 Hello, welcome and thank you for joining the second of three UX design industry night panels. My name is Christina Peter. I'm the manager of credential programs at Emily car university continuing studies. Industry nights offer recent graduates and current students of the user experience design program valuable insights into industry, as they start on new and exciting career paths. We also want to welcome members of the broader Emily car community who have been joining us yesterday and today as well. This event is hosted by Emily car continuing studies, and I'm joining this event today from the unseeded territories of the Musqueam Squamish and slave with tooth nations. I'm grateful to live, work and connect with you from the territories of the Coast Salish peoples, but also through online portals we may be connecting across many different traditional territories and lands. In these digitally mediated times, it is more important than ever to connect back to the land. So I encourage you to also take a moment to acknowledge the land on which you live and learn. Today's panel offers insights into UX internships requirements best practices for application and interview interview processes, what to prepare for and what to expect. UX internships offer valuable opportunities to experience real challenges of design work, whether applying to work with a specific company industry design team or location internships are competitive and require preparation. Joining today to share their insights are guests Bob Warner, Michelle Yao and Leon Zhang. So I'm going to turn it over to the panelists, starting with Bob to give their introductions. Hello hello. It's good to be here thank you for having me. I'm calling in from you clue that BC. I'm one of the people who migrated during the pandemic. So I moved out here from Vancouver last year and I've been here for a year and loving it. So, a little bit about myself. I went back to school in my 30s I used to work in film and kind of had a wall that was a lot of a lot of work man so and I always wanted to go to Emily Carr so I applied I got in and so that's when I went back to get my interaction degree. So, after that, when graduating I wanted to know. I wasn't sure where to go but I knew I wanted it to be a name. I was thinking like enterprise business my idea was like I want to work at Google so if I could get in a tech company that's known. It'll be like a step to there. So in Vancouver that was SAP. So I started as an intern, and then was a UX design specialist there where I got to work in data analytics. At that point, you know I was just trying to establish myself, but I figured out that I, my previous work experience helps so being a returning student and having some experience in the business world really helped. And I also learned that I really like complex problems. So to be able to dig in and solve those types of problems really kind of set me on my trajectory. So after that, I ended up going to progress, which is a fintech company. They do loan management, and I was a senior designer there. So I got to help build their design system from the ground up, and it really kind of challenged me to expand into systems thinking and to think about the broad application that we were working on. This is the first time that I ever got to really do design interviews. So it was sort of my proving ground to be able to start talking to people seeing how people hold interviews what design challenges are like. And there was a really great design challenge that they brought to the table the architect had one, which was to design a parking lot, which was so outside of left field because it wasn't a digital challenge, but it really did show how people think they're a problem. I got that on with me into my next company. So I also in the meantime, have done some session instruction at Emily Carr so it was really fun to be back at university and helping out there with some teaching. There I learned that it's so helpful to be able to say what's normal and what's not. So, through experience you can look back and when somebody says, Oh, this is happening and I can, I can't believe it. It's nice to hear, you know, that's normal that this will happen. It's okay, here's some things you can do to work through that so that was something that stood out to me when I went back because I know I was that person freaking out in university. And so, after that I landed that copper leaf so copper leaf helps companies make decisions on how they spend their money is to have some technologies that are built in that that help them make some of these complex decisions. So the senior designer, then became a lead and I'm now a design manager for the core product. So, it's fun because you know I continue to be breaking down really, really big problems. And recently in a manager role it's been interesting because people people have complexities as well. So, that's been kind of fun. I've also been a key hiring manager for for our area. It's interesting to be able to kind of do that on a regular basis, and get to know sort of the ins and outs of hiring. So, for hiring it's been fun to kind of learn about case studies what's important in case studies see how people present to be able to kind of know when when they're out as being someone you'd want to hire. And just to realize also like I don't care if they mess up really I more care about how they recover. So it's, it's for me, the realization has been that I don't strive for perfection I strive for honesty. And so that's sort of what I hired hired to as well so it's, it's more of a better quality for me to see someone struggle a bit and then be honest about it and and show how they can be supported in that then to, you know, collapse and failure. Yeah, and the big thing that stood out to me too is that everybody who gets to that hiring stage usually knows the basics. So what I'm usually looking for is is things around the basics so research insights. Are they able to really get the right context and do they work with user stories and what are their leadership skills like and do they have a growth mindset. So, these events and interesting things that I've watched and kind of learned along the way. I'm still at Copperleaf, and I'm pretty happy there and I'm really happy to be here. Thanks so much Bob that was a great start. I'm going to pass it on to Michelle next. Thanks Bob for the great intro and then I prepare a little thing so just going to present. Hello, my name is Michelle and then for title wise, I, I just realized I put a wrong thing here. Anyway, so my title usually like designer and founder. I got a startup from Boston called Jocked. So it's a already job recruiting platform so I work on the employer side. I was the founding designer which means like, yeah so the also the first hire in Canada. So it was pretty interesting process I'll walk you out of you through a little bit later. And then for like on the side of, oops, I also run a nonprofit or, well, it's not profit right now I'll explain that a little bit later too. So, just a little more a little bit about me. I was born and raised in Beijing and then live in UK and USA a little bit, but before I settled down in Vancouver for school. I was a person with a lot of ideas because I studied idea. I study interaction design and electronic arts. So I did a master for like the program called master of design in Emily card back in 2017. So I'm graduated around two years ago out by then actually there's like interdisciplinary which means you don't actually have a direction but my direction mostly focus on media art and electronic arts. So sometimes during the day people thought I'm kind of like this is my day to day very like iconic that's seeking notes on the wall that's UX designer life like for like potentially your glamorous LinkedIn profile what kind of company you worked in. So what I'm actually passionate about this was how I look like basically most of the time when I was at Emily car. It was the best two years of my life it was really exhausting. I think at least 50% of the days I'm staying there until school close. So I'm like soldering burning a lot of things. But that's what media art is like and then I'm always passionate about that. So in some past projects I made outside from my design career I thought it just important part of who I am and then as a creative individual myself. Yeah, so this one it's mostly I know we wanted to talk about internships. So I'm, I just wanted to keep it short. I know like most people probably only see these two from like LinkedIn and Microsoft I interned. I took a look at like a bird's eye view. It took a long journey for me from like from 18 to what I'm or who I am right now like 2526 to become an industrial alumni. All the way, I was a freshman in college. So how's the journey was like, so I guess just wanted to say there's a lot of up and downs. So in real time you might see like, it says M desk first year is this