online as well because that's part of your brand. 

I would also caution or advise rather to tap into a mentor or someone else who can look at your brand objectively from an outside perspective and give you feedback as if an employer. Not just have them review your resume, have them review your portfolio. Look to your professors, look to your mentors, but look holistically at your 360 brand because it really matters. It says a lot about you.

AD: You never get a second chance to make a first impression, right? So frequently now that first impression is what people think of you when they encounter you online. It really is that important, but I also think it's an opportunity to show your character, your spirit, and to elaborate on some of your thought processes.

DD: And your individuality, right? That can come through, which doesn't often times come through on say, a resume as an example.

RS: I would just really quickly emphasize the incredible importance of scrubbing your social media accounts. It can really be shocking how things can backfire in a very unintended way. It's so important to really think about every presence that is someone can find on you online as being something that you are not embarrassed about or regret. It's hard to do, but so much social world now is online for students graduating and it's a good time to sort of take out the eraser before you put yourself out there and make sure that anyone could look at your social media life and you wouldn't be embarrassed by it.

AD: Thank you. Let's move into the Q&A and try and get as many questions in before we have to close. The first question is for President Somerson. You had mentioned how big firms have integrated design teams in-house. Are you seeing new areas and fields where designers will be needed and creative thinking required and valued?

RS: Yes, I think the fact that design is not any longer thought of in a more traditional definition of presentation, communication, product development, but is really seen a conceptual frame means that almost every industry is looking to design. We have students, alumni working in the medical industry, the real estate industry, the insurance industry, the financial world, venture capital. These are all companies that are coming to our portfolio days to recruit students and when I talk to recruiters they say that they're looking for people that can move their business into new directions and new realms.

To Natalie's point of culture add as well, a lot of companies are in the process of reinvention. They don't know how to do it, so they're looking for a perspective that can actually help them to understand themselves differently and to advance who they are. I don't know, when I think of the several hundred companies that come to our portfolio days, the number or the percentage of them that are pure design firms in the traditional sense, is shrinking every single year.

AD: Here's another question: I've heard from a lot of professionals that their career trajectories are attributed to a lot of right place, right time moments. What advice do you have in creating these moments of opportunity for ourselves? Are there networking events you know of that are happening right now?

NN: I'm a big proponent of 90% of success is showing up. That has been my experience and it's super, super, super great advice. For example, right now we are in quarantine; we are confined to a lot of digital interfaces, but show up to free webinars that are outside your comfort zone. Practice lateral thinking. Don't just show up.

You just heard the range of sectors and industries that are interested in hiring people with design capabilities and have a really heightened creative competency. Show up to free webinars that are being offered by interesting conferences that you would have never thought to attend, especially when they have kind of break out room moments. Ask a question; be curious about following up with someone.

Once we move into our next normal and we have much more interpersonal human interaction, you never know who you're going to meet on the elevator ride up or at the grapes and cheese station where the hors d'oeuvres are, but you must show up. That's rooted to your curiosity, that's rooted in your ability to stay buoyant. But I think it's fundamental; you have got to show up.

Go to your go-to design associations, whatever. If you're a graphic design, industrial design, IDSA, AIG, etc. But, also DMI and international ones. Now there's nothing stopping you if you're based in the Philippines to check out something going on in Mexico City, and if you're based in Philly where I am, to check out something going on in San Diego or New Zealand. There's nothing stopping you from exploring that.

DD: Amy, if I could add on as you putting yourself out there. There are far more virtual events than ever before that are far more accessible at little to no cost again than ever before. To Natalie's point, above and beyond participating and showing up, oftentimes those speakers are far more accessible to you now as well, not only asking a question, but connecting. Connecting with those industry leaders and fostering a conversation and fostering that network.

I've found that to be far more impactful than ever before. I think part of it is not just putting yourself out there and creating an opportunity, but simply recognizing an opportunity when it's presented to you. Some of the best career advice that I got over 25 years ago was from actually our current CEO who said some of the most successful people in life it's not necessarily about their pedigree or what they did although academia is really important, it's about those that recognize an opportunity when it's presented and go for it.

Opportunities are presented to you all the time. If you put yourself out there, to Natalie's point, you engage, you connect with people, then it's about seeing the signs of an opportunity and being open to exploring it.

AD: Thank you. I just want to add one thing for the introverts out there. Sometimes it's showing up, people will start to recognize you. You don't even have to speak up. They will recognize your face, they will see the interest, they will remember your name from the Zoom and you will have that information in your head. If you ever get a private moment to talk to that person or somebody else, you'll be able to engage in an informed conversation because you were there paying attention. This isn't necessarily about how outgoing and charismatic you are, it's about how curious you are as Natalie said.

We've got one more question: Any tip on how to efficiently communicate the soft skills we have and that customer needs but they still don't know they need? What are some tips and language and signalling that you can do to just remind people that they need what you've got?

NN: Be curious about their problems. Try to get into their world. Try to ask questions and frame questions that get them to paint a picture of... A couple of examples: What are the two biggest challenges your leadership team is facing coming through Covid-19? I love this question because it's such a wonky question: If you were going to make things worse and fill in the blank, what would you do? Not what would you do to make things better, but if you were going to make things worse, what would you do?

They've just painted you a road map for what not to do, and then you can begin to, if they're interested and curious and they said I don't know why’d you ask me that question or what do you think about that. Right? But, don't push; pull so that you can begin to have communication. Don't start to try to be impressive, ask questions to understand to try to inch your way a bit more into their world and to understand from their perspective what's keeping them up at night and what gets them out of bed in the morning.

DD: I think Natalie raises a really important point which is the most important of the interview is at the end when they say do you have any questions. I've interviewed hundreds of people and those are the moments when I decide who I want to hire and it's because they ask questions that make me think and I think this person could really be a valuable contributor to whatever work we're trying to do.

It's that notion, that old adage of show; don't tell to demonstrate how you think. Make it really apparent and do it in a surprising part which is at the end when they think that they've interviewed you, and in fact that's really the key part of the interview.

AD: That is a beautiful thing to end on. Great food for thought. Thank you so much for joining us here today. I want to thank President Somerson, Natalie Nixon, and Diane Domeyer for their invaluable insights and for all the good work you're doing in the world. Of course, huge thanks to WantedDesign, the organizers of this talk and the WantedDesign Online International Schools Show. 

Hey, thanks for listening. To view the WantedDesign Online International Schools Show, visit wanteddesign.online. To read the show notes, click the link in the details of this episode on your podcast app, or go to Cleverpodcast.com where you can also sign up for our newsletter. Subscribe to Clever on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you would please do us a favor if you like Clever, rate and review, it really does help people find us. We also love chatting with you on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, you can find us at Clever Podcast and you can find me at Amy Devers. Clever is produced by 2VDE Media with editing by Rich Stroffolino, production assistance from Ilana Nevins and Anouchka Stephan and music by El Ten Eleven. Clever is proudly  distributed by Design Milk. 

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Diane Domeyer

Natalie Nixon

Rosanne Somerson

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Clever is produced by 2VDE Media. Thanks to Rich Stroffolino for editing this episode.
Production assistance from Ilana Nevins and music by El Ten Eleven—hear more on Bandcamp.
Shoutout to Jenny Rask for designing the Clever logo.

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