We see it often in the entertainment industry: actor becomes singer; athlete becomes actor; singer becomes producer; producer becomes music industry mogul.
Why do we in the design and building industry feel that once we choose a career, we’re locked into it for life – destined to do the same thing year after year until we retire? Through your college education, on the job training, years of work experience, volunteering and hobbies, you've gained a host of transferrable skills, and most likely, an insight that others may not have. How can another segment of the building industry - or even a completely different industry - benefit from your experience?
3 comments:
This is so true and something professionals should think about. The sign of the times are showing professionals today that in order to continue success we need to continue to improve and grow. This means expand in to others professional related (or unrelated) areas for many of us. If we are not growing, learning new things and expanding we will soon find that we have eliminated ourselves from being useful in our professions which may lead to unemployment.
This is exactly what I've done with my business. When I started my company in 2001, I offered web design on my web site only because I was interested in it myself. When one of my clients asked if I also did print graphic design, I took on the small project and asked the printer lots of questions. After many years of learning along the way and taking on larger and larger graphic design projects, and especially in this slow economy where building projects are very sparse, I do more graphic design than architecture and I'm very thankful that I diversified. If I hadn't, I'd be struggling for sure right now. Instead, I'm busier than ever. I apply the same design exploration and production phases and project management skills that I learned in architecture to my other design projects and it's worked out great. I also learned something interesting completely by accident: there aren't a lot of repeat clients in architecture, but a single graphic design client can have many, many different design, layout, and advertising projects. Even if the projects are smaller, it's nice to have the regular work and foster a nice relationship with regular clients.
Rob Cummings, designer of buildings and lots of other stuff
Studio Equis, LLC
(313) 530-8002
Rob,
The evolution of your firm is a great example. Thank you for sharing the experience.
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