like a little crying face because I couldn't find anything in Vancouver when I first moved here. And then it was like very, very, that's pretty for me and then I felt very lonely, and then just I used to watch a YouTube tutorial. And that episode, I remember very clear one day I failed an interview, I went home and then I watched that video again so that's like that's the episode of the designer encouraging everyone just to keep designing they will be better opportunities they will be better and I just like crying with my cat watching that for a good amount of time. So yeah so just to wanted to also to encourage everyone just to keep designing and then there's a lot of potential paths you can take, even from that, from that crying face I could potentially that time I was offered from a branding internship actually but I didn't take it, but looking back there's a lot of potential. And if I ended up taking that are probably not going to go down the password like UX product slang or probably in New York City or Toronto doing creative direction right now. So um yeah it's been a short journey. But like, looking back, it's a very interesting journey as well. Yeah, and I'm really glad to be here today. And then I'll pass on to Leo. Thank you so much Michelle. I think that was both of these acts were quite hard to follow but I'll do my best. Okay, so can everyone see my screen alright. Yes. Okay, so I'll start and since I'm going last, I'll make sure I do my best to control the time here. My name is Leon. I saw I'm from the University of Washington, I'm doing a five year program there so I wouldn't exactly call it masters but it's a little bit of a special I guess version of the bachelor's interaction design program that often there. A little bit about myself. I'm also from the PNW area similar to Michelle I originally grew up in Beijing and then I came here for college. So that's a little bit about myself. But of course I know for today's panel we're mostly talking about like internship and turn into the word transitioning from student into industry. So I won't talk too much about my education background. But I do want to build off of what Michelle just said, there is going to be a lot of up and downs. So I'll briefly move forward to my work experience here. There's a bunch of up and downs that on your LinkedIn on your resume, you know we try to show the best of ourselves so you might say like oh this is also glamorous, you know these people like how how how did they do it. But you'll see through the this mini presentation that it's not really like that. Obviously we're trying to show the best of ourselves when we're applying to jobs but having these ups and downs will be super normal. I remember one time when a hiring managers asked me what's your greatest like UX, not UX but like what's your superpower, and I said, I'm really good at being a failure. And I played to that because I think that's true right people who don't know how to kind of learn from their failures. I don't want to use that word so I guess setbacks, they will really grow as a designer and as designers I think it's really important that we always keep that learning my stuff. So bouncing back a little bit. Currently I'm working on Expedia. Last summer I was in turning at Amazon so I'm also a bit newer to my career. I think a lot of you might know me for writing some articles I think that might be one of the initial reasons why people were reaching out to me. This is one of the more kind of well known articles to help people with internships. So going back to this experience, even though I've been a student, something I am quite proud of is I try really hard to find these work opportunities, even when I'm still going to school right. And I think right now, because of COVID and remote work there are more opportunities than before. So that's always something we can try to leverage. Before COVID, I interned back in Beijing. My first internship was at the design firm called Uniway where we work with some large clients such as Neo and Huawei before all the complications. I'll talk a little bit about my VR experience as well since I know that's something people might be curious of and kind of big tech. Amazon Expedia is something I have some more experience with. This was kind of my first design intern experience or real industry experience. This is back in 2017-2018. I want to highlight this one here because you can see this one was like an exhibit design thing, very different from UX, but I think it's important to know that when we're kind of new to our career. It's totally okay to try to do things that you might feel like don't exactly fit into what you want to do. It's just because when you're so new to your career, everything is a learning experience and eventually when you're a bit more down the road, you'll find that all these thoughts start to tie together. So when I'm working on this exhibit design, I have to work a lot with 3D people, 3D modelers, people who interact with things in unity, and a lot of that really helped out later when I'm doing my VR work. Yeah, so talking a little bit about my VR work, Sword Reverie is my main creative outlet for that, and it was really interesting because for Sword Reverie, we launched a Kickstarter a few years ago. It was really successful. This is kind of like how the game looked just for some context, and this was something I really took ownership on. So I won't go into this too much, but what I want to emphasize with this was I only had that opportunity because that year was the year where my internship at Google was canceled. And that was something I felt like was a huge setback. Obviously, I worked really hard to try to get that internship and trying to deal with the canceled internship was something I think I wasn't really able to prep for COVID was super out of the ordinary. But because of learning from that, I'm trying to like, I guess take whatever opportunities I can. And I was able to learn a lot more by launching Kickstarter with the team, right, because I got to learn more about business, taking ownership, working with a lot tighter constraints, right, trying to make an impact and how to launch something that, you know, can really be successful. We were fully funded in 72 hours being one of the top 10 funding titles. So, all that being said, I'm sure there's going to be a lot more questions about some of those experiences and some of the internship application details, so I'll save that for the Q&A. But yeah, thanks everyone. Thank you so much, everybody. That was a really great introduction for this panel. I've been furiously writing some notes down to continue following up on what you've all mentioned here. So I do want to go into some of the questions that we've prepared for you first. In any particular order, if anybody wants to just jump in. So, with both big names and tech. So we've seen that some of you worked with Amazon with Google, but also there have been opportunities with startup companies and just smaller kind of independent projects that you can work on. When you have all of these different competing opportunities or there's just like such a broad spectrum of opportunities, offering internships, etc. How can prospective interns or new graduates decide which to apply for. I can give my perspective. I think something to consider is that there are a few categories that you could choose. So when I was thinking about it I was thinking about enterprise versus agency versus contract versus entrepreneurial like I actually wasn't thinking entrepreneurial at the time I didn't have that mindset but that's something you could do as well. So it matters. Most of the people who I knew who chose a category are still in that category. So, if you went to the agency often what you end up doing is creating artifacts that defend you in that category so it builds and builds and builds so think about where you want to go. There's pros and cons to either both in like salary and also in autonomy and visual design so it's worth considering if any of those appeal to you. It's not a cliff. It's more of a hill. So you can change, but just know that your choices do matter. And remote changes everything so you can kind of think a bit broader. I think you're not really stuck to your area and we found it's even harder to hire at this point because it's just kind of spread around the planet. So do think about that. Look outside think about what time zone you want to work in and then check that out. The goal culture matters so if you're really like go ultimately when I was doing an internship you the goal is you want to get hired so think about a company that you're really interested in staying at because you might want to plant there. The other thing is to to consider what your values are so this is something that you do early on. It can actually help guide a lot of your decisions along the way. I can course correct like often when I was frustrated in my