Australian Infront

Did you take any design job after uni?

Posted 14.04.2012 @ 11.13AM

Hi everyone

I'm graduating mid year and have been scoping out the types of jobs advertised out there for a while now and notice that most junior/graduate roles want you to have 2-3yrs in house industry experience, the jobs that don't, tend to be ones in factory type environments / desktop publishing roles or deal with very high turnover type of things. i have done freelance work here and there but no industry experience.

Im wondering if it is beneficial to take any sort of job remotely related to design when first graduating even if its not in the particular areas id like to do? would it hinder trying to get into another area of design later on

did you take any job straight out of uni?

Posted 14.04.2012 @ 11.48AM

Hi MattH,

I was in the same boat as you, after completing my studies in website design/development I was a fresh graduate and everyone wanted someone with experience, so knock back after knock back, became very frustrating.

I was persistent and kept on trying, after emailing my resume to 100 different companies, I received 4 phone calls, 2 interviews and finally a job at the end as a website designer.

After working at the website design company for 2 years I decided to leave and start my own website design business and haven't looked back. The moral of the story is " A quitter never wins" so keep trying, if the job is similar to the job you are looking at, take it so you can gain some experience in that field, earn some cash and also fill up your resume with experience.

Best of luck bud, hope you find what you are looking for.

Posted 14.04.2012 @ 3.26PM

Take any paying job. All experience is good experience. Some places/industries I'd never work gain, but it gave me a good perspective of all the different places you could work in. Temping may not be the best lifestyle but gives you a taste of different businesses.

Posted 14.04.2012 @ 3.39PM (Edited 14.04.2012 @ 3.40PM)

What's your other option? Not working at all?

Take whatever you can get but keep your eyes open for better opportunities.

Posted 14.04.2012 @ 8.18PM (Edited 14.04.2012 @ 8.18PM)

Also there is some amazing skills you can pick up from these other jobs which sound horrible like time management, dealing with printers, client and other suppliers, efficiency in programs and I could go on and on

But also don't just apply to places that are advertised, you should be contacting studios directly saying you are looking for work, as most of the time studios won't even advertise they'll have a list of people who sent their work through and just contact them rather than advertising

Posted 15.04.2012 @ 2.25PM

After Uni I've dabbled in design jobs and sales jobs. I would say take what you can get, learn what you can and keep looking/climbing up that ladder.

That's something I should be doing but I'm in a tight situation wherein I don't have the luxury of being able to follow that path at the moment.

Posted 15.04.2012 @ 8.00PM

I got a job at a printers right out of college.
I was there for about a year and although I didn't like it I learned a lot, especially about health and safety.
I learned the hard way that it wasn't a good idea to use MEK fast thinners (press cleaner) to clean the hot glass of a repro camera in a sealed dark room:(

Posted 16.04.2012 @ 10.02AM

My first two jobs out of uni were a radio copywriter and a commercial producer at win tv. I did award school in my last year of uni and made the contacts through that. i was also a little older than the other graduates because of a first degree. luckily my first design job involved a bit of tv and radio so it all fitted in. STILL when i moved to the big smoke - hobart to melbourne - i applied for 200 jobs before getting one. The ower played golf and so did I...

i should of probably stayed in tv

Posted 16.04.2012 @ 10.21AM

labouring in london, winter, it was great : - (

living in a squat in islington surrounded by misfits, punks, hippies and junkies, which made it interesting and bearable

Posted 16.04.2012 @ 12.10PM

After uni I got a job in a publishing house as a traffic coordinator. A far cry from the job I thought I would get when I first left. Working in production taught me about deadlines, about making things press ready, dealing with all sorts of people under all sorts of pressure. After a year or so an opportunity came up in the design department and I moved across. After that I didn't look back. My time in production though has proved to be a solid base for the rest of my career. Some times a side step is not the worst step.