Daniel’s Ice Cream Adventure

Wednesday, March 13th, 2019|

You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream. But few people are willing to give up a high-profile career in digital marketing in search of the perfect pint. But Daniel did just that, ending his travels working at an ice cream shop in rural Maine. Now he’s back in Los Angeles, looking for work, armed with the knowledge of the power of pursuing your passions above all else. 

What prompted your 50-state adventure in search of the world’s best ice cream?

It was the perfect storm, really. I had the dream, a little money saved up, no mortgage, no kids, no debt. I’ve always been able to eat a lot without gaining weight. I loved my job, but I got a yen to travel and experience some soul fulfillment. Part of me just wanted to see if I could do it without quitting.

What was the best part of your journey?

The people, without question. I knew what to expect in terms of geography and even ice cream. But my interactions with people blew me away. I met amazing people with fascinating life stories. It’s not an understatement to say that this journey restored my faith in humanity. I forged new, lifelong friendships. I would never have had the opportunity to do that if I had just stayed in my comfort zone.

How did your professional skill-set help you along the way?

Three aspects of my career helped me along my journey: content creation, analytics, and social media management. While traveling, I updated my personal blog, The King of Ice Cream, talking about fun ice cream flavors and whatnot. I also curated a little following on Instagram (@_kingoficecream). These had the unintended consequence of ice cream businesses reaching out to me and requesting I stop by when I was in town to try their ice creams. With a little bit of traffic analysis from my following, I managed to create proposals for sponsored content, and the funds from said content helped prolong my journey even further. I was now able to try more ice creams and travel to more places than what I initially had planned in the outset.

Why ice cream?

Ice cream has always had a special place in my heart. From ages 4 to 14 I probably ate ice cream every single day of my life, rain or shine. All throughout and after college, during national ice cream month (July), I made it my mission to try a different flavor of ice cream during every single day of the month. Over the years, my ice creams flavors became more daring and intense, until one year, I ended National Ice Cream Month in an Ice Cream Cleanse — a three-day dietary cleanse where you eat no solid foods aside from five pints of ice cream each day for three days straight. It was a special vegan ice cream found in Venice, CA, and the whole experience was more difficult than I’d thought. At that point, people started sending me recommendations of other crazy ice cream challenges all around the country that seemed pretty interesting, and ones that I hoped to attempt one day.

What motivated you to take such a big chance?

While I’d like to say it was purely love of dessert, if I’m being honest, there’s a part of me that says it was definitely out of fear too. Fear of regret later on in life if I didn’t go out and do this. All the what if’s and what could’ve been moments were terrifying to me. Even more so than playing it safe and staying within my comfort zone. And as I said before, a quick metabolism will only last for so long, so it was best to do this in my youth as opposed to in my retirement.

Can you share some info on your book?

It’s still in the works, but I do have the title picked out already. It’ll be called The Cream of the Couch, and it’s about the people I met during my journey. These people were complete strangers to me, and we only met through happenstance. But they willingly let me sleep on their couches, free of charge while I tried ice cream in their city, and I learned a lot about myself and other ways of living through these strange encounters.

What advice would you share with anyone thinking of taking a sabbatical or pursuing a life-long dream?

It’s hard for me to tell others what to do when I don’t know their circumstances or goals. If you have medical bills, loan debts, or other responsibilities, it would be pretty foolish for me to say drop all of that to pursue a passing desire.

However, what I can say for me though is that I have no regrets. Even as my bank accounts have dropped, or I now am back on the grind to look for steady employment again, I’m still extremely glad I went. There’s a special kind of pride and peace of mind that comes from not only accomplishing what I set out to do but from growing in new ways I hadn’t conceived of before. Leaving is a feeling that can hardly be put into so few words.

At Artisan Creative we work with some amazing creatives, artists and creators. We love featuring their stories when we can and hope you’ve enjoyed our 512th a.blog and Daniel’s Ice Cream Adventure.

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A Guide To Creating Mood Boards

Wednesday, February 20th, 2019|

For designers, digital storytellers, project managers, or anyone in the business of creating, mood boards are a useful way to brainstorm, showcase specific design concepts, or communicate the bigger ideas around a project.

Never made a mood board? Give it a go! Even if you don’t consider yourself a designer – you may find that honing your ability to organize images enhances your power as a communicator. If you’ve hit a stuck point at work, or need a jolt of aesthetic inspiration, making a mood board is an inspiring way to drill down to basics, rediscover what matters, and shake out some new ideas.

When creating a mood board, keep this advice in mind.

