Recently I was asked to speak to some designers. I wasn’t given a topic, and since I don’t have a vast number of years to pull from when it comes to experience, I thought it best to outline a few lessons I’ve learned as I approach my one year mark in the industry.

Where It Started

I discovered design in high school, almost by accident. One of my art teachers encouraged me to join SkillsUSA because they didn’t have anyone competing in T-shirt design.

I wasn’t hooked by cool aesthetics. It was the chase. The puzzle. The feeling of trying to make something work, not just look good.

That mindset followed me into college. I still thought about design the same way, but I wasn’t good at math, science, or English. I joined fine arts and applied to the design program.

I got rejected.

Rejected and forced to take a semester off, I worked hard. I read books, studied good designers, and did projects on my own to develop taste. I tried again. The following year, I made the program and finished at the top of my class.

I don’t say this to be braggadocious, but to emphasize that what I learned in college boiled down to a quote by Coach Tim Notke:

“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”

What Reality Looks Like

After school, I got a job working full time for a local full-service creative agency. Every day I work my forty hours, come home, make dinner, spend an hour or two with my wife, and then get back to work.

Freelance projects. Personal brand. Making connections. Learning new tools. Repeating the cycle.

I’m not the most experienced designer in the room, and I’ve never been the most talented. But I work hard, and I’ve learned a few lessons the hard way. If any of it helps you skip a mistake, it’s worth sharing.

Stepping Stone Projects

Everyone has a different name for projects like these. I call them stepping stone projects.

They’re the projects that don’t make you Pentagram money. In all honesty, they barely make you money at all. Across all the projects I put in this category, I may have made a grand total of thirty five dollars.

That’s because I wasn’t chasing money. I was chasing intentionally good design. I wanted to design them well. I wanted to make things I was proud to show.

And those projects ended up getting more attention than most of the “real” ones I was working on at the time.

“To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift.”
Steve Prefontaine

Potential clients don’t just want to see a final product. They want to see how you think. Your process. Whether your decisions hold up. That’s what they hire you for.

I’m not saying to give your work away for free. Your work is valuable, and you deserve to be paid. But sometimes the work that gets noticed the most is the work that wasn’t properly compensated, because you weren’t designing for money. You were designing for growth.

Design and Business

In college, I was the creative director. I had final say. Total control. Every decision ran through me.

It was awesome.

In the real world, you don’t get the final say. That isn’t a bad thing. It’s just different.

Designers are problem solvers. That’s the job. Clients come to us because they have problems they can’t solve themselves. They don’t hire us for taste alone. They hire us for perspective. That’s why it’s so important to show how you think, not just what you make.

There are people who have decided AI is good enough for creative work. That’s fine. They don’t want great creative, can’t afford it, or don’t believe it matters.

That’s not the kind of client you’re looking for.

The right clients understand that design is necessary. They understand that successful brands need more than the average of all the information an algorithm can gather.

When a client hires you, they are trusting you with their brand. They wouldn’t ask for your help if they didn’t believe you could handle that responsibility.

Trust the Process

I’m not gonna lie. When it comes down to it, I’m pretty sure I have like four friends.

And I’m not great at math, but if I’ve already worked with two of them, that leaves two more potential opportunities.

The point is simple. If no one knows who you are or what you do, they can’t ask you for help.

One of my first jobs was with Denik. Through that job, I met people who worked at other companies. I also met the crew at Lincoln Design Co. They emphasized the same thing I’m slowly learning.

Work hard, but don’t rush. Develop your skills.
And when you can do that on someone else’s dime, even better.

You don’t have to freelance forever. You don’t have to do everything alone. You don’t have to lock yourself into one lane.

Trust the process.
Do good work.
Be a learner.

Don’t get stuck doing the same thing. Expand your toolbelt. Learn something new.

Because momentum doesn’t come from doing more.
It comes from doing the next right thing, consistently.