Jason Bouvman - Compass Creative - November 18, 2011

Jason Bouwman - Founder & Owner of Compass Creative in Burlington

On November 18th Jason Bouwman from Compass Creative came to our class to speak about his journey from being a Sheridan Illustration graduate to owning his own marketing and design studio. It was really great to hear him give us an in depth talk about his struggle and transformation to continue doing what he loves all while keeping bill paying in mind.

JASON'S STORY

AFTER GRADUATION

 
- Jason graduated in 1994 from Sheridan as a Technical Illustrator
- He comes from a very blue collar family so was always very mindful about how to take his talent and turn it into a viable business
- Fanshaw's industrial business program caught his interest so he signed up but quickly found out the program was not all it was cracked up to be
- Balancing the two worlds of being creative and trying to make money was become quite a burden so he found a job at a marketing communications firm where he told them he could do all sorts of things and basically faked it till he made it
- Meanwhile he was doing a bit of freelancing for some graphic design work
- Having come from a  family of business owners he was very upfront with his boss saying that he did not intend for this gig to be a long term position
- His boss was great and told him he could use the office on off hours for his freelance work so he did not have to buy all the equipment
- After working in the city a bit he quickly realized he was not a city guy and did not enjoy being a schooser so in Burlington he planted his roots

MARRIAGE+RESPONSIBILITY
- After getting married and buying a house Jason decided to hunker down and finally start his own business
- It took him a while and a lot of hours and side jobs to really make it on his own until he became too busy to have a life
- It was time to either hire somebody to help him or charge his clients much more so he thought to do a little research

GAME CHANGER
- This led him to sending out emails to ask all his clients why they like working with him, which he thought they would say things like "because your such a talented designer and illustrator" yada yada yada... but instead they came back with answers like "they loved the way he asked all sorts of question and hands back the work exactly the way they envisioned it and forced them to think in a different way"
-This made him realize that he was asking great questions to force companies to look deeper into their approach, which them made him think about these crucial questions like "why should customers pay me" , "what can I offer that other's cannot?"
- These questions led him to focus on the branding aspect of his business  because he was becoming quite good at it and it was worthwhile to companies
- Even though he really wanted to continue with illustration he changed his career on what makes the money and illustration on the side

ILLUSTRATION SIDE PROJECTS
- Jason designs coins for the Canadian mint on his spare time, check out some of his work here:
See his Canadian commemorative coin
Canadian wildlife series coins
Olympic coins

WHAT HE WISHED HE KNEW WHEN HE WAS 20
- Your passion about something is not enough - there is pain associated with passion
- BUT passion alone will burn you out so you nee skills
- BUT for these skills you need a market
- Artists need to create specialities so they can be different than every other artist out there


ABOUT COMPASS CREATIVE
http://www.compasscreative.ca/
- Compass Creative tends to have a great history of employment duration among their employees, they basically have to force people out
- Jason really tries to make the office a fun and comfortable space to work in to keep everyone happy, and when everyone is happy quality work tends to flow and people actually want to show up the next day
- Compass Creative really prides itself on work appreciation, when you produce quality work you are rewarded
-Check out their work here: http://www.compasscreative.ca/case-studies/arborwood-tree-service/


THE COMPASS CREATIVE ROLES
- There are six people that work at the first and they all have specific job titles but do a variety of different jobs

   
BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS
1) The e-myth by Michael Gerber
2) First things First

TO TAKE AWAY FROM JASON'S PRESENTATION
- Know your priorities and stick to them, make time for a life, in the end when you look at what you've done with your time will you regret anything?
- Life is not about work, remember family is forever
- Specialize or perish
- Remember nobody owes you money just because you have skills

Alex Pejcic - Sonic Boom - November 11, 2011

Alex Pejcic - Vice-Presiden & Co-Founder of Sonic Boom

Board of Directors at The Advertising & Design Club of Canada

ABOUT ALEX & THE START OF SONIC BOOM

- Alex studied psychology in University
- When he finished he still did not know what he wanted to do
- He and his buddies were using this "internet" thing a lot so they learned some basic HTML and started up a hockey pool website online
- After that they decided to try and make some money on this idea, so they went door to door selling companies on digital jobs
- Over the years he has gone from an entrepreneurs with an idea, ran with his ideas for as long as he could, then realized he had to do some scaling, so started learning to understand the corporate culture
- Now he has internal and external clients - changed his world completely and had to become responsible for his workers, and learned to become a great manager
- When it's all said and done it's not the money that keeps him coming back to work everyday, it's the people.
- It's worth it to be constantly learning and inspired by people everyday - learning to think in a completely different way changes everything.