career, I would go back to my values and I'd realize okay well I'm not feeling a sense of community or I don't have the autonomy that I wanted. So that's something if you start now and get those written down it'll actually be really a really big help for you as you're, as you're starting out. And sometimes it's not the right fit. So this is the thing when I was first starting I was like, oh man I got to get this job but, but it's sometimes it just isn't the right job. One of the things to remember is that you're, you're amazing and you're bringing a huge amount of talent and growth and there's an opportunity there. So you should also be interviewing the company. So I think we often forget that that like, we have to like prove ourselves to them but in a way you're still choosing where you want to go. And so a lot of times it's nice when you get these challenging questions back because you're like oh they know who they are and they know what they're looking for and that's something that's kind of interesting it's a different. It's a different thing that you might get from somebody who's applying to an internship so those are some things that might help guide you and give you a bit of an advantage from my perspective. Oh, great. So two things I want to build off a bit more of what Bob said, kind of from a more applicant perspective is I think having a long term mindset versus a short term one is really important. So, I know a lot of people, you know, this is a stressful experience I'm not going to lie right right a lot of articles about this when I help students. Depending on your, I think personal style, you might be someone who kind of sleeps better at night if you feel like I applied to every job out there so this is who I am that might be your style, definitely do it. On the other hand you might be someone who says you know I really know I want to do this one specific thing. So I'm going to try my best to learn all about that. Do you all the networking and just try to focus on this one mystery. So, you know there's a lot of different styles out there. But regardless of what your plan is, you should have a long term kind of mindset right. If you have your own maybe like a creative firm in five to 10 years, or do you want to work in big tech, maybe be a senior designer individual contributor, having those will definitely affect your short term kind of planning and I guess decision making. One suggestion I would give is, if you're really just someone who wants to get that first work experience. Of course, don't be too picky. I'm sure you have a lot of talent. Mutual selection is really important, I want to build off that a little bit later, but right now if this is really the first work experience. I don't want you to think that I like for example, if I say I want to be a UX designer at a big tech, and then you don't have the offer that you think is appealing. Should that mean that you shut every, every option out. I don't think so. And I think from my own experience right, a lot of that early kind of career opportunity will feed into one another short changing tracks later on. Like Bob said could present some challenges, but having some experiences always better than nothing. That's something I would definitely emphasize my first work experience back in China for the design firm. It's a really competitive firm in China Beijing. The pay was 100 RMB per day. So that's about $10, maybe $15 USD per day of work, which is, you know, very not ideal to many I would say but I get to learn a lot right. So to me that's a great experience. And the last point I will say is mutual selection is really important. Even if, you know, you're someone who feels like I'm not too confident yet, I don't have too many experiences yet. Don't sell yourself short. When you're chatting with these companies when you're making the decisions. Even if you're new to the industry, you should always feel like I'm kind of in charge of my own future, you know, it's very important, whether you're in a role or when you're still applying for role. You should know what you want. You shouldn't wait for someone to tell you what's best for you so if you think the company, even it might be well known it might be a big brand. If you feel like that's not the right fit for you, you know, don't be afraid to have those concerns. So I think mutual selection is something. When you do have the offers, you should definitely think about but before you kind of move to that point. Definitely also be open minded don't be too picky so it's a very balanced everyone I think should kind of consider that. Yeah, I think Bob and Leon already cover a good amount of that. I just thinking about the question. Honestly, I didn't get to choose when I was a student. Most of the time I don't have the chance to choose it because even. Yeah, I think for me, just looking back, I will just encourage everyone to try as many as you could. I guess that's a little bit contradicts to what the other two like has said but that's basically I guess depends on your personality and also the kind of life you want. And for me just looking back if I haven't done my very first design gig or even not internship was like when I was like 18 first, like freshman year I was taking some freelance and gig from for my cousins online store literally like do some photography shooting built out a website for him, and I got paid. So, later on, I went to like two startups I did two different roles for like visual design first and then UX design after, and I tried a product manager role, like then actually. So, just also like try different roles and try different skill companies. For me if I didn't try out like bigger tech in the smaller startups, I wouldn't know I'm not passionate to tech. So that's why I didn't chose going back to tech for my first full time job. I went forward to creative studio. So like, I think it's always try to keep yourself just like don't limit yourself or what kind of thing you can do. So even I'm not from graphic design background at all I didn't even know how to use illustrator properly but I got a branding and like creative agency offer to so I'm just focus on what you really love and to think about what match what's your passion about and what matters to you so I think that's the most important But I do want to mention like I do think those two big tech internship I did although I didn't enjoy it. We can talk about that later, but that's literally looking back that was kind of like the pivot point for my career. So if you do have the chance try it out. Maybe you'll hate it like I did. I think the beauty for internship is low attachment and low commitment the worst thing that can happen it just like four months or a month maximum you can just like not doing it anymore not taking the return offer if it doesn't work well. If it does work well well congratulations you're already kind of like found something you like, but it doesn't work for everyone. So, if you didn't happen to like some experience, at least you know like next time you choose where next time you have to make a choice for like long term commitment for full time job you'll learn learn that a lot better. Michelle I just want to quickly add on to your point. I do also think like for me personally I was someone who I think for the first time around a few years ago when I was only applying. When I was in my camera butcher of college but that year I didn't apply to that many. And I think when I got the offer from Google. I was very happy and I didn't have any other applications and I think that's also why when COVID hit, you know the position got closed. That kind of hit me extra hard because even though it's technically not my fault, I still feel like I didn't do what I guess I could have foreseen it and maybe done something else. So, for me personally I would say I agree with you like applying to every role out there, or you know applied to all the ones you think you're interested in is a great thing to do, especially when you're early on in your career so don't feel like there's anything wrong with doing that. The other thing I want to say is like, depending on your like, you know, this is a very real world we live in right like you might have these personal constraints, you might not have, you might need to sponsor visa. So maybe looking to a big tech is going to be a bit easier for you right because big tech companies are going to be more lenient and more willing to sponsor your visa. Depending on some other things, whether your financial situation you might really want to get a higher pay to save up a down payment for house so like there's always these other concerns. And that's never anything to be ashamed of you know like we're all human we all have other constraints so yeah just want to add that little bit. Thank you so much everybody for sharing your insights. We did actually have a question from somebody. Leon already responded but I think it builds into some