Design Education – is Change Happening?

I gave a talk to around 50 students at Bury College this week, the students were from 2 BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma courses, one in Art and Design and the other in Interactive Media. The purpose of the talk was to help them understand how an agency operates, what a career in design is like and what the future may hold for the design industry (as I see it).

I started by explaining how I got in to graphics, starting with a Diploma in Art & Design at Blackburn School of Art before choosing to focus on Design & Advertising at Salford University. I took them on a 1 slide journey of my design career path before talking about how & why Clock was launched. We spent some time discussing the importance of strategy, planning & process to ensure design success. Before looking at changes in the industry and the impact this may have on designers of the future.

Problem solving first, aesthetics later

The key message I wanted to deliver was about design being about solving problems – in our case, often business issues.  I took them through our own ClockWise™ process where our brand diagnosis tools help uncover the real issues facing a business. The importance of understanding a clients objectives, the audience and developing a single-minded proposition before starting to design cannot be under estimated, something I knew very little of when I entered the industry.

I was very pleasantly surprised by their response to the talk, their questions demonstrated they are already starting to think about where they might fit in to an agency and what their career path might look like. They showed how they are starting to think about audiences through some of their project work, if they are doing this at Diploma level then there are strong signs over the next few years that they will be able to think through challenging client briefs in the future.

Where are we headed?

Talking about changes in the industry and the influence social is having on the world and the design industry, I touched on the importance of them understanding the media landscape – and embracing it. I asked them if they are using social media to reach out to the design industry and start to build relationships with other designers and agency owners and was amazed to find the vast majority weren’t.

It occurred to me afterwards how cut-off design students can sometimes be from industry and yet how easy it now is to access the industry now. I feel design & media students need to understand they are in the communications industry, design is one element of communication and one which they often hide behind. For them to be employable they have to start mastering the art of communication, which means they need to use all means of communication they can to reach their audience; social media, telephones, direct mail, digital, events to name a few. When they asked me about how to get in front of agencies, my response was “not email” and “don’t send me a PDF” – be creative, be communicative. Take the time to understand what makes Clock tick, create something that talks to me about what you have to offer, rather than sending a blanket email with a 12 page PDF of work attached. I want to be inspired by the future talent, I want to understand what they could bring to Clock and why they want to speak to us specifically. Follow up on the telephone – demonstrate you know how to talk and follow through your piece of communication, rather than hiding behind an email.
What, if anything should agencies do?

So if that’s what I recommend a student does to stand out and approach us, what do students want from agencies? Well apart from the obvious questions I got about “is there a job?” I think as an industry we need to give up our time to go to colleges and universities and maybe even schools, to help them understand how our industry works, what we want and expect from students and start them on the journey to problem solving.

There is still a massive amount education needs to do to reach out to industry and as this is now being championed by Government, there’s a chance change might happen. In the meantime, if you are in the industry or client-side, get in touch with your local college or university and get involved with changing perceptions, I think you might be pleasantly surprised.

Salford University Design Futures and Design Management Degree course students are doing some exciting things at the moment to engage with industry. Here is a video of an event they recently held. http://vimeo.com/24328954

Ann Rimmer – Director of Strategy at Clock Creative