Think Like a Collector

Whether you’re scrolling through your Instagram feed or taking a walk in your city, take in your environment through the lens of an image curator. Smartphone cameras, bookmarking tools, and screen capturing software make it so easy to create ad hoc scrapbooks of the colors, patterns, and other sights that catch your fancy as you go about your daily travels.

Center One Big Idea

To make your mood board more cohesive, start with one large image, place it near the middle (or in some way that indicates its prominence), and arrange other images around it. Some of the best mood boards also function as visually rich mind maps.

Be Obvious

If your mood board is for your eyes only (such as a vision board to help you set personal goals), it’s not so important that it be easy for others to understand. However, if you’re sharing your mood board with colleagues, collaborators, or especially clients, be ready to answer any questions they might have before they have them. That means it’s okay to use well-known “classic” images, or even use text to drive home important ideas.

Go For Emotional Resonance

Be cognizant of color theory, Gestalt theory, and best practices around typefaces and other design decisions. Make sure your smaller choices are in service to the larger emotional sweep of your mood board. The goal is to create an emotional response to give your ideas the power of strong feelings.

Experiment With Different Sorts of Images

As long as your mood board makes sense as a whole, there’s no reason to limit yourself to photographs, illustrations, and other common images. Experiment with text, maps, diagrams to create striking visual metaphors, and anything else that may help you get your points across.

Experiment With Formats

There is power in the unexpected. Tools such as Pinterest now make it wonderfully easy for almost anyone to generate a mood board. That means that, if you want to go offline, break out your glue sticks, and do some old-fashioned collaging, you can make an even bigger splash at presentation time.

Presentation Is Everything

Whenever possible, always present your mood boards in person. This gives you the opportunity to showcase your work as you want it to be understood, to clear up any confusion, to receive feedback (an opportunity to improve and clarify your work), and to transmit the personality and flavor behind your mood board. Presentation skills are important, so whatever you do, seek as many opportunities as you can get to become a more agile and effective presenter.

For practice, try communicating your personal brand through the medium of a mood board, and then present it to a sympathetic colleague or your creative recruiter.

Mood boards are just one of our favorite techniques for honing ideas and building a brand, a company, or a creative career you will love.

Contact us today to discover many more and see what Artisan Creative’s knowledge, experience, and inspiration can do for you.

We hope you’ve enjoyed our 510th a.blog.

 

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Our Top 25 Blogs

Wednesday, December 12th, 2018|

We are thrilled to publish our 500th blog today. As we approach the end of the year, we’d like to share some of our a.team’s favorite blogs.

These cover a range of topics from self-development and time-management to job search, hiring, and much more.

We hope you enjoy this top 25 greatest hits compilation.

We hope you’ve enjoyed our 500th post.  You can find plenty of other tips, inspirations, best practices, and advice on our a.blog.

We look forward to connecting.

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The Power of Ambiverts

Wednesday, November 14th, 2018|

When it comes to styles of socializing, most people aren’t fixed at one extreme pole or the other, at least not all the time. Most of us spend our time somewhere on the spectrum between painful introversion or exuberant extroversion. Some of us shift positions based on the situation, whether we’re wired or tired, the cold number of strangers in the crowd or the warmth of being surrounded by close friends.

If you identify as neither an extrovert or an introvert and you share key traits with both, you may be an ambivert. Does this sound like you? Here are a few common characteristics of ambiverts – see how many you identify with.

You’re All About Context

In high-stress situations, particularly at work, you may prefer to keep a low profile and think before you speak. However, when you’re around your friends, you may behave quite differently.

Ambiverts have the color-changing powers of the chameleon, subtly altering their presentation to what serves them best in the situations they find themselves in. When you cultivate the mindfulness and self-awareness to make these adjustments deliberately, you can dramatically increase your effectiveness, at work and in life.

You Love to Chat But Prefer Valuable Conversation

You combine an extrovert’s gift of gab with an introvert’s aversion to small talk. Although you’re adept at casual banter, you’re eager to get to the heart of the matter and address what you really care about.

If you readily understand social cues, yet not always in the mood to follow them, you may be an ambivert.

You Provide Balance

When you’re around your boisterous friends, you may calm down a bit, or do less talking and more listening than usual. However, when you’re on a corporate retreat, you put yourself in the mix, break the ice, and help others form the connections they need to be themselves and come alive.

Because of your sensitivity and versatility to others with more extreme social styles, you can provide the secret sauce that makes relationships work.

You Respect Your Own Boundaries

You do fine in social situations, as long as you’re in your comfort zone. Over time, you’ve come to know how much socializing you can tolerate without getting tired, how much you can participate in different sorts of meetings without overextending yourself, and what sort of people bring out your best as friends, collaborators, or mentors.

