Personal Development - Graphic Designer
- Gabrielle Vebryzky
- Jun 9, 2021
- 14 min read
Updated: Jun 11, 2021
Guest Lectures:
Christa Linggar (SOSJ)
Notes:
How to build a studio:
Set the roles for each person - The roles set for each person is done along the way according to their skills.
Choosing the right partners
Your partner should be:
Someone you can trust and respect
Someone you look up to
Someone to build your life and dream with
It is important because finding the right partner defines the future of the business.
Do not be afraid to start
People are considered the most valuable asset in the creative industry. Because of that, there are more ups and downs involving people themselves.
More brains, more creativity
More ideas, more thoughts, etc
More brains, more opinions and disagreements
Due to having opinions, people may be faced with disagreements with one another.
Lesser brains, lesser problem, lesser experience
Dealing with one person in different compared to dealing with 3 people
How to get clients?
Power of connection
Build as much connections as possible. In the future they may bring a benefit for the business.
Trust and credibility
Building trust and credibility with your client could result in good words to spread (mouth to mouth) around, bringing in more clients.
How do I maintain them?
Treating a friend
Treat the clients as a friend to create a sense of having personal connections.
How to build a team?
Form a solid team (small or big → depends on preference)
Stay on each role
Respect each and everyone’s role, if its not your side of the business, have little to no say to it
Understand people
Every single person is different, therefore it is better to understand them and their preferences, allowing you to work well with others.
Respect differences
Know their strength and uniqueness
Communication is key: Through communication, the team would become more solid and grow closer with one another.
Travelling could provide inspirations and references for future projects. It could also upgrade your taste in design.
Be a positive person. It is the key to a successful business, projects, etc.
Business is not only about money. It is important, however, it is not more important than your mental health and well-being.
Things I learn:
There are a lot of things we need to consider to create the best workplace.
Connections are also one of the key factors in gaining clients.
It is important to be open and try a variety of design techniques.
Being positive could greatly impact our future.
Do not sacrifice your mental and physical health for your work. Money is not the only important thing in business.
Essay:
In setting up a business, it is always important to find the right person to do start a business with. To determine whether one has the right partner, the person must be someone that you trust and respect, you look up to, and someone to build your life and dream with. These factors are essential as it will affect the future of your business. Once you have a partner or group of people to start the business, set a role for each member. In order to do this, one must assess the skills and weaknesses of the members to determine the perfect position for them.
In a business that is a part of the creative industry, the most valuable asset is people. As the business continues to grow, it may experience fluctuations and this is most likely caused by people themselves. Therefore, it is always a necessity to set the right size when building a team. More people in the group means more ideas and creativity, however, this may also cause more problems and conflicts due to contrasting opinions.
Once a solid team is formed, always remember to stay on your specific role and responsibilities. By doing this, the responsible member may feel a sense of respect and less conflict may occur, resulting in a stronger bond between the members of the business. Apart from that, always try to understand people. Growing up in different families and different mindsets may affect the bond between the members. For this reason, mutual understanding and respect are important in running the business.
Gaining clients are one of the important factors in running a business. There are a few ways to get clients and increase the number of potential customers for the business. First, always build your connection. Building connections may bring potential clients to the business, helping it to grow even more. Second, always maintain good product quality. By building trust and credibility in the business, the clients may spread the word and give good reviews for the business. As a result, this may bring more clients in the future.
Other than gaining clients, it is always important to have a loyal customer base—or maintaining the clients. To do this, treat the client as your friend. By doing this, it will create a sense of personal connections between the business and the clients. In the end, this will result in a loyal customer base.
Other than the factors mentioned above, there is a variety of key factors for the growth of the business in the creative industry. One of the main factors in building a strong bond is communication. By communicating with one another, the team would grow closer and create a sense of mutual understanding, resulting in a stronger bond to be formed. Another important factor is having a good taste in design. It is essential for businesses in the creative industry to have unlimited references and inspirations. Therefore, travelling could be one of the ways to provide new inspirations and references for future projects.
Vina Ameilya (K.A.L.A. Studio)
KALA Studio mainly uses e-commerce to sell their products, however, KALA Studios still had to do some orders manually (through WA) for customers who are older.
CEO Roles and Responsibilities:
Create and implementing new design strategies
Researching and incorporating new trends in the fashion industry
Collaborating with the management team and strategic business partner
Create and implementing collection launching plan
Overseeing day-today operations
Review the financial reports
Product:
Concept
Act as a canvas for the artists’ artwork
Creating Prints
Brainstorming on how the artpiece could be made into prints/fabrics
Sampling
Sample the style, quality and prints.
