Letter to Upper Quarter Students
Every three months, clockwork, I get the notes from rising seventh-quarter students, suddenly pushing for internships, asking about holes in their portfolios, begging for job contacts. There are specific points of panic (DO I NEED ANOTHER TYPE CLASS?) and generalized anxiety (What if I can’t find a job and have to live in my parents’ basement?).
This time, instead of answering these letters one by one, I’m posting my response here, meant to help you consider these questions from another angle, ponder the idea that you might not be asking the right questions:
Dear (Your Name Here),
Think for a moment. If you are going to represent the many and myriad questions inherent in society, and then support enforcing an economy to foster the fullness of its potential, what is it you want to say? Design and Advertising offer you the opportunity to be that voice within our society.
If you could stand before people and deliver a message, what would it look like? Would it look like all the things that have been said before? Would it look like a status quo? Or would it uniquely reflect your values?
I’ve been reading with great empathy the continuing saga of Edward Kennedy in the news. He has a lot to face. But, I also find it very uplifting to realize all the things he has done over the years and how important that work is… He has hugely influenced health care, education and civil rights. His ethos inspires me.
Wow! What if in your career you could do the same. Yes! in design and advertising. What would it require?
That becomes the question that relates to where we need to go. It’s not a question about another internship. It is not a question of insecurities held via title. And it’s not a question of what someone else has done.
It is a question of what message you’re going to take forward. How can you prove it to the world?
That is about hard work. It is about digging in and doing what needs to be done to have YOUR portfolio speak to some of what it is you want to message- what you want to be understood, what you stand for. After all, a portfolio is about defining or demonstrating a pattern of values that showcases your capability to principle an ethos that will determine the significance of global business in a world where today’s new media is tomorrow’s floppy disc.
And, as you may get that chance to make your influence known, what is it you want noticed—and how? That is what you have to make happen in the next quarter, and in the rest of your life.
Being good will get in the way of being great… but stop for a second and ask, What is great, anyway? And why great? Your portfolio should seek to define itself not in conservation but in impact, and in values that suggest you are consistently open-minded, not averse to change, and in favor of maximum individual liberties—however you see them.
Why? Because all creation comes from conflict, and that produces change.
If you want the opportunities of a future, then start looking inward. Don’t ask if God made the world. Ask, Who made God? That is where the difference lies. That is what you have to share in a portfolio if you want it to be deep down as good as you know it can be.
Your only competition lies in the status quo?
Your imagination is infinite. Imagination comes from things that move you. So? What moves you?
The other day, a student came into my office and was wearing a brand new Boston Red Sox hat, and it moved me. I had to ask him about it, though he should have brought it up first. It was brand new; get it? What was the story? I always wanted to be a major league baseball player when I was young. Nothing was better than pinstrips or the Yankees as a kid growing up. Get it… You have to move people. (By the way, Student: you need to roll the bill.)
To move people, you have to learn to listen really well. You have to learn to see.
It is in the attitude. You have to be brave enough to look at your work truthfully, to consider breaking tradtion- to examine what needs to be conveyed and deliver a best message. You cannot settle for the predictable before considering the options.
It is about taking that extra effort. For instance, recently I saw an upper quarter student, and she told me she just sent her product design off to what some would consider the most expensive place in the country to have a prototype comped… I think, how very smart. She will now be able to convey her message superlatively. Mark my words: others will complain it is too expensive.
Excellence is about doing a little bit more, stretching a little bit further.
So let’s not talk about the distractions that surround advertising, design or things that don’t really matter… let’s talk about doing something and how advertising and design as mediums can enforce that something.
Embrace your creativity… you can do it. Your success will be achieved by growing your strengths, not by eliminating your weakness.
Oh, and have some fun in the process.
Hank.
“Excellence is about doing a little bit more, stretching a little bit further.” I’m going to have to use that to tell clients. Sometimes, they just don’t get it. Growing your strengths…amen, Hank. People recognize strengths. They flock to them. And if they see it in you, they will flock to you. Good luck to impending 7th & 8th quarter students. You will get through it, and it will be one of the happiest moments of your life.
I think this is a great post. So many times we get bogged down with the immediate future ratter than looking at the bigger picture; our ultimate goals. It is easy to loose sight of this in the last couple of quarters at PC. But as Hank said ultimately we are all striving for bigger and better things and that drive in itself is our biggest asset. This is what makes you stand out from the heard. This is what makes you a PC grad.
Thanks for the perspective, Hank, and the encouragement!
(I’m pretty sure I DO need another type class, though)
There have been a handful of times over the past 2 years when I’ve stared blankly at the wall wondering, A) what the hell I’d gotten myself into, B) how I am I going to find myself out of this particular plight, and C) if [professor name here… usually Hank] was serious about doing [huge project here].
The answers always came as follows:
A) A complete change of everything
B) Work as hard as you can, then work a bit harder. After the first 6 quarters, it gets a bit easier.
C) Yes. Always. They are always serious when they ask you to tackle some huge task. It may sound like a joke and they may laugh while saying it, (“Go build a chair, cowboy! haha!”), but they are always serious, and it is always worth it.
“It is about taking that extra effort.”
If you choose not to work as hard as you can, then give it a little more, that is the only way you will find your self in the basement of your parents house.
If you are all about (taking that extra effort) you will find yourself not knowing which job to pick when it comes down to it, and once you have that job, you’ll be asking yourself when should I move onto another opportunity that may or may not lead to your personal ultimate goal.
As Boris said look at the big picture what is your ultimate goal.
The Big Picture is what I am battling with currently, and to me it’s about how deep to I want to take it. You see there will always be jobs to fill, but what is it that you want from that job how does my ultimate goal fit in the big picture.
So how bad do you want that first job, are you willing to work your ass off for it and then give it some more. If you don’t it’s the basement for you!
People always remember hard work and dedication.
Oh, and have some fun in the process. right on Hank!
Great to see John & Boris weighing in. I really miss hangin with these guys and picking their brains. Yeah this is a good post and one I completely identify with at the moment as I sit here and plan each minute of the next couple of weeks. Thanks for the vote of confidence, Jason. It’s really bittersweet to be nearing the end of this journey. I’m really thankful to have crossed paths with so many brilliant open minded people in my day. The fact that there’s never remotely a shortage of people like this around the halls of PC is what I’m gonna miss the most.
BTW, Roy, your type is lookin good. Awesome to see a writer so interested in that.
Word up Mike!
Miss PC you will, but now you have seen the Power of the Force.
Not sure if this is going to make a point or if it’s right or wrong but…
Force: power to influence, affect, or control
• Physics an influence tending to change the motion of a body or produce motion or stress in a stationary body. The magnitude of such an influence is often calculated by multiplying the mass of the body by its acceleration.
Not sure if i explained this perception clearly
But we can talk about it at a Braves game if you like. FREE!
Would love to. Gimme a call man. Sorry I’ve been out of touch. Say hi to Noel.
I want to come to a braves game too. Too bad I can’t make it but you guys need to come visit.
John,
I know Noli’s got the hook up so you’ve got no excuses and mike I always have a couch for you to crash on.
Talk to you guys soon.
Well, that settles it:
“are you willing to work your ass off for it and then give it some more. If you don’t it’s the basement for you!”
I have to work my ass off, then. My parent’s house is built on a slab…
Ah, but there’s always the attic.