Hi, in 2021, I led the organising team for Career Nights, a series of events that focus on bringing design students closer to working life. Usually done as a panel discussion, our team invited various professional designers and asked them questions related to how they got to where they are today, their design careers and their future ambitions. The events are usually followed up by an informal discussion and questions from the audience, as well as a networking session. In 2021, we organised two of these events, each one attended by around 50-60 people.
<aside> 💡 This portfolio entry is about a 7-10 minute read.
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Our first event, Career Nights #1, was focused on Innovation, Experience and Fashion Design. We (and the audience) learned valuable insights into how to sell yourself, design portfolios, networking and creating your passion (by almost falling off the edge) as well as many details and tips for individual careers.
Before the event, I was searching for panellists, creating the social media posts, renting the venue and sending out the graphics. We managed a list of interesting individuals through an Excel file, then we took turns messaging them through LinkedIn and E-mails, As we had set a strict limit beforehand for the number of panellists (2), this was the bottleneck in our search, as we had to wait for the response of people before sending out the next set of emails. Ultimately, we found our first participant, Head of Experience Design at BOND Martin Mohr. The graphics were finished shortly after that, as we needed to send out the invitation at least a week before the event happening (this is also why Martin is the only guest on the invitation graphic). A few days before the event, we also got confirmation from Sasu Kauppi, a self-employed Fashion Design entrepreneur.
Additionally, I was also introducing the participants at the event and acting as the event host, although I was not the one facilitating the panel. As a learning experience, Career Nights #1 was immensely valuable, as I learned the ins and outs of event organising and public speaking.
In Career Nights #2, I was a part of the panel. Beforehand, I created a discussion guide for myself, structuring out how much time I would spend on each of the sections of the panel - introduction, pivotal career moments, values and secrets and future (found under this section).
The search for the participants here was much more successful, as we did not set an official limit for the amount of panellists, allowing us to send out more invitations at the same time. This time, the topic of the event was Service and Experience Design. We had three amazing participants from different design teams: Design Director Lotta Julkkunen from Hellon, Lead Service Designer Anni Leppänen from Helsinki City and Experience Design Lead Kaisa Ruotsalainen from Pentagon. Although the job descriptions for all of the participants would be similar, they each came from such different companies - one focused on mentoring and consultancy, other in the public sector and the third one a design agency.
During the panel, I kept track of the panellists’ answers and important points on my notebook, so as to bring them up in the summary afterwards, as I was also acting as the host - opening and closing the event, introducing the people (section labelled ‘Introductory words’ in the discussion guide) and facilitating the discussion with the audience. In essence, the whole experience had taught me how to manage discussion between people effectively and how to induce people to give lengthy, meaningful answers that provide long-term value for the audience.