Brand Positioning
Determine the key message of the collection
Marketing:
Engagement in social media
Could be done through Instagram story, Instagram TV, or Instagram LIVE with other brands or artists
The result from collaboration with well-known artists
Their loyal customer/follower base would come to know of the collaboration and collection.
The result from collaboration with other brands
Able to reach out to different target market (different brand → different target market)
Launching plan
Mandatory: Newsletter, Lookbook, Catalog, press release, Facebook business catalog, Instagram business, and design in the website.
Innovation
Always open for new marketing ideas (e.g. TikTok)
Things I learn:
Always be open to new business strategies.
Collaborating with different brands/artists allows businesses to reach a different target market.
Continuously research on trends and the current market.
Essay:
Innovation is an essential factor in the growth of a business. As the world continues to change, there are more ways to innovate and improve on the structures of the business. However, it is always important to not neglect the older ways of running the business. One example includes having a website to sell products. While the younger generation may be aware and easily use the website, the older generations may have problems in using it. Therefore, it is important to provide different alternatives that will cater to the needs of both the older and younger generations.
Trends affect businesses today. From marketing to production, studying the trends would greatly benefit the business itself. Newer social media such as TikTok, which is still on trend today, could be used to boost the business’ exposure to the public. Hence, being open to new business strategies could help in the growth of the business.
A business could only touch a few groups of target markets. Consequently, the business may not reach its full potential due to limited exposure. In order to overcome this problem, K.A.L.A. Studio collaborates with different brands to reach a new target market and increase their brand exposure. By doing this, more people would be aware of the brand, leading to more potential customers for the business itself.
Another way K.A.L.A. Studio gain more brand exposure is by collaborating with different artists and putting their artwork into wearable products. When doing this, they mainly focus on being a canvas for the artist and turning their artwork into prints or fabrics. Once the product is done, sampling is done to ensure that their product is of great quality to build the trust and credibility of the customers. Finally, they determine the key message of the collection.
All the things mentioned above is considered as an innovative way of marketing. By creating a social media presence, collaborating with well-known artists and brands, and creating a launching plan for the business themselves would establish a loyal customer base, as well as potential customers.
From this, I learned that businesses should constantly improve and innovate their business strategies in order to achieve full business exposure. By being open to new strategies, there could be more customers who could be a part of the loyal customer base in the future. Collaborating with different artists and brands, the business is able to touch different target markets that they have never been able to reach. However, to do all this, studying trends and the current market is an important part to ensure the growth of the business. Even though new strategies may emerge in the future, always ensure that the needs of customers of all ages and generations are able to be satisfied through customer service and business strategies.
Ngah Muli Ong & Tatiana Romanova Surya (DesignLab)
Design is no longer about who you are, it’s more of a problem solving mechanism to satisfy the customers’ wants and needs, based on their target market, identity and branding.
It is important to pay attention to the main message of the product while considering the technical aspect (size, placement, visibility, color production, and a clear image/imagery of the product).
The design is created in a way to attract the target markets’ attention.
Things I learn:
Designs are made to convey a message to the public.
Different target market requires different designs to attract their attention
The image/imagery of the product should be clear when making a packaging.
What is your business goal?
We would like DesignLab to be the go-to-packaging company. The first name that comes to mind when thinking about packaging.
How do you gain customers/clients? What form of promotion techniques did you use?
One of the best marketing you can do is taking every project as your masterpiece. One happy client could lead to another 2 or 3. Best marketing tool portfolio. Create easy to navigate website, be present in the social scene. Personal approach could lead to potential clients when meeting in daily life. Build network. If you’re working in the team it would be better to assign someone to communicate with clients, etc.
Essay:
Today, design is used as a medium to satisfy the wants and needs of the customers of the business. There are several factors that could be used to identify the wants and needs of the customers. First, the target market of the business greatly affects the way to approach the customers. Each target market have their own needs and wants, characteristics, interests, and many other factors that differs from other groups. Therefore, it would be suitable for the business to study their target market. Another factor is identifying the business’ identity and branding. The way the business carries themselves affects the image of the business. With this, it is always important to recognise these factors before creating a design for different businesses.
Once the target market, branding, and identity of the business has been taken into account, pay attention to the main message of the product before designing. However, the technical aspect in the production should be taken into consideration when creating the design. The design should also be appealing to the target market.