other questions that we had prepared so maybe I'm going to weave them together a little bit here. So, my question to you is in your experience. What would you, what kind of advice would you give for making the most out of an internship so regardless of whether you're actually enjoying it. Maybe you have an experience similar to Michelle where you didn't like the internship or you realize that this was not the right place for you. In those kinds of cases. What would you do to make sure that you're getting the most out of it for yourself. Yeah, maybe I can go first on this. I remember very clear that was. This is not an advertisement for Microsoft but I think that was like value prop or something Microsoft written on my first orientation day so I think it perfectly covered how you're going to make most of this like try new things. And then secondly, wait, I think it just blanked out. I think lastly was, oh yeah, learn from others, try new things, lastly embrace the journey so learn from others very just like straightforward. So you're going to meet a lot of like peers might be a little bit when it's virtual. So make it the most use of it, try to network with as many people as you could. It could be someone within your group outside your group, even like someone you're not like working day to day with that's a great chance to get to know people and also like assess the company. Do you want to work here long term in the future so that's a great point to start so and try new things is definitely, I think, no matter it's like you like the job itself or not. It's always a good opportunity to try something you never tried before so if you happen to like you don't know how the things working that's a great chance to try it out. And lastly embrace the journey it's basically just them. I guess like good or bad try to enjoy it and take that as an experience if it's good then we call it. It's like it's it's a fortunate to to be in somewhere you actually really enjoy you like the and you say if it's not that's the experience to so um yeah I guess that's kind of like that might just take away from the how to make it most of it. Do you have anything you want to add to that. Yeah, sure I can throw some things in there. So, I would, I wish I had gotten a mentor early. So I had, I had my leads that I would run things through but a mentor really does make a big difference so doesn't have to be at your company but look at who you can have as a mentor and work with that person to improve so might also want to get a buddy at your some works assign a buddy but if you can say like hey, I'm new here can I can I work jam with you on some of my designs you can book like a couple hours sessions with them if they have time. That can help you kind of skip a lot of steps sometimes when you're working next to someone you can kind of see how they work through things. Also be clear about what you want to learn so you know moving into work you you set your agenda, you sort of need to set your professional development goals so. If you would like research then make sure that your lead knows that you like research and you want to try to find some things like that, especially an internship really you should be kind of spread into areas where you want to grow. So think about that and be prepared to talk about that. You might consider booking meetings with the people on your team sometimes it's a little timid and you're like I don't know I got to join these things but it's you know, like I said it's up to you so you can get to know these people and say hi and go for a coffee so it shows initiative and you kind of set it at your own pace and and you really kind of settle yourself in. You, one thing you might consider too so usually companies have a matrix that allows you to move from level 1234. And when you're coming into the co op you're sort of below the level one. So you could work with your team lead to assess where you are based on a level one. And you could actually spend your internship training into level one, so that when you leave you feel like you could kind of be capable at their, their matrix. So that's something you all these things you could kind of initiate and ask for. And a big one for me is that there, there ultimately is a shift in mindset so when we get out of university we're sort of trying to approve. I was trying to prove myself I was like I'm a designer, I'm working at this company, I'm finally doing it and it's kind of freaked me out a lot and so there's a, for me there was a tendency to be timid and to not really give my point of view and to really just kind of, there's there's an element of growth that happens, but at some point there has to be that switch where you become a designer with a point of view. So I think in your co op, the real big trick is if you can start to realize what your point of view as a designer and think about how you can speak to your point of view and why you believe in your design decisions. And that will help you when you finally kind of land as a, as a designer. So that's sort of a mindset thing that can continue on even, even into your designer face so the more you know about it and the more you can look at it address it. At least you kind of you end up being above it and not fully controlled by it. So soft skills are really important to so most of the people who are starting as an intern know the basics of design. And so you're, you really could dig in and understand what the corporate the company's meeting etiquette is how they do documentation to make sure things aren't lost, what sort of mechanisms are there for context gathering and stakeholder management. How do you communicate risk. All these things would help you outside of being able to do wireframes with iterate. Also, you like the company be clear, say I want a job when this is done. What can I do to get that like it's often, often where they're sort of I was afraid to say it. And it was near the end that I realized like you almost have to like just claim it so don't be afraid to do that if you really like where you are be clear say say you want to stay. Quick, quick wrap up. So I think for this question, going back to the original question of kind of making the most of the internship. I think I really depend a little bit about what kind of role you're in what's the company structure. I think the example Bob gave was really great. I think, you know, aligns with a lot of what I think I took away from interning at Amazon. You know, at these big tech companies, there's these structures by Amazon has these leadership principles for those who of you who might have intern interviewed or work at Amazon right. We talk about like learning be curious we talk about have a backbone disagree commit so I think those were two points. Bob just mentioned and during our internship at Amazon those will be things that your mentor you know kind of works with you a lot to kind of learn, but I think that really applies to a lot of companies. And I also want to emphasize that even when you're not working or interning at a big tech company. There's still a lot to learn and a lot to grow and I would even argue that you're kind of learning different things. When I was working with the indie game company sort of every very small startup base in Seattle. And when I'm in that role, I kind of was a solo designer at one point. And you really get to wear multiple hats so it's a very different learning experience than working on a big tech right big tech very well structured like Bob said clear matrices you're expected to feel these roles you're expected to learn these things. Of course you can do better than expectation, but you know the structure is usually pretty clear. It's a smaller startup company. A lot of times you get thrown a bunch of random stuff one day you might be making them a random website one day you might be making some you know ads like maybe your title is a UX designer but you know you get to learn a lot more about the business at the product. So yeah, it really depends on your style. And I think depending on where you're at, you should always kind of be grateful for the opportunity. There's a lot of those like brasses green on the other side situations. So just try to avoid that. Learn whatever you can at your role, because there's always tons to learn I guarantee it. Whatever kind of experience you are at currently. Thank you so much everybody. I want to come back to something that I think both Michelle and Leon touched on in their in their introductions which was about the up and down trajectory, you know you're not always landing in the place that you expected or you know it takes an unusual path. And then how that appears to the public right if we're looking at our LinkedIn profiles. You know it shows only a certain amount of what it is that we did to get to where we are now. I think showing the best of ourselves I think is how Leon put it, and this ties into the question that was in