With their appreciation for the best of both worlds, ambiverts are well positioned to help others better define and establish their own needs and preferences. There is power in this versatility – when you understand the inner lives of both extroverts and introverts and can switch gears as appropriate, you are capable of great compassion and empathy.

Ambiverts may be well suited to roles that require thoughtful negotiation (e.g., sales or management), as well as the “helping professions” such as therapy, advocacy, or creative recruiting. Author Dan Pink, in his book “To Sell is Human” has created an assessment to test for yourself. He argues most of us are indeed ambiverts.

At Artisan Creative, we believe in the strength of diversity. We have decades of experience helping all sorts of creative professionals and businesses bring out their best selves and succeed beyond their expectations. Contact us today to discover your capabilities and embrace your excellence.

 

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 496th issue of our a.blog. 

 

 

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Resume Refresh Checklist

Thursday, October 4th, 2018|

Are you starting a new job search? Could your ongoing search use an energy boost? Have trends in your industry shifted? Have you accomplished those professional goals you committed to at the start of this year?

If you answered yes to some or all of the above, it could be a good time for you to review your resume to give it a quick update and polish.

For most recruiters, hiring managers, or connectors who find you through a LinkedIn search, your Linkedin Bio and resume will be your best chance to make a first impression. You will approach the job market with more confidence if you’re sure your resume is as strong and polished as it can be.

Have a look now at your resume to make sure it meets all the important criteria.

Is it fresh?

If you haven’t spent any time on it in more than a few months, it pays to give your resume a close read, especially if you’re actively sending it out. You may be able to improve some awkward phrasing, use more modern formatting, or even catch a stray typo. Grammarly and Hemingway are two popular and trusted tools you can use to improve and tighten your writing.

Is it current?

Clearly, if you change jobs or achieve new professional goals, you should update your resume to reflect the new you. You must also be mindful of changing trends and language in your industry. Any expert who reads it should know that you know your stuff. With the rise of applicant tracking software, exceptionally strong SEO is one of your best friends during a job search. You are your own marketing department, so familiarize yourself with the latest SEO tricks and techniques that marketers use to boost visibility. Also, read job descriptions for jobs you want and rework your resume to use similar keywords. Make yourself easy to find.

Is it exciting?

Write in the active voice to present a stronger sense of who you are and what it might be like to work with you. Rather than “responsibilities” or “duties,” focus on your accomplishments and how you provide value and ROI. Rather than your “objective,” be descriptive – every line should be lush with details about what you know, what you can do, and what makes you different. Grab your reader’s attention and lodge in their memory.

Is it on brand?

Your resume works in concert with your social media profiles, your online portfolio, and the rest of your overall digital presentation. Make sure they all present a consistent sense of your personality, your professional values, and your realms of expertise. Create a buyer persona to represent the hiring manager whose attention you want to attract, and redesign all aspects of your digital presence to communicate directly with that person.

Is the design appropriate?

Always emphasize content over form. Every element of your resume should add; none should distract. Unless you are a visual designer with a distinctive aesthetic, stick with common typefaces and simple formatting. Trends in aesthetics and language change rapidly; present yourself in a manner that will have perennial appeal. If you’re in doubt, find a mentor or a peer you respect and ask if you can use that person’s resume as a model for your own.

At Artisan Creative, we know that building your dream career isn’t just about attention to detail – it’s about knowing which details matter.

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 491st issue of our a.blog. Get in touch today and continue the conversation.

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Create a Creative Workspace

Wednesday, September 26th, 2018|

Living things don’t exist in isolation – we are who we are through complex interactions with our environments. This means building strong relationships with colleagues and coworkers. We can also pay more mindful attention to the details of our physical surroundings. This can help us bring our workspaces into harmony with our projects, our values, and our personalities.

Whether you work from home or have a desk/cubicle in a larger office, these tips can help you spruce up your space, which can help you become happier, more productive, and more creative.

Shed a Little Light

The light you work under sets the tone for what you think and what you accomplish. It can have a powerful effect on your psychological and ocular health. If you can, invest in a stylish lamp you love. If you love to work with your hands and you know a bit about electronics, you can even try making your own.

Know Your Ergonomics

We did not evolve to sit at desks all day. But with a basic understanding of the principles of ergonomics, you can make your work much easier on your health, and feel better as well. Understand what you need from a chair, how to place your equipment, and how to sit. You’ll feel better, accomplish more, and preserve your long-term health.

Keep Your Vision in Sight

Keeping your vision board prominently placed in your workspace can help you stay cognizant of your larger goals and mission. When you’re in danger of getting lost in the details, your vision board can realign your mind with a larger perspective. Whatever you’re working on, the big picture is only a glance away.