This situation could be taken from the operations of DesignLab, a company founded in Jakarta in 1998 that create designs involving visual communication. DesignLab focuses on finding and creating the suitable designs that would fit their clients’ needs and wants in a way that would satisfy their target market. This could be seen from the way DesignLab work with one of their well-known clients, Pop Mie.
The main objective for the stated event is to create a suitable design for the limited edition Pop Mie with three unique flavors as a way to support the Asian Games. To do this, DesignLab needs to analyze the branding and identity of Pop Mie, as well as their main target market and their characteristics and interests; along with the technical aspect of the production.
After taking everything into account, DesignLab was able to create the ideal Pop Mie design that was able to convey their message across while portraying the spirit, enthusiasm, playfulness, and dynamicity of the Asian Games event.
From this, I learn about the significance of design in the business industry. The case study was able to clarify the idea of how designs should be able to carry the company’s branding and identity and convey the main message without altering it. Moreover, I learn how important it is to study the target market, clients’ business, as well as the trends or events to create the appropriate design.
Christine Chai (CAVA Prive)
CAVA Prive → Sells custom wedding shoes
Work with fashion designers (clothing) in fashion shows
Collaborate with hardware accessories
There are some shoes that are created to fit casual wears as well
Making shoes requires various knowledge such as sewing, fabrics, fabric manipulation, machines, etc.
How many people is in the team at first? How do you divide the jobs for each person?
Working in H&M doesn’t immediately provide the entire funds for opening a business. It requires constant savings. The funds are first used for buying materials and hiring an artisan/handyman (?) The team originally only have 3 people.
Funds:
Trials and error
Materials
Hiring
Packaging
Monthly payments
Instagram ads
Building portfolio: Released one collection → 5 designs
Uniqueness: custom size and made to fit the feet nicely (custom based on the person’s feet)
It is important to understand the team’s capabilities to keep the credibility of the company.
Ready to wear shoes are made for those who prefer a simple wedding (no custom), however, there are more orders for custom shoes.
Things I learn:
Prepare mentally
If one path does not work out, there is always another way.
It is important to know the strength and weaknesses (capabilities and skills) to ensure the quality → affects the company’s credibility.
Essay:
Cava Prive has become one of the well-known businesses that sell custom-made wedding shoes. They have worked with different fashion designers in fashion shows, and collaborate with hardware accessories. However, starting this business was not easy. At the start of this business, Cava Prive sells ready-to-wear shoes that result in a loss due to the funds needed for the collections. In order to avoid the situation from becoming even worse, Cava Prive begins using a new business strategy, making custom wedding shoes. With this, Cava Prive experienced growth in the business.
There are several factors in which benefits Cava Prive as they successfully change their business strategy. One of the most beneficial factors that come with changing their business plan is how there is no excess stock when making the shoes. As they create the custom-made shoes, Cava Prive was able to accurately use the right amount of funds for the production of the shoes. This results in no-to-little excess materials, making them save more money for future use.
Another beneficial factor is the decrease is in the number of funds used to hire extra workers. Selling custom-made shoes allow the workers to focus on their role without being too burdened with the large amounts of shoes having to be made. This could also benefit the workers as it improves their skills as they are continuously being challenged with new designs.
Even though there are advantages to the new business strategy, being a custom-made shoe brand also has its disadvantages. Custom-made products require extra care and skill in order to fulfil the buyers’ demands and expectations. Other than the products being one of the problems, treating the clients or miscommunication could also be one of the main cause of conflicts between the client and the designer.
Cava Prive has had many experiences with treating different clients. Even though each client was treated the same and proper way, some may find the way they were treated was improper. Not only that, some clients may even find or cause problems on the simplest things and not cooperate with the designer. This could lead to a far bigger dispute, therefore, one of the ways Cava Prive deal with this problem is to be selective in their clients.
From the experiences Cava Prive has gone through, I learned that there is always an alternative way to grow your business if the original path did not work out. Another important lesson is to know the strengths and weaknesses of the members of the business. With this, the quality of the product, as well as the customer service could be ensured to have a great quality, which positively affects the company’s credibility. The last thing I learned is to be mentally prepared when meeting new clients, as well as maintain a work-life balance. Due to their different backgrounds and mindsets, they may react in a certain way which we may not be expecting. Therefore, it is okay to be selective in choosing your clients.