the Q&A as well where we have someone who doesn't have a career yet, and doesn't have the confidence with their resume so I'm wondering if folks on the phone could talk a little bit about shaping that story you know, thinking about applying for internships or applying for those entry level jobs, and wanting to capitalize on previous experience that might not be the one to one ratio that we're expecting that to check all the boxes right, but like what is a strategy that we can use to tell the best story when we're applying for those jobs and standing out amongst all of the applicants. I can try to go first since I think I answered that I think the original question was from uni. I'm so sorry. So, and then building off of what Chris Christina said I'll try to answer them three parts first part being those definitely were packed questions the first part being like your experience not being one to one to maybe the one you're trying to apply to. So for that part I think that is totally okay. First off, you know a trick I try to do when I mentor or help other students is. To tweak your resume a little bit for the job specifically if you're 75% match, usually you can tweak it to 85 or even 90% match because a lot of times companies asked for different things maybe that specific role is really data driven. You may have had some data driven experiences in some particular projects, more than some other ones so if you really like this company you really care about this opportunity, definitely take the time to tweak your resume, and then submit it. There's no shame in doing that, because it's your own work right you're just showing a different part of it the resume so forth. So that's going to be really important trick. And then going a little bit into the second part of the question. Going back to uni's original question of like what to do if I don't feel like I'm confident I don't have that many experiences. One thing you can do is. Try to make a, I would say like some sort of list or some sort of like. I guess document of all your projects and experiences that kind of relate to us, and then see which ones you can kind of repackage or put on your resume. So maybe you have a school project that you feel like isn't like industry, but there are certain parts of that project if it's UX related that you could probably put on a resume that is meaningful to the recruiter right. If you look at the job description, the recruiter might say something like, I want someone who has who's an effective communicator with cross functional teams right that's the common wording. So in that project you might have worked with people who, you know, had different strength from you and if you kind of repackage a little bit. I think you can make that experience something that the recruiters are looking for and there's once again nothing wrong with doing that. So, usually you should try to make your resume, at least having three of these school projects side projects personal projects, whatever you want to call it. If you have a case study, you can try to put it on there because you kind of just need to start somewhere everyone needs to start somewhere. If you aren't willing to take that first step put yourself out to your comfort zone, then that's kind of going to be something that is very hard to go to the next stage. If you, I feel like what I said is a bit like technical to you so for uni or whoever else is interested in that you can definitely feel free to chat with me on LinkedIn as well so I'll leave it like that for now. Bob or Michelle, do you have any insights you'd like to share if not that's totally okay we can move on to the next question. I can throw a few in there. I like what Leon said about making it specific for the role. So, you want to tailor your application to the specific role and you may be struggling to see how you fit so you can look up the job right up and see the words they use and repackage those words in your, your application. For me, I do like to see at least like I'm on the enterprise side right so I like to see at least one really good enterprise case study, even if it's spec doesn't really matter if it's spec as long as it's a good case study. For an intern, if you were an interaction designer, it means you need to show a few more but so consider your area and see if you can pull together a case study that that really exemplifies that. And another big one for me is to just be yourself. So, there's so much stress and tension that goes into it. And often there are quite a few applicants that are going through and everybody's just like trying to be so perfect. And so, it does stand out when you show your personality and when you can kind of be who you are and bring that to the table. That's a big one for me is, you know, your work is going to show for itself, but you also you also be one want to be someone great or an interesting point of view and personality. Yeah, and then I'll just wrap up on that one. I think it's, yeah, so those are also really great points just to add on. Definitely be yourself don't fake it don't pretend to be someone else. If you can fake it for interview, like, I believe it's easy, but if you're trying to like you have to like stay in that persona for long term that's very hard and you're not going to be happy with it. And then I will say try to think a little bit about how to make yourself standing out. That's my sounds really hard, but thinking about it just for me for my day job I also hire. So when I was like trying to hire either like interns were like designer. I have to be honest, most of the candidates are qualified, you'll find most of people have the similar skills that as you do. So if you're from like UX probably you know a little bit front end you know a little bit for like, definitely you know user flow that set of like process. So think about tailoring for just echoing what Bob just said telling for what which company you're actually applying to try to show some case study related to that. If not think about some other things you can just like basically giving a pitch that company why me, why I'm the best one to enter here. And just an example, think about when I was like interviewing for Microsoft I didn't have any like big Canadian experience that time other two designers going to the same interview as I did I think like one of them internet I see people for the other one internet Samsung. So I had any like just like literally nothing only I had was like a R a ship only car. So the kind of the built your narrative around that so if I'm let's say I'm interviewing with Microsoft. I'm from a media or background so it's actually not connecting to the role I'm applying to. So if that's the same situation for like a lot of you you're not from design background, leverage that your background as a strength not a weakness. So let's say how I build my narrative was, I do a lot of like creative tech project and the Microsoft connect was one of the technology I usually use is like open source. It's like Microsoft product. That's will potentially will help you standing out from like all the other candidates because you use their product and then you know better from that. Now definitely like try to think a little bit about if you're not from like a traditional art and design background which is like, absolutely, like not a weakness. Think about the transferable skills you're able to carry over for just also take me as an example. My narrative was like the most valuable thing I learned it's to figure out something I don't know so that which is also applies to my career as a UX designer you can say that too. So if you got an interview where like craft that into your website or portfolio site. So, um, yeah, so just to make sure to craft your application telling to a company also think about some strategy how to make yourself stand out. I thought of one more thing to go ahead. It matters if you know people at that company to get in touch with them. See if you can go for an informational interview. You can meet with the person who's hiring or just talk to them and see what they're looking for. These long term relationships, get you to the front where when you when you're, you know, the people make a note and they're like, Oh, let me make sure I look at this person they're really keen. So, yeah, consider how you can connect mentorships a good way. You're also a mentor on ADP list is that correct that's a more recent. Yeah, it's been it's been nice to kind of get to see a broad group of people and be able to help along the way. Okay, great. I'm going to move into a couple of specific questions for each individual panelist so I'm going to start with you Bob, since you're on my screen at the moment. So, Copperleaf Technologies is one of Canada's best employers for recent graduates, the top 20 fastest growing software company in Canada and multi award winning as well. So as a design manager. How do you determine the company's internship