In-house opportunities haven’t historically been a designer’s first choice of career move, so it’s important to approach this hiring activity in the right way.
Having helped a range of brands hire digital designers, I can offer a few top tips to consider when you are looking to attract the best digital designers to your in-house team.
Think from the candidate’s perspective
Having a great brand or product is obviously a good place to start, but that alone may not sell your role to the best designers out there.
How does this role develop the candidate’s skills? And how does it stack up against other opportunities that they may potentially be exploring?
One of the traditional misconceptions digital designers hold about working client-side is that they’d be working on the same product with the same style for a long period of time. This isn’t always true; plenty of client-side roles offer real variety (sometimes more so than agencies if you end up on one account) and it’s important to communicate this.
If your company is offering the opportunity for designers to work across multiple work-streams and platforms, or the chance to work on digital rebrands, develop new visual styles, or to play a part in conceiving entirely new products or services – then you should most definitely shout about it!
These are really attractive opportunities for designers, and it’s worth bearing in mind that a large proportion of digital designers would rather join a small or “less well known” company offering a lot of these deliverables than a larger company offering very few of them.
Create the right kind of partnerships with recruitment consultancies
Whilst they are not used by every single business, the right recruitment consultancy can be an incredibly powerful ally in helping you attract the right digital designers for your business. If you are using one, it’s really important to build the right kind of partnerships with them.
Where possible, it’s beneficial for both parties to have a face-to-face meeting. Whilst it’s great to put a face to a name, see the work space and get a feel for the culture, the conversation should go a little deeper. From the recruiter’s perspective, the meeting is a chance to understand how projects are delivered, and where digital is heading in your business.
It’s also an excellent opportunity for you to get their buy-in and motivation to work hard for you in promoting your role to the best designers out there who may not currently believe that in-house is for them.
In creating a partnership with the right kind of agency who ‘get’ how digital works within your company, you will have a strong brand advocate who can help deliver the digital designers that you’re looking for.
For more on how to hire talent as a startup, check out Jon Wall’s article here and David Mitchell’s article on nailing the recruitment process here.
Toby is a digital creative & design consultant at Futureheads recruitment. He’s worked in the design industry for 3 years, and has helped start-ups, agencies, and established brands to hire top digital design talent.