Each industry has similarities in getting hired. By asking “How should a company or individual in your profession be chosen?”, I was also hoping to find the differences.

Andy suggests research and recommendations

If you are looking to commission a design partner, you should spend a reasonable amount of time researching possible candidates. Look at the problems you are trying to solve and the skills you require, and then try to find a good match. For instance, if your main concern is branding, then you probably need to find an agency that specializes in visual design, whereas if you have a lot of information you need organizing, you’ll want an agency that that focuses on information architecture. If you are building a content oriented site, your partners will need a good understanding of content management. However if you are building a web application, interaction design and user experience will be key.

With so many agencies out there specializing in different ways, it often makes sense to commission different companies for different parts of the project. So you may want to hire a design and interaction specialist to design the user experience, and then a development company to program the application.

The best way to select an agency is to ask for recommendations from your colleagues or other web developers. If somebody you know has worked with an agency before or has heard good things about them, they are already pre-qualified. Look at sites in a similar field to yours. If any are particularly good, find out who designed them and add them to your list of possible partners. I also recommend looking at design galleries and noting any sites that are a similar size, quality and style to the one you are trying to produce. Create a shortlist of 3-5 agencies, send them a detailed brief and then base your decision on the result. Remember that you’ll have to work with this agency for several months, so choose a company that’s a good fit and you get on with.

Andy Budd | Managing Director | Web Designer | Author
Andy Budd::Blogography | CSS Mastery

Anna opts for portfolios and word of mouth

The best way for a client to choose a design professional is to take a look at the designer’s portfolio. If you like the work that the designer has done in the past, chances are you will like what they do for you. If you aren’t all that excited about what they’ve done in the past, you probably won’t be excited about what they produce for you. Almost all designers have (or really should have) portfolios online that will help you determine if their design aesthetic and approach is right for you. A few websites to help you start your search:

Design:
Coroflot
Design Directory

Obviously word of mouth is one of the best referrals, but a client should still always look at the designer’s portfolio, because just because your friend had a great experience working with them, you may not end up liking their style and approach.

Anna Corpron & Sean Auyeung | Interdisciplinary Design Practice
Sub-Studio | sub-studio design blog

Brian agrees on word of mouth and ads networking

Based on experience and expertise. Clients can always find a less expensive alternative, but will they know what they are doing?

Experience will be shown by case studies and profiles on the design firm’s web site. Expertise will be proved by having clients concentrated in an area of specialization.

Word of mouth undoubtedly yields the best client/designer relationships. Networking leads to word of mouth; industry-based sites where a designer may be lurking because of their expertise in a given field can be fruitful.

Brian Sooy | Design Consultant
Brian Sooy & Co | Altered Ego Fonts

Chris also goes with networking and word of mouth

For my company, my clients have strictly come from networking with other business owners and word of mouth, with the latter being the most prominent. I think a portfolio and casual conversation can really help any client decide on who to choose for their designing. All too often industry jargon is thrown into the conversation, which does nothing more than confuse a client. I love the K.I.S.S. method and do my best to remember that when meeting with a client.

Chris Tomlinson | Communication Designer | Printer
Gonink | Gonink blog

Dag goes with presentation

How should someone in our industry be chosen? Well, presentation of course is a big factor. Maintaining a portfolio that showcases one’s finest output (this includes online presentations). And as a physical portfolio has a select small number of your best work, I feel your online portfolio site should do the same—it shouldn’t necessarily be measured by how much work you can upload on it. I feel that volume is not the measuring stick of a successful business. Some people have been in this business longer and thus enjoy a greater body of work to showcase. However there are others on the other end of the spectrum who put up anything and everything they’ve ever somewhat completed in the belief that quantity conveys a (sometimes misguided) measure of success to a client. Although I’m sure that it’s worked for some, I also don’t quite see this as the best approach. Select your best. If you feel you need more, there are many professional graphic designer sites that can not only offer advice on improving that situation, some also have mock-up client project briefs posted for you to do. Post them up in their forum for critique/review and when all is said and done you should end up with a nifty sleek piece to add to your portfolio.

What’s important is to show that not only are you talented, but that this end was possible because you drew upon your training and experience to execute a good visual solution. You are selling your expertise. That’s why I enjoy those sites that illustrate some of the developmental process that went behind the creation of some of their portfolio pieces the most. And I’d like to believe that prospective employers will also respect a designer as a result, because seeing some of this process will also communicate an intuitive understanding of the volume of intangible talent that goes on behind the scenes of the piece’s execution. Thus they’ll be able to not only see whether your style will align with theirs, but they’ll also be able to decide if you can draw upon your resources to meet their various promotional criteria. And hopefully, they’ll eventually come to comprehend that the computer isn’t the one push button “magic box” they once thought it was. An idealized reply to be sure, but it’s to ensure the probability of a prosperous working relationship. I’ve learned that a designer can’t realistically meet any client’s primary creative needs to their satisfaction, try as they might. Tastes, styles and methodologies between designer and client can be too distinct—in their effort to please the client, usually the designer ends up compromising far too much along the way. That’s how PITA projects are formed.

Dagmar Jeffrey | Principal Arche-tech
NO!SPEC Brainstorming Team Member | Arche-BLogGER

Daniel agrees with word of mouth and portfolio

Word of mouth is often the best way because then you talk to someone who’s had first-hand experience with the designer.