needs. Well, we're looking for someone who we can help gross like that's the big part of it is where we're looking to kind of teach and mentor and grow so that's a big part of it. And so the company invests in it quite often every every year there's a mentorship round in each department, and often they move to being full time employees. So, yeah, we do this on a yearly basis. For me portfolio case studies are key it's sort of, it becomes a reflection of how the person's brain and how they think. So, when you're writing that and the way you work through problems. It becomes sort of a physical like a representation of, of your process. And how you present the case study is also really important. So, often will challenge the designs because we want to see how the person will think through the process. And so, responding responding to that like if I'll ask about research, you know, often you can see how deep they went in the project because if they can go right into it and give you answers, then it goes a long way. And so, I mentioned this earlier but another big thing, at least in my area when I'm hiring is did they falter and if they faltered. How did they recover. So I know this actually happens more than you would think or maybe you would think it would happen. Just there's the panic and it just catches up and all of a sudden it's just it's a catastrophic failure. That is okay. That's fine. So, it's actually like I kind of, I don't look forward to it but when it happens, I'm like, Oh, this is the moment let's see how they handle it. And depending upon how they handle it, you know, that actually says a lot towards how open they are and how, how they're able to deal with some complex scenarios. It's, it's kind of a good thing in a way to have messed up a bit and to be able to speak to it and just own it and, and even even some people have said like yeah this isn't my, my best skill communicating but it's something I want to learn. If I get to get this role so that matters a lot. Yeah, and what I keep saying this but when you go beyond the basics, it really matters as well. So what we look for is, do they have they gone deep into research have they done any discover work. What insights did they get from research, often, often a case study just so when you're in university you end up doing process work so process books. That sort of proves that you did what you were supposed to do. But the difference, I think when you get out of university is that you don't need to prove what you did you really just want to give the value. So, what insights came from research. And so though if those are highlighted in like okay they get they get that I don't care what they did I care what they found. So that's sort of an insight into what is that. Are they do they know what user stories are so have they really been able to narrow down the context and how well are they communication have they reached the point where they're okay to communicate risk. So have they talked to failures, what does failure look like often, and you'll see most of most of what I bet is based around this concept versus being perfect versus being honest. So it's, you know, if, if is failure okay and at that point, can you communicate it in time so that it can be corrected and you could be supported. So, any, any examples of that being open is really good facilitation leadership skills growth mindset, all these sort of speak to the openness so. Things that that really help in in like in our area when I'm hiring and that I look for. That's great. Thank you so much. I think that's a common thread that's come up today, or in today's discussion is this theme of failure. And, you know, perhaps thinking of it as failing up where you know you're, you're ready to accept that, you know, we're we're imperfect. We can prepare as much as we want for a presentation or an interview and have all of that really sealed up tightly and like ready to go. But that ultimately that's just one instance, whereas, you know, being able to talk sort of ad lib or to present something and be able to point out where it didn't work the way you wanted it to and how you figured out your way through that problem. I think has in some ways, perhaps more value in the long run, because it shows that thought process that you're talking about that complex problem solving, as well as that growth mindset right that, you know, I'm learning from my mistakes. I am at an early stage in my career where, you know, I have confidence and I know what I want to do, but I also know that I'm going to make mistakes. So I think that there's a fine balance to strike there as well. Yeah, and failure is such a key part of the creative process right so you iteration right so what you you learn what you can and you pull the insights and then you create the first version and you fail like it's part of it you knock it over and so the sooner you can knock it over. The sooner you can make the second version so I think that's why it's so important to me is just kind of get used to it. Yes, fail forward as Leon says maybe not failing up. Okay, so I have a question for Michelle next. Breaking into the creative industry is challenging. Much of your recent work focuses on empowering designers through peer communities networks and resources. What are some key strategies you share with recent graduates. Great question and then just realize I forgot to introduce that in the deck so we on the side I also run a community called ECU design careers. We might change the name in the future. So it's an independent community nothing attached with ECU, but we're just hoping a group of friends of like mine we're just curious about what do we provide students with mentors with most relatable experience. So in that case design student pairing with alumni mentors who've been through the same struggle as you did basically. So, from there, I noticed a lot of student, like most commonly asked question or like some just things I noticed. So I would say like first advice portfolio isn't everything. I know that when I was a student. So, so definitely I would suggest if you do have a portfolio in place right now so it's like a first duration, try to spend 5050 for your time like 50% work on your portfolio either it's like crafting the key study. Visual design any aspect from the narrative. The other half like 50 try to use it in network. So networking is really important to build your network for someone who's like it might not like be that easy as it sounds for me it was difficult because I didn't know how to do it basically coming from the Eastern culture is like totally different. And I would say even like attending events like this is a great start so after that you can add us on LinkedIn we're both we're all hiring so probably will just reach out to you where you see that in our feet right so that's kind of one way for network it doesn't have always be like cold reach out someone on LinkedIn. So that's very intimidating. And then so portfolio even everything depends on which state your portfolio is try to split that time, either like 5050, or I don't have like portfolio ready yet maybe spend a little bit more time on that. 70% on that 30% on networking, set a little goal for yourself, I'm going to talk to one people I don't know in the industry every week. Set something realistic for yourself to. So that's like tip number one I guess the second one. So this is actually a vice from the panelists yesterday designer I really look up to like Scott Scott and I used to work at a robotics. I'm the designer after him. So that was Scott told me when I was a new graph he told me like, don't rush into things which means like don't try to find a job because you need a job. It sounds very like unrealistic everyone needs to drop to make the ends meet. Just which is mean like if you do know where your passion license you know that's something not for you but the opportunity is there. Like, just think it twice. So it's going to be might be if you're a new grad that's going to be your first like full time job. Think about it do you really want to work here long term is that like going to meet your career goal going to really meet your personal life goal. And so like think a little bit around that. So there's always something else you can do where like sometimes opportunity just needs a little bit of time. So like, make sure you're just like, not rushing into anything. Lastly, I think it's also like trust yourself and then ask like, after a few years right now on the other side of the table. I have to say, it's usually it's just a business at the end of the day, asking like hiring manager or like this line lead ourselves when we try to make a hire everyone wants this to happen. So both parties want this to success. So if it doesn't happen, don't take it personally so it's not about you most of time it's only about business we just have to assess who's the best fit in order like culture or like experience. So