Add a Splash of Color

In every culture, colors have deep symbolic significance. According to color theory, the right combinations of colors can inspire new ideas and perspectives. In your space, experiment with colors to find your ideal aesthetic and psychological balance. You don’t need to turn your office screaming neon pink; minor accents can be enough to alter your brain chemistry and enhance your insights.

Go Green

When we strengthen our relationships with nature, we put ourselves in touch with the rhythms of the earth and the essence of life. Bringing plants into your workspace (even just a modest succulent) can freshen your perspective. Taking care of a plant also provides a sense of responsibility and accomplishment, a valuable reminder that what you pay attention to always matters in this complex web of existence.

Work Within the Code

When we innovate within the rules, we become, as Proust writes, “like good poets whom the tyranny of rhyme forces into the discovery of their finest lines.” If your employer has rules governing how you can decorate your space, this can drive you to be more creative, not less. Go through the rulebook in detail, and figure out fresh ways to let your personality shine within the structure. This can inspire you and those around you to look at established guidelines with a fresh perspective.

At Artisan Creative, we support all aspects of your career, because we believe the best work can only be done in the right environment. Contact us today to learn more.

 

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 490th issue of our blog.

 

 

 

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Personality Assessments and the Hiring Process

Wednesday, July 25th, 2018|

“When you meet somebody for the first time, you’re not meeting them. You’re meeting their representative.” – Chris Rock

Businesses struggle every day to hire and retain top talent. Making professional matches is as much an art as it is a science, and even the strongest minds in HR, recruiting, and management must sometimes learn from mistakes.

In their quest to find the best candidates, many top companies use a variety of personality and integrity tests to screen applicants during their interview processes. There’s an ongoing debate around this practice, with strong arguments and research supporting either side. Should you consider implementing this sort of testing for potential new hires, it’s important to know the pros and cons.

Pros

– You’re in good company. According to a recent survey, more than 40% of Fortune 100 companies use some form of personality testing as part of their recruiting and onboarding procedures.

– It can get results. Studies have shown that retail businesses who used integrity testing in hiring reported a 50% reduction in inventory loss. Long-term results for some other forms of testing are less clear, but anything that weeds out clearly unqualified applicants obviously saves time for HR, and money for the company.

– It can eliminate biases. Individual interviewers may be biased toward candidates they personally like, or, worse, make decisions based on unconscious cultural biases. By establishing measurements that are more objective, at least theoretically, testing can correct for this tendency.

– It can be fun. Startups such as Knack offer gamified versions of some employment-related tests, which can infuse a spirit of play into your hiring process. Some companies also test current employees after they’re hired, which can be a part of an employer-employee feedback loop that improves conditions at work.

-It’s a good communication tool.  Learning more about ourselves and our colleagues is a great step towards better communication and connection.

Cons

– Tests themselves can be biased. Tests reflect the values and biases of their creators. Interpreting results requires training and judgment. Placing value on certain personality traits will always be controversial. Proceed with caution, research, and awareness.

– Potential new hires can “game” the tests. The main thing a test measures is how adept the subject is at taking the test. People who are determined to get hired, despite any reasons why they shouldn’t, can find ways to manipulate their results.

–Testing can entrench a fixed mindset. “Growth mindset” refers to the attitude that perceived weaknesses present opportunities for improvement. According psychology professor Art Markman, there is a significant risk in testing if it carries the message that skills and characteristics are innate or that people are fixed entities, hardwired from birth for success or failure. Employees deserve the chance to improve over time through their own initiative, which is easier if they don’t think of themselves as fixed data points on a scale.

One tool that the Artisan Creative team uses as a group is the CliftonStrengths Assessment, where we use our top 5 strengths to communicate via a common language on a regular basis.

With decades of experience as creative recruiters, we know hiring is easier when you don’t have to do it alone. Contact Artisan Creative today and leverage our expertise to make your next great match!

 

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 481st issue of our a.blog.

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5 Free Online Courses for Creatives

Wednesday, July 11th, 2018|

Another long, hot summer is upon us! If your business takes on a slower pace and you’re planning to take some time off, we’d like to recommend taking this opportunity to build on your professional skills and enrich your creative awareness by taking free online courses.

Coursera is one of several popular online platforms for massive open online classes (MOOCs). It offers engaging college-level courses in partnership with major universities, in a variety of creative disciplines and new technologies, all free of charge. Along with video lectures and reading material, many of these include tests, graded homework, discussion forums and some offer certificates of completion that add more experience to your resume or LinkedIn profile.

Here are five free creative courses that can give you a professional upgrade.

