“The success of a remote studio comes down to one thing: effort”

Creative Career Conundrums is a weekly advice column from If You Could Jobs. Each week their selected panel of professionals from the creative industry answers your burning career questions to help you navigate the creative journey.

This week’s question:

“What can a young designer do to get more exposure, feedback and mentorship when the setup is remote?

I am going to graduate soon and I have received an offer from a studio that has a work from home set up. I’m worried that I might not get as much exposure as a traditional studio. Is WFH something that I shouldn’t do so early on in my career ? And would a WFH set up limit my networking chances?”

Katie Cadwell, co-founder of branding studio Lucky Dip and The NDA Podcast:

The success of a remote studio comes down to one thing; effort. Effort from your colleagues, and effort from you.

You should start by communicating your concerns with the studio. Ask them how they ensure everyone feels connected. How do they encourage learning and development remotely? And how do they contribute to the industry? 

In my experience, remote studios attend lots of industry events – it’s a good reason to meet up as a team, and they need to network themselves. If they’re not keen, you don’t need their permission. I’ve met lots of people going solo at design festivals. You couldn’t ask for a nicer place to network.

I’d argue that building your connections or industry exposure is not the job of the studio. They’re interested in their own profile, not their individual creatives. Most of the designers that have big networks or platforms have created those themselves. So that’s good news, as that’s not impacted by you working remotely. Make sure you’re doing all the usual things – posting work online, showing BTS, volunteering for talks, panels, events. Generally, getting involved and getting visible is the winning combo.

The more important part of your question is how to ensure you’re getting good mentorship in a remote setup. This is a clearer 50/50 responsibility split.

Here are some things you can do to make the absolute most of this experience. 

• Ask for jamming sessions where you work with another designer. The rigid, formal catchups are not great for collaboration. It’s much more fun to jump on a call with a bunch of you and think out loud.
• Share little and often. I’m a big fan of a quick Slack screenshot with ‘what do you think?’ Don’t wait for the next feedback session to show your work.
• Make sure you speak up, both in creative sessions and the morning small talk. A remote studio’s culture is better the more people contribute to it.

And some things that a good remote agency should be doing.

• Including you in other things going on in the studio, just to listen in and learn. These are the things you would naturally overhear if you were in person. Business updates, new client calls, different phases of projects. 
• Putting in time to chat. Opportunities to catch up like a weekly wrap up on Fridays. The more comfortable the team feels, the more natural collaboration will come.
• Asking for feedback. Checking what you need so they can support you better.

There are pros and cons to WFH – but if your main concern is networking, at least you can use the ‘commute time’ to invest in that.

In answering your creative career conundrums we realise that some issues need expert support, so we’ve collated a list of additional resources that can support you across things that might arise at work.

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