take it personally and don't lose heart. Thank you so much Michelle. We talked a little bit yesterday about reaching out to people on LinkedIn and how important networking is so I'm glad to hear it reiterated again. I definitely know that it's that it's scary to to reach out to people and think that you're, you know, bothering them or that, you know, oh I'm sure they get thousands of messages every day but you know you have to just put yourself out there and put in that effort to to see it return to you so. Yeah, and coming to events or going to events with coming and going to events I don't even know what's happening anymore, but just participating and listening to what people are saying and and and then reaching out you know like the importance of connecting with the people that you've connected in some capacity, because what an amazing in that is to say oh I attended this panel where you were one of the panelists Michelle I would love to have a chance to chat with you you know there's the introduction you know there's the way in that isn't as cold as the as a typical cold cold call or cold email or something like that. Yeah, of course yeah I am I definitely resonate with that I have to say I think most of my job opportunity are landed from like somewhere I know where I accidentally know them. So, where I asked them to talk to so definitely try to if you're also like just feel it's really weird to call reach out someone on LinkedIn as I do so try the method Christina just suggested. You can like just have a little bit intro usually you can start with introduction of yourself, my name is someone. I'm studying somewhere, and then I know you from somewhere, and then I want to connect with you because maybe, let's say a I'm interested in your work and second. I really found the whatever thing you just said in whatever events really helpful. Most people will say yes, I will say. So, most of the people, especially design community will be just happy to connect. And then you don't have to just, but always acknowledge that that might not bring your job opportunity right away. So, but definitely it's very important to scale your network from time to time. So yeah it's a great starting point just to getting started. Thanks so much Michelle. Leon, I have a question for you. So earlier this year you actually mentioned this article in your introduction, you published on the three secrets for getting a UX design internship at a big tech company. So competition is is challenging and you talk about working hard for the right reasons. Can you talk a little bit more about that. Yeah, I think I was not so long ago. And I think like when you're in a more competitive environment sometimes like your mental model but sometimes your, I guess mindset really kind of makes or breaks the situation a lot. Right, like final jobs, it's like a numbers game. It's also like sometimes it's a waiting game a lot. And then, you know, like, even when sometimes your peers their intentions may mean well you might see like LinkedIn postings where like, hey I got the offer here hey I got this there. You know, like, some things might be discouraging to you sometimes might make you feel a certain way. And I think when you're in this situation, it's really important for you to kind of keep the right mindset and I think that mindset is you want to make sure everything you're doing is just to improve and trying to get from where you want to your next goal. And that goal, like what we mentioned, will definitely be up and down. It might take longer than you expect. But you know if you really think this is the goal you want, then you should be willing to kind of work hard for that so you know on the road on this journey. Try not to get sidetracked, try not to get affected by all these other things going on in the world, kind of going on with your peers. I think that's going to be really important. I think a lot of times like people really get too stressed. And at the end of the day, like, you know, this is just part of your life. Your job is just part of your life, like your career is obviously super important, but you want to make sure that like you're still in that healthy, positive mindset, and you know you're curious to learn you're happy to try these new things, and you're happy to try to work hard for your goal. Things that I think I've seen that really lead to negative outcomes is saying that I think as like designers can be competitive sometimes so I think something that can potentially really harm you as if you feel like, Oh, I think I'm better than this person right like how could they get this job that I wanted when I don't when I didn't get the offer right I think these things like will really backfire because even when you get an offer you want like do you now think you're better than someone else just because you have a job they don't have like so no matter what you go like those kind of mindsets will really like not be healthy long term and it's really bad for your career growth. Other things you might be like oh I didn't get an offer. I don't feel like I'm worth anything like I'm going to be a failure like those things will also really be negative towards you because maybe for some students I worked with right like if they don't get that offer they want maybe they can try to do some other sort of learning, try to find another passion project, improve in a certain way. So sitting kind of that long term goal versus that four term goal will all help with that, and then going back to the question. But I think all that will play into like working hard for the right reason it's really about like having that good mental like place where you know like we're working hard for the right reason. Thanks so much Leon. I think this comes back again to another theme, the showing the best of yourself. Whether it's on LinkedIn or other social media, you know there's a there's a tendency to only want to show the best of what's happening in your life. You see often actually on LinkedIn people talking about, you know, I didn't get that job like I'm going to post something that's different from what everybody else is saying about like yeah I got this job offer and I'm going to say like I didn't get the job offer. So I think, you know, there, there is this tendency to compare right to see what other people are doing and achieving and comparing ourselves to where they are but we actually don't have any idea what the path or the journey has been for them to that point. So keeping your eye on where you are and where you want to go, I think is is kind of the point right to make sure that we're staying in that healthy mental state as long as possible so yeah. I do want to, I do want to open it up to the Q&A from the audience we do have one question currently sitting here so I'm going to present it to the panel. The question is, what should you do if you feel like you're being exploited or harassed, I'm assuming in a in an internship role. Like being able to protect yourself in a bad situation. I can just give my perspective. This is sort of maybe a question that can be handled outside of professional context. It's just important to have boundaries. You'll need as you go higher anyway and become a manager and lead people so you can one you can go back to so one of these I mentioned earlier is to know what your values are right so obviously it sounds like some of your values are being compromised. So, you know there's varying varying degrees of how that can happen. But at that point, it's, it's up to, to you to consider how you can change that. So if, if you do need to consider when to make adjustments and protect yourself when your boundaries and your values are being safe. So, I think the answer would be to, if that's happening, find out how you can change your scenario. So, it depends in some professional context that can be handled through your lead and then if it's somebody around you for there's like mechanisms to be able to take care of that. And then to make your work safe, your workplace safe. If it's larger than that, and it's a systemic issue, you just want to consider what you can do to change your circumstance. And I think like that question is a very serious topic, you know, so I think my wife works at Epic Games as a UX designer. So in the gaming industry if you follow the news recently right. Like Blizzard, there's a lot of like news related on these topics of like sexual harassment. And then they have really serious consequences right like people are getting seriously harmed. Someone lost your life for this. So if you're really in an environment where the leadership already knows your situation and it's like very big problem. No one's coming to like help you always just, you know, just leave the job. Your life's not worth losing over things like this, like protect yourself, I would say. I think that's the blizzard thing is very serious. I think if you find yourself in an environment like that, just