But the web is also a great way to find a designer–the only difficulty being that there are so many to choose from! But their own sites give you a good idea of their approach–do all their designs look the same or are they all different, reflecting the client more than the designer? Do you connect with them emotionally (you should). Do you like them. That’s subjective, but important.

In the end, you should judge a designer on their work–how effective is it?

Daniel Will-Harris | Communication Designer
Will-Harris House | Schmoozeletter

Dan also goes with word of mouth

Word of mouth is good way to make a selection. Contrary to that, some design firms are better at selling their wares that others, bottom line- every client gets the services they deserve.

Dan Sturdivant | Communication Designer | Editor
TexasDesign.com

Leslie says to search around where designers lurk

CA, Creativity, Archive, How, Print, AIGA, word of mouth…there are all sorts of sources to get leads on designers. See a website you love? Email the company and ask who did it, for example.

Once you get leads, talk to several designers. Getting a good personality fit is important as is their creative product. Look at prior examples, ask for client references to talk to. Do your homework. Don’t bring up money for your project right away, but don’t be afraid to look at a project the designer shows you and asking what they charged for that project.

Leslie Burns-Dell’Acqua | Creative/Marketing Consultant & Coach
Burns Auto Parts–Consultants | Burns Auto Parts blog | Podcast | Book

Metin’s on the side of portfolio

According to the quality and relevance of his or her work. That’s why a good website with a representative portfolio is an important instrument of attraction.

Metin Seven | Communication Designer
Seven’s Heaven - design and illustration

Neil goes with referrals, google and portfolios

My belief is that a client should scope out referrals from business associates, google around the web for potential designers and look over their work. When a potential fit is found between a few, the client should meet with each, request proposals and then make their decision based on the work, previous successes, personality fit and availability.

Neil (nt) Tortorella | Marketing Manager
Tortorella Design | The Marketing Mind | Creative Latitude | BoDo Team | Marketing Minute

Roger prefers style and attitude over an impressive portfolio

When searching for design services for myself, I’m more concerned about the designer’s style and potential than what they’ve done in the past. Attitudes and working styles are more important than an impressive portfolio. I’m not impressed by impressive portfolios accompanied by know-it-all attitude, or excessive focus on their skills rather than my needs.

Design is hard–whether you’re doing it for yourself, or having it done for you. Life is too short to deal with unpleasant people, or vendors who are more interested in showcasing their excellence rather than solving my problems.

I have frequently chosen design partners for projects who did not have impressive portfolios. These individuals compensated for a lack of “a perfect portfolio” by communicating the right attitudes. These attitudes included curiosity, enthusiasm, attention to detail, a willingness to learn, and–most important–by displaying a genuine love of design and a dogged determination to create work we both would be proud of.

I’ve long been fascinated by the relative importance of craftsmanship and creativity. To me, craftsmanship–the inner drive to do the best possible work combined with a refusal to compromise–is the basis of lasting relationships.

Roger C Parker | Designer | Writer | Marketing Consultant
Design To Sell Online | Roger C. Parker Design to Sell Blog | Design to Sell

Scott’s all for RFP’s, references and successful projects

From my own experience, typically designers are chosen through a RFP process but sometimes clients will come directly to me because they want to work with me based on my work or what they know of how I do things. A problem, as I mentioned earlier is that clients often undervalue design and designers. They want top quality work but often aren’t willing to pay for it, instead trying to nickel and dime you every chance they get. The sheer number of so-called designers severely undercutting the large majority of true professionals is at least one symptom of that larger problem and unfortunately there’s only so much the industry can do to deal with that.

Being able to provide credible references for past successful projects and being able to explain your own process in a way that clients can understand is a good first step to allowing a client to make an informed decision as to whether or not they should work with you.

I would hope that designers aren’t chosen on price alone and rather on proven skillset, and there’s many instances where that isn’t the case, but definitely in Canada where I live, I find that becomes a bit of a struggle. But that goes back to my comment on the undervaluation of design in general.

Scott Boms | Communication Designer
Wishingline DS

Stefan also goes where designers linger

When we’re looking for a designer we will generally put an ad in Communication Arts Creative Hotlist. We find that more designers are looking there for positions than anywhere else. Plus, we can scope out designers that are looking for positions, even if they haven’t contacted us first. Of course, their salary is a big consideration, and we generally don’t pay more than they are worth (based on experience and cumulative portfolio). On rare occasions, it’s necessary to pay a little more if that person can add a new dimension and can bring positive change into a firm. Personality is always a big consideration for us. If they don’t seem to be in a generally good mood during all of our meetings, that’s one red flag. But you can generally get a good idea by how they interact with you during conversation. If they are great at talking about the whys of their designs as well as great presenters, that’s a big bonus. But ultimately we look at personality, then skill, then other things.

Stefan Bean | President/Creative Director
Pulse Creative Partners, Inc. | BoDo Author | Bean’s Biz

Summary

As you’ve read, the consensus was heavy on the side of word of mouth and portfolios, with a few talent agencies thrown in. Andy made a good point - when looking for talent, sort out what the project needs to achieve and make a selection from there. For those aiming to be hired, a portfolio showing strengths is a must in attracting a client with a fit.

The next question on the list - At what point should your profession be brought into a project?

until the next
Designers WW,
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