Alvin Tanthio (Business advisor and HR Professional Consultant)
Creative Industry
The creative industry has contributed 7.44% to the Indonesian economy
Core Skills:
4 Types of Learning Styles:
Visual
Auditory
Kinesthetic
Reading/Writing Preference
Entrepreneurship/Entrepreneurial Mindset
Business Model Canvas:
Essay:
Learning agility refers to utilizing our experience and learning to face new challenges. By heaving this agility, it could improve our leadership skills. There are 5 aspects included as a part of learning agility. There are change agility, mental agility, people agility, result agility, and self-awareness agility.
Change agility refers to the idea of curiosity, experimenting, and trying new things. With this agility, people would be able to be daring to try new things. By having the change agility, it is possible for the business to begin creating new business strategy, products, or solving business problems. This could result in a positive output for the business itself.
Mental agility refers to complexity, new ideas, and being analytical. This skill allows people to learn and analyze different situations and problems. With this people could find a way to solve the issues the business may face by using their critical thinking skills, as well as their analytical skills.
People agility provides the ability to understand people, being constructive towards others, as well as being open to new culture and ideas. By having this agility, people would be able to feel included and respected, which could also result in the strengthening of the bonds with one another. Moreover, this allows people to feel understood and fewer conflicts may occur. Being constructive to others would allow people to help others improve. With this, people would greatly appreciate and understand the feedbacks given to them and it may help them improve. Another important aspect is being open to new cultures and ideas. This allows new ideas to be formulated and respect to be shared amongst members. Due to the different cultures and perspective people have, this skill would positively influence the group as a whole.
Result agility refers to being ambitious, self-confident, and goal-oriented. Having result agility allows the business to reach its fullest potential, as well as the products and service produced. This is caused by being goal-oriented. With the desire to reach a certain goal, people with this agility tends to be ambitious. Another important factor needed to fulfil in having this agility is to be self-confident in the choices made.
Self-awareness agility lets people know themselves and reflect on their actions. This is an important trait as being self-aware in their actions, wants, and needs could affect the business. However, if these abilities were not used properly, it could also be the downfall of the business itself. Being self-critical allows people to examine their choices, their works, and action. This will allow them to constantly improve their skills, as well as character. Being a development-oriented person may also greatly benefit the future of the business as they strive to continuously develop and improve for their business and character.
Professional Development Plan:
Being professional is fulfilling the work standard (e.g. being a morning person, being formal, etc)
It is important to have a work-life balance
Follow the professional standard
Different company have different professional standard
What does professional actually mean?
Dressing smartly at work, or doing a good job
Having advanced degrees or other certifications, framed and hung on office wall
All these are being professional, but it covers even more.
What’s your purpose in life?
Vision → what you want to be, Mission → what you do to achieve your vision
Mission and vision is connected
Goals are short-term objectives that supports mission and vision (steps to achieve the vision)
Vision: I want to enjoy life while inspire people/future designers.
Mission: To create a signature, as well as unique designs that inspire people.
Feedback
Be more detailed in the vision and mission
Further explain the definition of unique
Revised
Vision: I want to enjoy life while inspiring and motivating people/future designers to create their own artworks/designs through my works.
Mission: To develop a signature style of design with a unique identity that would inspire people.
Top 5 Skills Requirement & Audit (Technical and Soft):
Feedback
Change persistence to agility
Revised
SWOT Analysis:
S.M.A.R.T Objectives:
Graduate from UIC College in 2022
Go to university in the UK in 2022/23
Apply for an internship in 2023/24
Earn Master Degree in 2024/25
Feedback
Be more specific in the details for example:
Graduate from BTEC HND in Graphic Design from UIC College in 2022
Go to university in the UK for Bachelor of Graphic Design in 2022
Complete my Bachelor of Graphic Design from a UK university in 2023
For an internship, you need to be specific about what type of work you want to do, for examples Attain an internship in a UK Graphic Designer house in 2023
Start my work as a Graphic Designer in 2024
Earn my Master of Arts from A UK University in 2025
Find 1 more objective, probably start your own agency in 2030
Revised
Graduate from BTEC HND in Graphic Design UIC College in 2022
Go to university in the UK for Bachelor Degree in 2022
Apply for an internship for graphic design in the UK in 2023
Complete the Bachelor of Arts (Hons) Graphic Design in 2023
Earn Master’s Degree in Graphic Design in 2024
Begin working in the UK as a graphic designer in 2024
Final Revision
Vision Board:
Feedback:
Some writings in the vision board is hard to read
Use tables for the skills audit
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