The Road Less Travelled - Unconventional routes into Careers in Design

One of the things I love about the design industry is that you can find so many different routes to becoming a designer.

I recently led a panel discussion with somebody who used to be a rocket scientist and then became an interior designer as well as somebody who studied law and theology, became a mum and then got into interior design and ended up winning a TV interior competition too.?

And then there’s me, who used to be a project manager and business analyst and after an epiphany moment during a millinery course, I became fascinated by colour and I’m now a worldwide authority and consultant in behavioural design with a best-selling book.???

The routes into design I’ve just mentioned are by women I invited to join me on a panel discussion, interior designers Justine Guillermou and Tara Rodrigues, called?The Road Less Travelled - Unconventional routes into Careers?at New Designers a couple of weeks ago?at the Business Centre London.?

We shared our unique and diverse roots to creating the careers and businesses that we have now.?

This conversation is going to be particularly useful and fruitful for you if you're someone who is an emerging design talent and not yet sure which field to go into, or you want to go out and start your own business, or you want to make a career change into design.???

This conversation was incredibly uplifting and inspiring and we had so many people saying “so inspiring”, “you’ve really encouraged me to keep going”, “so many great ideas.”???

Here are some of the specific things we talked about in our panel discussion:

• What was the?defining moment?that propelled us to want to switch careers?
• How?we?dealt with?the response from family and friends?
• The?challenges?we faced along the way?
• What were some of our?career highlights?
• We shared our?number #1?piece of advice for someone starting out in their design or creative career.

I'm so delighted that New Designers gave me the go-ahead for this panel discussion because I could tell from the response in the room that we really touched a chord.

From someone who’s in the design industry and worked their way up from zero, as most people in business do, it was so fulfilling to give inspiration and real practical tips to support starting designers or people looking to get into the field and give them ideas for the variety of ways they can do that.?

Link to the recording?

If you'd like to listen to our conversation, here’s the link to the free recording?https://www.newdesigners.com/the-road-less-travelled-talk/?

If you are someone who is starting out I would love to hear what your biggest challenges are. I'm creating some new resources behind the scenes and I would be really interested to hear what you would like to know as you move forward in your design career.

Just hit reply and let me know?and I’ll response personally.

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Colourfully Yours,

Karen

p.s.?Here's the?link to listen back to the recording.