SONIC BOOM - WHAT MAKES THEM DIFFERENT
http://www.sonicboom.com/#/home/

- Sonic Boom is all about helping the clients by maximizing what they can do with their media
- They work closely with the clients to understand their business, consumer and influences
- Focus is then placed on the client business challenge and they work to create meaningful solutions that will last
- They use a tactic they call "eMerge" - a combination of social media, traditional communications and interactive marketing to utilize all aspects of marketing and branding.
- Their goal is to get not only the audience excited about a company/product but the client themselves excited about the tactics in which they will be using i.e. social media


WHAT A DIGITAL AGENCY LOOKS LIKE ON THE INSIDE

- It's important to learn what a digital agency is comprised of presently in order to understand your place within a company.
- Digital used to be all about the design but has transformed where strategy drives the creative
-Various departments:
    -strategy department
    -account team - i.e. project managers
    -creative department
    -engineering
    -production
    -quality assurance
    -*more unique to Sonic Boom: Subject Matter and Content Expert
        - Sonic Boom now hires someone that really understands a certain industry        

 - They have done insight and research about certain industries
        - Content people can be copy writers but also strategy writers
        - social media, monitoring, design, management

- It's so important to know what's out there, what networks there are - come in as a user of these things, know their capacities, you don't have to be an expert but at least know where the world is going, and then you can learn the business end when you are hired


WHAT YOU SHOULD UNDERSTAND

- Know at least basic knowledge of whatever company you are working for
- Do your research, find out what tactics they use and research them a bit to you can know what your talking about
- Check out Mashable, Digital Buzz, Hyper-Island


WHAT SHOULD I POSSESS

- You should be able to prove your skills in your discipline
- Have a strong portfolio
- References - use who ever you can (Sheridan is great)
- Positive attitude, team oriented, be someone that really cares about the company and it's work, don't be there to stroke your ego - nobody likes assholes
- Willingness to learn - you never know it all, even when you feel like your just starting to understand you will realize you actually know nothing, never be a know-it-all because you never will be and no one likes those as*holes anyways
- PASSION - within 5 minutes you can tell if a person is passionate


GETTING NOTICED, RECOGNIZED & RESPECTED - IT TAKES TIME
- It takes time to really get into your role and actually get good at it
- You will not get where you want to be right away, don't have an ego and be an idiot, pay your dues, everyone else has
- Join interactive media groups
- Submit your portfolio to online communities - creative people are really busy and might not have time for interviews, don't let your portfolio get passed up, make it easy for them
- Create your own online space - BLOGGING - what you say and print shows your passion and also shows your not just about design, you can also think and write
- Ask for advice in interviews - also talk about where you want to be
- Take opportunities as they come but remember to develop a tough skin, if someone says your not cut out to be a designer, there are other jobs in the creative realm, have an open mind
- Work hard and be passionate - it's not a 9-5 job


OTHER STUFF
- Check out Poke - great company that uses technology to solve problems ina  smart way
http://www.pokelondon.com/portfolio/

- Don't always attend conferences in your industry, go to Ted & Idea City, they will help you develop different ways of problem solving and show your interested in the bigger picture
- Jumping from studio to studio does not reflect well in short periods of time, your not learning deep enough, your not paying your dues and people will notice - that is not the way to get ahead and will really make it hard for you to get jobs in the future if you don't seem like the kind of employee that will be worth their investment
- SODA is an organization that consists of the best independent agencies - get to know them
http://societyofdigitalagencies.org/

Jay Schacher - Henderson Bas Kohn - November 4, 2011

Jay Schacher, Art Director, HBK

ABOUT JAY
http://www.linkedin.com/in/jayschacher

- 2006 Grad from Sheridan Web Design
- York University New Media Certificate 2004
- York University BFA 2000-2004

-He started his Toronto design career two weeks after graduating the Sheridan Web program.
-After 4 years he has become an art director

 

DAILY TASKS AS CREATIVE DIRECTOR

- Brainstorming
- Concepting
- Designing
- Overseeing work
- Mentoring
- Meeting timelines
- Ensuring client expectation
- Being creative - all the time


COMMON TRAITS OF GOOD A.D.

- Loves video games and doodling
- You like Photoshop more than TV
- Have a favourite hex colour
- Really creative passwords and network names


HBK
http://www.hendersonbaskohn.com/

- Specializes in digital - online ads, mobiles and recently added print
- Approximately 60 people working there at at time
- 10 people on creative team


BRANDS THEY WORK ON
Check out their work


JAY'S ADVICE FOR AFTER YOU GRADUATE
- Stay close to your classmates
- Network a lot
- Be a team player - not a hero
- Check Creative Niche for events


TO KEEP INSPIRED
- Check out Smashing Magazine, Mashable, Web Cream, Colour Lover

 

JAY'S FAVORITE HEX VALUE
- FEFEFE or 010101

- a fan of subtlety apparently

 

TAILORING YOUR PORTFOLIO
- Know the shop you are going to apply for & show work that suits their companies style
- If applying to web shops, show web work first, then your design then visual art - process documents are great too