Professional/industrial experience is experience a student or anyone looking for a job should have an understanding and familiarity with before they can take the step into full time employment.
Part time placements into work experience provide a requirement to achieve objectives and deliverables set by their industrial supervisor. At the work place industrial supervisors negotiate working objectives and the activities needed to meet those objectives & deliverables. This will ultimately bring to light key skills for further development.
It may involve simply talking to someone in the industry or it can be as dedicated as a number of weeks working with an agency.
Why is professional/industrial experience important?
It is important because it gives us a chance to apply our current knowledge in an industry standard work place. It also enables us to undertake in real life deadlines in live briefs.
Ultimately it encourages us to make an informed choice about our career and it enhances our prospects of finding employment in your chosen area.
Ideally by the time I go into my first placement I will have a strong idea of the kind of designer I want to be. However this may not be the case, and it will certainly be the case for a lot of students. If I am not sure exactly what I want to do I would hope that the placement would help me clarify who I am as a designer.
A few bullet points highlighting what our learning aims should be at placements.
- First hand experience of how procedures work at industry standard.
- How you manage your time around things like printing, proofing and client meetings, which may not be encountered within the course.
- Working to a live brief with a deadline.
- Printing and finishing processes which we do not have access to in college.
- An idea of who we are as a designer.
How do you gain professional / industrial experience and what form does it take?
Firstly you will need to act professionally to gain experience in industry. Most companies will not have the time or patients for students, so you need to build up either a strong and professional way of talking on a one off situation or be able to build up a relationship with the client. You cannot be pushy or intrusive nad you should respect the time they have given you to talk with them. They must know that you show genuine interest in the needs and goals of their business.
There are several ways which you can gain work placement.
- You can find a specific company online or in a magazine which you aspire to and call them up with an enquiry.
- Look online at Design agencies which offer placements to support students. (these actually exist thank god).
- Looking either online, in magazines or newspapers for companies which help students find placements.
- By word of mouth. Don't forget that we are surrounded by designers most of the time. Asking the year 3rd years or contacting the previous 3rd years is a bit sneaky but probably the most fruitful, as you will know exactly what the placement will consist of.
- Be brave and find placement online which involves traveling abroad.
I have found a couple of companies which specialize in setting up placements for students who wish to go abroad. This is a seriously tempting idea to me and is something I will most likely look into with a great deal of interest. I think something big like that would give me a huge push in the right direction.
Professional placements/experience do not have to be a long term commitment. They can be as simple as visiting a design agency for the day to look over their portfolio and have a few discussions with employees. Or it could be anything up to a 12 week placement. However they are most often up-paid placements, so committing that much time to something which may not be wholesomely profitable may be unwise; unless there may be a job offer at the end of it, which is not so un-common.
What should you aim to gain from professional / industrial experience?
Well this kind of answers itself. Experience is exactly what you aim to gain.
You aim to achieve an understanding of how graphic design works on a professional level. How all the processes work and where they should be used. Not only should you aim to understand the fundamentals of how a professional agency works, but also how you work as a professional designer. What faults do you have and how can they be resolved. What are your strengths and how were you able to apply them to the professional experience.
I might find that there is something i can do which the agency really liked or even needs. If so then perhaps that should be the thing i ficus on to become an expert in that area, be it type, photography or illustration.
