From In-house Design ~ Topics: inhouse issues
Centaurs, RoboCop and the X-Men...
Like all characters from Greek mythology, comic books and movie sagas that combine man and animal, alien or machine, we in-house designers, though endowed with special strengths, constantly wrestle with two competing halves of our psyches. We must be intuitive yet logical, unique yet conformist, artistic yet technical. With one foot in the creative universe and the other in the world of business and finance, our workplaces demand that we be of two minds and spirits, much like those fictional counterparts.
Clearly, differing demands and an accompanying mindset can coexist—and when there is synergy between the two, amazing achievements occur. But the going can be difficult and we need specific talents, skill sets and dispositions to succeed.
Alex Murphy, aka RoboCop, woke up from surgery with superhuman, bionic appendages that were of absolutely no use to him until he could be trained in their use. Whether we’ve taken the design or business school route to our in-house careers, most of us need additional training for our alter egos, too. For the design grads this means taking courses in business-related disciplines. For the business majors, design classes are in order. The types of training available range from one and two day seminars to adult education classes offered by local colleges, art schools and universities. Some in-house creatives have gone back to school for graduate degrees in complimentary areas of study. Be aware that in order to capitalize on the dormant strengths you have waiting in your other half—be it the creative or the business side—without taking advantage of these many options, you will never discover your true potential in the corporate environment.
Unlike the X-Men (and women), we don’t have the luxury of wallowing in a state of alienated seclusion. Anyone who thinks that in-house design allows us to hide safely behind our 20-inch monitors, avoiding the salesmen and bean counters, has been sorely misled. There are no account execs in the in-house universe. We need powerful, effective written and verbal communication skills to sell our concepts to administrative philistines, keep our non-design co-workers clear about our needs and progress, and educate upper management on the value of good design. Training and on-the-job experience contribute to our success in this area.
Human intelligence coupled with the strength of a horse made centaurs powerful creatures. But I’ll bet they never had to multitask. Many in-house departments don’t have a traffic manager, forcing us designers to use our right brains in the concepting and design of our projects and employ our left brains in the management of our jobs. Our responsibilities include client and vendor contact, scheduling, art directing, quoting, pre-flighting and archiving our files. In-house groups would do well to standardize and document those processes to ensure consistent performance and boost efficiency.
The off-screen technical know-how that has brought many hybrid characters to life onscreen is another prerequisite for our success in the world of corporate design. Though we’re creative problem solvers who need to apply innovative solutions to difficult marketing requests, we have to master the often technologically intensive tools necessary to complete the job. Sorry to sound like a broken MP3 player, but training is paramount. We all need to stay current on the software and hardware we use to do our jobs.
Finally, let’s address the angst that afflicts our fictional peers. Give it up. It may make for good literature, but it has no place in the corporate marketplace. A good attitude is often cited by upper management as more important than talent. We need to maintain a positive, professional and supportive persona. Believe me, we’ll all have more fun and create better work if we opt for the relatively stable Superman alter ego. Batman never got the girl, and who wants to live in a cave anyway?
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Hi Andy,
I think your stance on training being a solution to the 'jack-of-all-trades' nature of an in-house design job is missing a key point.
Have you considered here that being part of an in-house design job means, (I would imagine) contrary to your design firm counterparts, that you are NOT surrounded by other designers? If your peers don't understand what "designer" means, they are going to be a bit off the mark sometimes with what they request of you. For example, an interaction designer getting asked to design artwork for a print piece or to write actual code for software interfaces, or a graphic artist being asked to design icons for a UI or write HTML/CSS. A lot of designers' skills do bleed a bit outside of the center of their expertise, so some of the examples above are quite do-able by some of the designer-types I gave examples of but it is also perfectly reasonable to not expect these types of designers to be able to take on those sort of tasks.
I think that a missing piece here then, of special significance to in-house designers, is that you shouldn't blindly take up training where you may be lacking, but also make sure your peers understand what exactly it is that you do and what your expertise is! If I ask my auto mechanic to help me with my boat, and he isn't quite able to figure out the issue, does that mean he needs to go get training on servicing boats, or does it mean I need to go see a boat mechanic? :)
I think it can be detrimental to try to fulfill every request you get no matter how outside of your focus it is rather than also making the effort to make sure your role is clearly defined, because then:
(1) What you should be focusing on can suffer because you're increasing your breadth rather than honing the depth of your craft;
(2) You're performing the tasks that are out of your focus anyway, so the need to get additional help to specialize in that function will continue to go unnoticed. Management will likely be unmotivated to hire in folks to specialize in those areas if the job is getting done, even if it's getting done suboptimally.
I think #2 might be especially important to avoid working in-house, since design is not the core focus of your company so it's likely not going to be optimized for, even if you're getting by with only mediocre results (mediocre because you're so overstretched! :) )
Anyway, I just figured maybe this other perspective might help add to the dialogue here. I'm very glad you've started this series of articles because there are a lot of us in-house designers whose issues often get overlooked in discussions about the practice of design. Thanks! -
We face these same issues. It's an excellent point that Mairin raises. Challenges such as "porting" design across mediums such as print-to-web, and vica-versa. Print designers would like complete control, and often lock horns with the web design team, who also want control. We work hard to iron these issues out, but often end up with compromises, or quick fixes.
