Presentation by SapientNitro

This week’s presentation was by SapientNitro (Toronto office) and was presented by David Han who is the Senior Art Director and a Sheridan graduate, Sonia Janovjak who is the Director of Human Resources (Hiring Manager), and Eiko Kawano, who recently joined the team last March, and is Associate Creative Director (UX focus) and manages a team of Information Architects.

Company Information & Work

SapientNitro has 6 thousand employees globally with a large variety of jobs. The Toronto office has around 200 employees. SapientNitro has end-to-end capabilities. For example, they have the technology and resources to build their idea of an interactive Coke machine from scratch. 

The number one reason why Eiko wanted to work with SapientNitro is that she came up with good ideas, but past firms she worked at couldn’t create them. However, SapientNitro has the resources to technology to make any idea come to life. There is a great diversity of people who can make ideas come to life because of their vast variety of skills sets. SapientNitro prides itself on going beyond expectations and delivering amazing results. As well, the company doesn’t have to outsource many design projects.

SapientNitro focuses on big end projects, print, TV ads, digital, and more. The focus in Toronto is digital. The New York office is full production.

SapientNitro has amazing work and is currently working with Target (huge budget in the millions). Some of their clients include: Nike, Sprint, Sony, Healthy Choice, Talbots, Logitech, Coke, Twix, Foot Locker, Powerade, and more.

Check out SapientNitro's work on YouTube

What are your hours like?

• Employees work all the time, but still have a very balanced lifestyle and value workforce balance.
• You are also given ownership over your work.
• Great ownership = great responsibilities.
• 9 to 5, unless you are out of balance if there is poor time management. What matters is meeting your deadlines.

What is the culture?

• Transparent culture.
• Very collaborative group environment.
• Many employees (junior to senior) are an important part of design projects.
• Opportunity to move office to office.
• On boarding, which are training one-week sessions with global hires (Atlanta, Miami, Toronto, etc). There are workshops and team building exercises where employees have opportunity to meet other people in the company from different offices.

Wanting to work for SapientNitro?

• Need to demonstrate that you are good at talking to people and there is a ton of opportunity to step up and do different things.
• Great experience to build your portfolio and learn as much as you can.
• Lots of opportunity to relocate and work on projects in different states and countries (ex. Germany).
• Many sessions and courses provided in order to grow as a designer. 
• A lot of lifers at SapientNitro, great place to work and currently will have it's 20^th anniversary this year. People like to stay for the growth and positive change.
• Employees always have a voice and can impact change.
• Employees don’t stop growing.
• People want to see you promoted.
• Being a team player is the number one most important.
• Be able to work with all types of personalities and build strong relationships, along with high quality work. 
• Get to work on amazing design projects.

What do you look for?

• Do you fit with the personality of the company.
• Want to see detailed wireframes and the thought process.
• Design fundamentals.
• Strong typography.
• Talk about constraints of the project.
• Some agencies want to see big brands, but SapientNitro is more about its work itself.
• Interested in thinking, discipline, and attention to detail.
• Hobby section in websites (creative expression important).
• Creativity, refreshing, personality, surprising, tangible, passion (ex. If you are from a fine arts background  you should add one or two pieces in your portfolio book).
• Research and prepared, but not aggressive.
• Book portfolio, progress portfolio (they love seeing the process), and a strong portfolio website. 
• The Wow factor.

What attributes are they looking for?

• Ownership and transparencies (it is a collaborative world and if you worked with a group, make sure to tell your exact role. Honesty is key).
• Acknowledge weakness, but talk about how you plan to improve upon it.
• Enthusiasm, passion, and interested in hearing your story.

How do you hire?

• Juniors - target certain recognized academic programs.
• Seniors - target work experience with brands (networking).
• Build network through LinkedIn, Twitter, referrals, and online portfolio.
• Who you know is key. Up to you to build a strong network (ex. past classmates) and go to networking events. 
• Be part of the “art” community. 
• Prepare great questions.
• simplyhired.ca (where SapientNitro puts their ads).

What is the interview process like?

