Guest Speaker - Tom Evans

Top tips for getting into the digital industry:

8 years experience. - Freelance creative.
- No experience is bad experience.
- Be able to sell yourself in a sentence.
- Be diverse, don't put eggs in one basket.
- Don't expect to get a job instantly, be prepared to put in a lot of effort.

WORK EXPERIENCE!!!
- Email plenty of companies, work on projects, new portfolio stuff, ask for unpaid work experience -> good to put on CV to show that your not sitting around.
- Work experience gives you the chance to decide what sort of company you want to work for e.g: Huge with big projects or small with dedicated projects.

MAKE AN EFFORT!!!
- Meet people
- Ask for extra briefs
- Go to the pub when they do
- Start up conversations
- Make an impression
- Bond with people, go out of your way to make relationships

DONT EXPECT YOUR FIRST JOB TO BE GLAMOROUS!!!
- Odds are you'll work as a junior member of a much larger team
- People will tell you how to do things, suck it up and put up with it
- Show people you can do everything to a high standard and you can do what you are told
- Its your chance to be seen as a professional
- You will climb the ladder and get promoted

PRACTICE BEING FAST!!!
- The more you push yourself the more you will learn
- Be a sponge
- Keep learning all the time
- People love talking about their passion, exploit that
- Keep asking about the things your interested in and you will move closer to it

THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU WANT!!!
- Don't be afraid to take a step back and think about what it is you truly want to do
- Do your research and find about the choices you have
- There are more roles than you know

LEARN TO TALK!!!
- Being able to talk about your work and explain it professionally is a key skill
- Listen to people talk, learn from it
- Learn to write and know your audience
- Do your research on the agency that you want to apply for
- Tailor your portfolio to fit each agency

BE PROACTIVE!!!
- Don't sit around waiting for people to come to you
- Anything off of your own back looks good on your portfolio
- Join competitions, win or lose it looks good on your portfolio
- Meet interesting people
- Go to networking events, talk to people in industry, show an interest in what they represent
- Don't talk about yourself too much, listen to everything they have to say
- Print business cards off to take to events