While predicting the future isn’t easy, there are some core thinking skills and mental models that can help leverage change and prepare for whatever comes next. This knowledge is widely applicable to those who do any sort of creative or entrepreneurial work and need to remain relevant to stay successful.

The essence of “design thinking” is “doing more with less.” This course explores how to pull off brilliant innovations under challenging and shifting circumstances, with ideas that are essential in UX or product design and relevant to anyone in business.

This is the first in Professor Scott Klemmer’s series of classes on interaction design, highly acclaimed by those in UX, information design, and computer science. You’ll learn the basic skills of ideation, research, and rapid prototyping that drive the latest trends in human-centered design, which is the art of working with your users and customers.

Content marketing uses the skills of advertising, branding, storytelling, and journalism to hook audiences and drive conversions. While this class is about communication and messaging strategy, its knowledge applies to anyone who wants to do business in the always-on digital age.

This course takes a serious, analytical look at the cutthroat social dynamics of high school that have inspired comedic films such as Mean Girls. By tackling a taboo topic with rigor and compassion, it has become one of the most popular MOOCs of all time. Its lessons have profound implications in design, in marketing, and across the cultural and professional spectrum.

Besides online courses, this is a great time to revamp your design portfolio and resume with updated information.

At Artisan Creative, we believe that the best opportunities are always reserved for those creative professionals who are most eager to learn. Contact us today to see how we can help you enrich your career and yourself!

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 479th issue of our a.blog.

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America’s Best Recruiting Firms 2018

Wednesday, June 20th, 2018|

We are delighted to have made the Forbes’ list of “America’s Best Recruiting Firms 2018.”

At Artisan Creative, we believe that successful placements change lives. They provide our talent with opportunities for personal and professional growth, and our clients with the right team members to make a difference in their businesses.

We have loved every minute of our 22+ years in the creative staffing and recruitment space. A special thank you to our clients and talent who have shared this journey with us.

This couldn’t have been accomplished without our amazing a.team, who over the years have demonstrated heart, grit, passion, commitment, tenacity, and dedication to create trusted relationships.

Here’s to continuing to build a more creative world together.

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Using Video to Impact Your Brand

Wednesday, May 23rd, 2018|

Whether you’re a small business or an enterprise-level company, there’s one thing you can do that’s just as important as attracting new clients and customers, and that’s attracting top talent. Just as you can use the tools of the internet and social media to communicate your value proposition to potential buyers, you can use them just as well to showcase your brand’s culture and story for potential new hires, the people whose skills and hustle you need to succeed into the future.

A full 82% of Fortune 500 executives don’t believe their companies recruit highly talented people. Attracting top talent gives you a serious competitive advantage. To make an unforgettable first impression, make full use of online video.

You don’t need a Hollywood backlot to create video content that engages highly skilled job seekers. Just keep these tips in mind, and to make your brand a star.

Be Transparent, Be Authentic

Honesty and authenticity work wonders on the internet. Take pride in who you are and what you do. Videos that feature members of your company team will strike a more authentic chord than those with actors or special effects. If you can, shoot in your own offices and facilities, and provide a visual sense of what a day at your company is really like. If you present your company culture in a way that’s fun, true, and realistic, you will attract talent that will be excited to work with you and appreciate the things that make it special.

Approach Potential Hires as Potential Customers

According to Glassdoor, more and more job-seekers are taking a consumer approach to the job hunt, treating it more like comparison shopping. 70% read company reviews before they apply, and most look at multiple competing opportunities before zooming in on one. Therefore, in order for your video to stand out from the competition, it must address the hopes and ambitions of your ideal candidate with empathy and enthusiasm. When planning your video or writing your script, be specific – not every job-seeker will be right for your team or vice versa. Craft your pitch for the ones who are.

Tell Your Story

In order to communicate your brand value, be clear on your mission, your culture, and what sets you apart. Your core principles set the foundation for any message your video will communicate. When you are clear on these, ask yourself, “how can we present our story in an intriguing and memorable way?” Does your company or its founder have a relatable story of risk or overcoming adversity? How are you changing the world? Determine how to tell your story visually, in a way that will stick, and then familiarize yourself with some of the insider tips and best practices of video storytelling.

Be Creative

Be willing to experiment with a fresh, out-of-the-box approach to your video. Check out some of the innovative, reasonably priced tools that are available, and brainstorm different approaches until you decide on the one that best suits your message.

At Artisan Creative, attracting top talent and matching them with career-making opportunities is our mission. Contact us today and discover new ways to elevate your recruiting and put your brand in the limelight.

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 472nd issue of our a.blog.

 

 

 

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