• Typically 4 to 9 interviews.
• Like a very big conversation where you tell your story and show your passion.
• SapientNitro sends you Linkedin profiles of all the people that will be interviewing you.
• The resume has to be an amazing design piece (clean 1 page resume, doesn’t look at cover letters, amazing typography, bullets 60% black compared to type).

About the speakers:

David Han  
Sonia Janovjak 
Eiko Kawano

About the company:

Website
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129 Spadina Ave.

Suite 500
Toronto, Ontario Canada
M5V 2L3 

Tel: +1 (416) 645 1500
Fax: +1 (416) 645 1501

Resume Writing Workshop (Creative Niche Inc.)

This week the class had a Resume Writing Workshop with Creative Niche Inc. presented by Adele Wootton, Director of Client Services, and Stephen Hodges, President. The presentation was very informative about resume writing and ways how to break into the design industry.

A little about Adele and Stephen:
Adele has had over 20 years of advertising industry experience and some of her past jobs include being a print production manager, studio manager, project manager, and account manager. She currently has been a recruiter for 10 years. Stephen has over 20 years of design industry experience and some of his past jobs include being a graphic designer, production manager, and studio manager. He has been in the recruitment industry for 13 years.

A little about Creative Niche:

Creative Niche is a business services agency that matches outstanding advertising, communications, design, marketing, and interactive professionals with their clients’ job opportunities. The company has a team that includes former account service, project management, design, and production professionals.

Creative Niche talked about current market trends, which include:

• digital, interactive, web
• mobile 
• rich internet applications 
• social networking

As well, they talked about how when looking for jobs we should look for obvious job titles (production artist, graphic designer, etc), less obvious (studio manager, production manager, content manager, project manager, etc), and not so obvious (U/X designer, SEO/SEM specialist, online community manager, etc). We also talked about different work environments, such as advertising agencies, design firms, studios, independent contractor, freelancer, and freelancing through recruitment agencies.

Ways of finding work and ways to research:

• through Creative Niche
• general job search websites and publications
• industry-related websites and publications
• social networking
• professional member associations
• potential employer websites
• recruitment agencies

Ways to research for jobs include identifying a list of potential employers, research market trends, consider your needs and goals, and carefully read job descriptions.

How do you assess your skills?

• do an inventory of your skills, abilities, accomplishments, and achievements.
• create sample case studies of your contributions to clients and employers.
• create PARs, which is a great exercise for thinking about your accomplishments. Problem (what challenge did you face), Action (what action did you take to overcome the challenge), Result (what was the result of your effort).

 Other important topics for resume writing:

• how to identify your soft skills (universal skills that your can use for any job, such as patience, sociable, resourceful, and strong communication).
• how to write your objective (quick statement including your title or how your skills can impact the company).
• how to write your experience (ex. being concise and specific about your accomplishments with high-impact statements. An example of a good statement is: secured $200,000 account by creating high-quality mock-ups, storyboards, and editorial communications). 
• writing your education (ex. with over two years experience in the field, don’t put your education at the top and write descriptions of your programs.

Some interesting hints were given for the format and design of the resume:

• determine layout, format, structure, and content.
• should be visibly pleasing and easy to read.
• consider a skills-based vs. chronological resume.
• Number of pages depends on your experience.
• avoid large blocks of colour.
• keep it vertical and 8x11 in size.
• have two versions: word (.doc) and PDF.
• review, proofread, and spell-check your final document.
• ensure grammatical phrasing is consistent.
• check that the design and layout is appropriate for the role and the company.
• save various copies and track where you have applied for jobs.

Overall, Creative Niche gave us a lot of good hints and advice. Some other ways they suggested we break into the industry and stay updated include:

• keep you resume up-to-date and ready.
• stay informed and look forward to industry changes.
• update your technical skills and knowledge.
• continue to participate in portfolio reviews.
• grow a personal network.
• build a great personal brand.
• always ask about the environments, does it fit you?

To Learn More

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Contact Information

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Toronto Head Office 110 Spadina Avenue, Suite 604 Toronto, ON M5V 2K4 t: 416.360.3893 x237 f: 416. 360.0137