Career Track Tuesday: Recruiting Creative Graduates

Tonight I attended a workshop on the recruitment of creative graduates, featuring Clare Gillen of Asda/George Home & Ross Featherston of Zeal. They discussed how their respective employers recruit creative graduates, including the media they use, the interview formats, the questions they ask, the criteria for inviting candidates to interview, the mistakes candidates make, the differences between successful and unsuccessful candidates, and the core skills they seek.

Claire Gillen

Claire Gillen is Design Manager for George Homeware at supermarket Asda. She graduated with a degree in 3D design (lighting, furniture, tableware etc.) before freelancing in the printed textiles sector, with clients including Next,  M&S, and Wilko.

Different retailers & developers of homeware work in partnership with buyers. At George/Asda Home, the design team carry out four trend presentations per year, typically for each season. Competitor research becomes very important as in the retail sector it can be a hard sell and you must ensure that the idea will sell, meaning it has to be approved by a senior team prior to production and distribution. Ideas must be well informed.

Claire describes the job as fun, challenging and fast paced.There are 9 designers on the design team, and while each designer is responsible for their own designs, the team do at times work together and support one another. 

There is usually 4 stage recruitment process at George/Asda Home.

Design graduates would to apply for a design assistant role. Designers at Asda Home/George typically go to new designers exhibitions and showcases to find new designers. Alternatively, they offer placements which can in some cases turn in to a permanent position once graduated. Jobs at Asda Home/George are also listen on job sites and the company's career page on their website. 

Advice

• Make your portfolio impactful and memorable.
• Have confidence.
• Do research on your potential employer.
• Have different versions of your portfolio, tailored to role being applied to.
• Have a commercial awareness.

Zeal are a full service digital and creative agency. Having graduated 15 years ago with a degree in New Media Production, Ross Featherston is now the Head of Development at Zeal. 

Advice

• Be quick to adapt and learn.
• Be confident.
• Beware of your ego.
• You can never stop learning.
• Be eager to learn.
• Clients can be wrong, but so can you.
• You have to be diplomatic and resilient.

Portfolio Tips

• Quality over quantity.
• Show what you did & why you did it.
• Tailor to job being applied to.
• Show ability in problem solving.
• Know your client base, make it clear
• You will be Googled by employers.