C.D.C BLOG WEEK 11: Selling Yourself

Week 11 was all about how you can promote yourself as a designer, how can you create a portfolio to showcase your skills, conduct a good interview and build a network for your professional career

We began on a reflection on ourselves to look again at what makes us a product designer.

Likes and dislikes in design now my journey what’s my plan how it begins. An aspect of design of grown to appreciate has to be the group discussion how much of an increase in productivity and ideas come from even two designers facing an issue in comparison to one. Being deprived of desired studio time and face to face group discussions has been massive to me personally during this past year of the pandemic. I strongly dislike the essence of negative judgment in the design world. everyone has their own niche and style and the disregarding of someone’s passion or if no respect is shown , there is no space for it and while it is rarely seen it is not unheard of.

To expand on that point I cant say for certain what path ill take or where that journey will take me I’m still testing the waters of the design pool. One thing I know for sure I will most certainly be pursuing something I’m passionate about and have an interest in. I also hope I can travel the world and not be bound to one area at least not for my beginning years.

And when does my journey start? It already has,

The task for the class that day was a group assembly booklet on how to improve cv or interview which was the other aspect of the class we touched on. My task was to put together a quick few slides on how to make a good first impression going for an interview. I felt confident. The core points I focused on was confidence always be sure of yourself and project that not only inside yourself but onto the world around you the first thing a person notices is your demeanour and confidence is attractive especially to potential employers, another aspect of confidence is appearance. Step correct. Dress to the suited setting and be professional . its always better to be overdressed than underdressed. Research is also paramount do the background work on employer or company. thell most likely ask you what you know so make sure you know a lot.

Personally I have no problem with interview preparation during my gap year after my leaving cert I worked in multiple industry and had to do interviews for all of them. Id consider my interview and first impression to be good and hope to use such a skill to my advantage not only for the upcoming co- op programme but in the pursuance of my professional career as well.