try to protect yourself by me even because I would say your life is worth a lot more than whatever you need to kind of go through in that situation. Okay, and then just to add upon that if it's something outside professional context I would definitely just with Bob and then Leon suggested so try to reach out as the resource as you could reach to just to try to tackle that problem because it is a very serious issue. If in professional context, which means let's say you're being overloaded and then your team not supportive your voice being not heard. So first, think about how can you deal with that professionally if it's about professional context. So we'll try to deal with in with no personal like emotion with it. So, so first, like try. How can you communicate with that person for just like subjectively. I'm sorry, objectively for just to to make some suggestions the next time maybe we can try this where that if you found situations still like that or it's like, just, that's the company culture for everyone works like insanely hard and then people expect people to work over time. So think about whether that's going to really meet your goal for like, if that's something really care about you care about the product. I guess that's probably not a big issue but if that's the case, think about that's whether where you wanted to pivot for either company or potentially another group. Yeah, so definitely it is a serious issue if it's outside professional context, and then yeah just like hope everyone's just do not going to run into that. Yeah, and if it's a legal thing, you can contact HR. So that's sort of like there's a scale that you can go down. Legal HR. And just add to that, you know, having somebody who can be if you're, if you're unable to be objective in that situation, which is very probable to have somebody that you trust that comes with you to a meeting so that they can take the notes. They can hear everything that is being said and help you process that information as well. I think often, you know, if you're in a scenario where the emotions are really high, and you're stressed out or super anxious and it's already very difficult to actually bring that forward and to officially bring forward an issue to HR or to legal or something like that, you know, having somebody to back you up in the room, not to say anything, but to to just be there as like the note taker is something that is really important as well. As you progress in your career as well you'll be able to triangulate on really positive and really negative scenarios, and you should be able to sort of come up with what what your limits are. So at this point I'm pretty clear on what my limits are and when they're reached it's like okay when somebody has to fix this or I'm going somewhere else. So, that's sort of, I think something that you'll get over time as well. I think it builds off of, I think something that you said Bob about being, being clear about what it is that you want, like going and saying, I want this job, you know, I want to, I want to stay with this company so you know using that as a starting point of allowing to be heard or making sure that your voice is being heard as a building block towards setting those boundaries, as well as setting those goals for yourself right that we should never, we shouldn't be starting from a place of shame to want things for ourselves and to need things for ourselves to be healthy in our work and in our lives. So thank you for that question. I don't know if anybody else has questions for the panelists, if not, I have one last one that I want to ask we're sort of down to the last few minutes here. So maybe I'll just throw one in. Maybe it's not totally throwing it in but placing it gently in front of you. So what can applicants expect from the interview process I know there's always this talk about the design challenge to present in front of a large group of people. So what is something that you can kind of anticipate or prepare for. Well, we don't do the challenge for interns. It's more of a learning opportunity for them so we wouldn't expect them to be able to navigate a challenge at the level of a product designer. We want to see their work. We want to be able to challenge them and see how they respond to challenges, really helpful to see their personality, and, and kind of have them explain how they work their problems. Yeah. Yeah, I guess like short answer it varies long answer. Most commonly if it's a UX job or product line job be prepared to showcase your work so it could be a presentation it could be just like a casual walkthrough. I will encourage you to reach out to the weather HR or recruiter whoever schedule interview for you ask for agenda. So if you couldn't if that person couldn't tell you. Estimated yourself let's say it's an hour interview so maybe you'll get around like 2030 minutes to present your work. So curate your presentation around that time. And then sometimes it may be very short I did like 10 minutes one I did like 45 minutes one. So definitely be prepared to show that so most of the company I guess regardless small or big definitely want to see your work during an interview. And then also secondly, I know some company let's say meta used to be Facebook, they used to do like up critique for internship, not sure whether it's still doing now for design challenges. Some of them are like take home some of them are on site which is like whiteboarding for my day job we did whiteboarding, but when I was like hired I did take home. So it was like two different experience to. So you don't have to be that good at that, but try to not make it the first time you actually doing it was that interview. And then try to practice it with maybe like once or twice. So you're not that scared like mentally, and then so you're more confident walking in that room or on zoom. So I think like also a very important part prepare for some question for the company to. That's also the part when I was hiring I found a lot of people didn't thought about that obviously. So it's also a great chance for you to ask the company for what's your expectation for this role. Let's say also what's your concerns are where just that's anything kind of can help you to assess whether you're able to you wanted to work here or not. And then you can also like ask your interview or some questions let's say you might ask you might be asked some intrapersonal skill question or soft skill question for like some challenge of your face. How you solve the problem you can ask that to an interview or two. So, at least in my perspective, I would say that's a very good question if someone asked me for like for any time working here with your biggest challenge how your team tackle that so you can also like use that as like for seeing what's going to be the work relationship between the team. I think that questions are a bit hard to answer I think in a few minutes, because first off it really varies so much. But I like what everyone has said so far, especially Michelle like, you know, like, you should be able to kind of get the agenda. I think most companies will send it. I think the only one I've done that didn't send me an agenda. And the recruiter said they don't know was like, when I interviewed with Apple for internship position a few years ago. And their process is also I was a bit out of the ordinary ended up being like a five hour session. And there was like a small break in between but it was like a full site by kind of virtual, but usually like for most internships, just expect a portfolio walkthrough. And then usually you will have to do some sort of screener with either the hiring manager, or the recruiter, and then the kind of key part is just some sort of walkthrough with some sort of behavioral slash technical questions. So that part tends to be quite standard somewhere in factors can be. I know redfin is one that still does apricot one of my recent students was like asking me about it. And then whiteboarding. A lot of design firms try to do whiteboarding. So that's also something you still might see, but kind of if you if you're familiar with design process. You can add that to everything right like just justify your thought process kind of talk through your logic while you're doing something. So that's my short answer, but it really varies a lot. So just prepare a paler to whatever agenda is presented to you. Thank you so much, everybody. I know I threw that as a curveball at the very end. I'm sure we can keep talking about that for a while. Okay, that is the end of today's panel. I want to thank Leon, Michelle and Bob so much for taking the time to join us today. And to our audience for joining us as well and for the great questions. So thank you. And I hope everybody got a lot out of this discussion today. And join us again tomorrow for our last panel in the series. So have a great night everybody. Thank you so much. And we'll see you soon. So long. Thank you.