These challenges can only be resolved if your managment "gets it". If management understands the role of senior designers or creative directors clearly, and that they should have authority over ALL design.
For in-house, this is large issue. Many in-house design groups are treated like a fast food "drive-up" window, placing an order with no one over-seeing or auditing design results.
We must try to highlight these problems as they occur, in hopes of convincing the authoritative power to entrust creative direction to a design leader. Unfortunately, there is no silver bullet.
As for training, I do agree with Andy, that it's important to cross train. We find it helpful for our print designers to understand what the web team needs, and vica-versa. I also agree with Mairin, that the technical should be left to specialists, but design should transcend all! -
Mairin & Ivan-In my effort to call out the realities we face as in-house designers I agree I overstated my case. It would be more appropriate to suggest designers have enough of an understanding of other disciplines to be able to intelligently and effectively manage other “specialists” to assist them with their projects. A good analogy would be a general contractor who hires and manages plumbers electricians, carpenters etc. I would envision the designer being a strategic partner/consultant who brings in talent on an as-needed basis depending on the scope of the project.
In terms of business skills, a designer or, more likely, a design department manager, should have enough of a business background to partner effectively with his or her peers in Finance, IT, Human Resources etc. to handle issues in these areas for the creative team.
Thanks for challenging my premise. It’s only through this type of dialog that the best strategies and tactics for in-house designers will reveal themselves. -
Andy thanks for a great post. I have to agree with Máirín as well that often the biggest challenge I face as an inhouse designer at a startup is trying to educate my co-workers, and the executive team, on the types of design work that I can and will perform.
I'm actually wondering if any of you have tips for me on a particularly large challenge I'm facing right now. Our company needs to rebrand desperately. This is something I've been pushing for since I was hired a little less than a year ago. However there is a lot of resistance to it, and fear of "change". Let me be clear that we don't really have a brand now, just a logo from 7 years ago and a few colors. But we do have a name in our particular industry. Do you have any tips for me on how to go about introducing a refined brand to the executive team, in a way that it will be accepted? I have already done some "messaging" workshops with the help of our PR agency and I can use that content to help drive my branding efforts. But what I'm afraid of is the inevitable cycle of reviews that will incur once I present the new brand. In a startup environment, and working as the lone-shark inhouse designer, I have a hard time implementing any sort of process around reviews. Perhaps someone has had experience doing this well?
Thanks for your time
I look forward to more of your posts.
Liz -
Liz,
At my previous job at a Fortune 500 company our in-house team was invited by the senior VP of communications to partner with Landor to work on a corporate rebrand - a once in a lifetime opportunity for an in-house team. Unfortunately, after months of effort the project languished and, as far as I know, has not been revived. The reasons were simple. We did not have access to and full buy-in from the CEO and most importantly he had no ownership of the initiative.
I’m hoping, given that you’re in a start-up, that you have access to the head of your company. If you do, then I would brazenly make an effort to meet with him/her and make a case for the rebrand and your abilities to implement it. (One caveat – you’ll need to be politically nimble if you have to leapfrog your direct manager.) I’d recommend that you make your case by doing the following:
1. Research and present the branding of your competitors. If their branding is substandard you have an opportunity to rebrand and easily differentiate your company from the rest of the pack. If their branding is good then you need to powerfully compete with them from a marketing and PR perspective. Nothing gets upper management moving faster than the belief that their competition is nipping at their heels.
2. Present at least 2 case studies of companies who successfully rebranded themselves and profited from that rebrand.
3. Speak to the marketing goals and objectives of your specific proposal along with messaging and general direction. I’d recommend reading Designing Brand Identity: A Complete Guide to Creating, Building, and Maintaining Strong Brands by Alina Wheeler
4. Present the implementation tactics – what business documents, marketing materials and corporate identity media will need to be updated and how they will be updated.
If you don’t have access to the CEO then you’ll need to get buy-in from your manager and other key stakeholders which, as you noted, can be a difficult process. Here I’d recommend making the case as you would with the CEO, but do it with one stakeholder at a time. Too often in group meetings a negative comment gets thrown out and snowballs with the other members chiming in – this isn’t malicious, it’s just human nature. By using the one-on-one approach you sidestep that hurdle and also make the person you’re presenting to feel special and also believe they partially own the rebrand initiative, And this is the most important point – you have to give the stakeholders, CEO etc. an opportunity to participate and own the process. That means not presenting the rebrand as a fait accompli in your initial meetings and being a good listener who respects but guides the clients.
I hope this helps.
-Andy -
Your article makes perfect sense of the chaos we in-house desigers must endure. The funny thing is, in the positions I've held, inevitably someone will ask me this question "Why can't you just make it the way I want it?" Apparently telepathy, as we all know in the design industry, is required (so say the all-wise employers). We all seem to lack it, though. Perhaps it is just the region I have worked in.
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your post about pitching to the CEO about re-branding is very helpful. I will be doing this in-house for 2009 and was a little intimidated since I'm an entry level. Your short nutshell list makes it sound very doable and good way to get the buy in. I personally think adding as a #5.Show how you will measure results/success of the re-branding/re-positioning over time. For instance increased sales, new clients, positive PR etc. CEO's love and understand numbers.
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