It feels like a beginning of a history. I had my first industry interview. It was for a summer internship with a small advertising agency. I recently read a book about advertising that said that times have changed where big firms are no longer economically feasible for most companies. This one is no exception. They have a skeleton staff of four people and hire freelancers depending on the projects they get. (When I read this part, I imagined advertising agencies consisting of minion’s similar to that of the Pirates of the Carribean, walking ghostly designers, just bones and eyewear.)

I was interviewed by the creative director and a lead designer. I had such a clever answer to the prompt “so, tell me about yourself” that fate would have it that they didn’t ask me that. They had highlighted annotated my resume and commented how they visited my sites and found me to be very proactive. The designer highlighted the words “flexible” and “self-starter” from my resume. I read a resume book that said soft qualifications such as these words that can’t really be measured or even proven are half-wanted/half-unwanted. Since I don’t have that much experience, I thought to put a section of words like this to describe myself to employers. I don’t know if I would recommend this feature for everyone’s resume, but it was received favorably this time.

They asked me how I worked with others, how I take feedback, how open to change I am and how I can be proactive. I thought these were very valid questions and I appreciated how they asked questions that mattered.

My schooling definitely prepared me for this experience. They threw around industry words like “collateral” and “deliverables” and talked about mapping to the creative brief.

I spoke with the principal for some forty minutes and he regaled me with what his company stood for. He said the word “marketing” a few times too many for me to be comfortable. I always imagine direct mail or some archaic annoyance like that when I hear the word “marketing.” My first and only communications job was “marketing” fiber optic cable internet door to door in Kirkland. He clarified that marketing was his way of saying that though he does advertising; his goal is to improve the customer’s sales. He isn’t after fancy design awards but rather serving the client’s needs. When he said it like that, he mentioned how Apple has amazing marketing. I asked him what the percentage of work at his company is creative—I know, “creative” is a nebulous term. He replied gracefully that it can be pretty creative if you consider that coming up with creative solutions often less will be more and it’s the elegance of the solution that will drive how “creative” a project ends up being.

He told me a sad story about how he pitched to a client an innovative idea that was diminished by compromise and at the end, the opening of the branded restaurant took place and the client sighed and said “We blew it, didn’t we?” Marketing is a huge part of advertising, not just reaching customers but persuading your client that this idea that you cooked up for them and with them is truly worth working toward.