CREATIVE

DEVELOPMENT

SALES & MARKETING

CLIENT SERVICES

PROJECT MANAGEMENT/PRODUCERS

STRATEGY

USER EXPERIENCE

BRANDS / CLIENTSIDE

-   We’ve seen a 10% increase in perm roles across digital and integrated agencies when comparing Jan – Sept for 2010 and 2011.

-   The biggest increase when comparing Jan – Sept for 2010 to Jan – Sept  2011 has been in freelance roles which has grown by 100%.  At the same time day rates for contracts have come down.  The rise in freelance requirements this year is certainly in part being driven by economic fears meaning companies don’t want to make a long term commitment to perm hires.

-   We’re meeting more people looking for new roles this year compared to last with a significant increase in people looking for freelance.  The increased numbers of freelancers is one reason why rates are coming down but the fact more people are looking for new roles suggests a little more confidence in the market.

-   We’ve noticed an increase in mid-weight roles (£30-£40K) but having come out of a recession where agencies didn’t invest in grassroots talent there simply aren’t enough people in the market for the volume of roles.  Great news however if you are in the early stages of your career as there is lots of choice!

-   Agencies are still not investing enough in grassroots talent favouring hiring experienced people that have lower needs for training and support, perhaps this is amplified by the state of the economy and companies not making as much investment into their people.  But when you combine this with the increased restrictions on immigration we’re facing a real lack of succession and new talent coming into the industry.

To finish on a slightly more positive note; both perm and freelance roles show no sign of slowing down when we compare Sept 2010 to 2011.  This is  encouraging against the backdrop of doom and gloom in the global economy – the stock markets may be falling off a cliff and cash may get a little tight when Greece default but the outlook for digital talent remains high!

Yes  folks, it’s that time of year again. Flash on the Beach returns for its 4th year and some of our consultants will be there. 3 days of design, code inspiration & networking for digital designers, developers & artists.

So a few things to remember:

1. Get your registration out of the way nice and early (don’t say you haven’t been warned!)

2. Don’t forget there a lot of camera’s and video’s about (just sayin’)

3. If you want to meet up with one of our consultants, then please do get in touch and we’ll track you down and take you for a tea/coffee/bovril or beer, depending on the weather.

For the first time ever, we’ve entered the MARA  Awards (the Marketing and Advertising Recruitment Awards). Finalists are selected based on votes from the public. Therefore, if we’ve delivered and hopefully gone above and beyond, then you’ll be happy to vote for us.

We’ve entered five categories:

1)      Best Candidate Experience

2)      Best Client Service

3)      Best Contract Recruitment Team

4)      Agency of the Year

5)      Recruitment Consultant of the Year (for Matt Challis!) – although people can’t vote in this category, it’s from application evidence only.

We would be delighted if you would vote for us here: http://bit.ly/nUoMH3

Having slogged away for few years, getting from University through placements/work experience and finally landing your first permanent role as a junior designer; what’s next?

Life As a Junior Designer

As a Junior Designer you’re probably working on lots of amends, emails, banners and even fast-paced but perhaps less interesting projects. So how do you progress to get more autonomy and better projects?

For a start, it’s vital to have a good variety of commercial work in your portfolio. You’ll ideally have an understanding of the ever-changing interactive and digital platforms, as well as how to create engaging work. This will help create a platform for progression.

Don’t be afraid to speak up and ask for more interesting projects that will help you develop your skills and portfolio. You should align yourself to, or ‘buddy-up’ with a Senior Designer and learn from their experience. Also, be sure to work with your Creative department head to set objectives and timeframes, and to gain access to other projects or a higher position within the team. Finally, push for training (for example After Effects or 3D).

Is Freelancing an Option?

If you feel that you’ve reached a point where you are not developing and you can’t see a promotion ahead or extra training being signed off, then what to do next?

The freelance market is pretty buoyant at the moment. However as a junior designer perhaps staying with a permanent role and developing your skills and portfolio might be a better move. Freelance is great for people who have loads of experience and can hold their own in a busy, fast paced and potentially highly stressed environment, but it is not a career-building move in the sense that you tend to repeat work you’ve done in the past rather than building in new skills. That’s not to say that there aren’t contracts available for freelance junior designers, but chances are that as a freelancer you’ll work on more production-led work rather than conceptual. The other aspect is you will need to consider is being completely financially independent. Freelancers have to have extra skills to manage their own business cash flow and new business pipeline, although there are companies that will manage your invoices and payroll.

If you love the idea of more autonomy, like production work and feel that freelancing is for you, drop me a line and I’ll give more details.

Taking the next step in your career

If you’re more interested in a new permanent role, the next option would be to pursue another role in a different environment and/or hopefully a step up. Now that we are out of the dark days in the economy, creative agencies are looking to bring in many more junior and middleweight digital designers/creatives and invest in their skills. With brands investing heavily into digital and innovative interactive work; mobile, tablet, experiential, etc. you could be looking to take on some exciting stuff.

You’re going to need a decent online portfolio. You could design one yourself or use a portfolio showcase like Cargocollective.

Hiring managers are looking for very specific skills and personality traits. At Cogs Agency we recently conducted a survey of top Creative Directors and asked them what they look for in junior designer portfolios. Here is what they said:

• A good balance of conceptual and practical work to answer a brief;
• Problem solving and demonstration of a logical thought process with the ‘creative’ ability to give that solution value;
• Design needs to have an idea and a purpose. Rethinking traditional approaches and looking at solving a ‘challenge’ in a unique and refreshing way is the point of our work. Execution should be flawless and should show skills – colour, layout, typography – all the usual things;
• Make sure you keep abreast of trends and know your industry;
• Do other stuff that makes you an anomaly. Read and learn about behaviours around technology; and
• Ignore digital at your peril!

At Cogs Agency we work with more than 70 of London’s best creative agencies as well as in-house departments within fashion and entertainment brands. Even as I write this post we are working with 12 creative agencies and 2 in-house departments for junior or mid weight designers. So if you’re thinking of progressing your career to the next stage and want to pop in for a cuppa and a chat then get in touch.

With the usual lovely long hot English summer well and truly upon us we wanted to flag this up again as we are still seeing a fairly significant shortfall of talent in the market to cope with demand. Great for the talented freelancers who are commanding high day rates, and  justifiably so in most cases.

Where does this leave the rest of the market then? Are day rates just too high to sustain growth in the agencies? Is the digital market fast becoming the English Premiership, where the players get paid as much as possible and then jump ship to the highest bidder? What will happen if the EURO falters badly?

Time will tell. In the interim, we suggest that you try as hard as possible to get paid your worth. If you don’t think you are then check out our Salary benchmarking for 2011. Or drop us a line, email, twitter or pigeon and let’s discuss as we have opportunities in London, Amsterdam and Germany that could be exactly what you’re looking for.

Looking at both the freelance and perm roles available combined means there are almost certainly not enough digital project managers working in the industry.

What does this mean?

• Companies hire freelance SPM’s to cover work and it affects their margins.
• Perm SPM’s who haven’t switched to freelance are working harder to cover more work and sometimes have to pick up on projects if freelancers haven’t delivered.
• Decent freelance SPM’s should have a steady supply of work!

Some thoughts and ideas to reverse the trend?

For agencies….
• Be more open minded about the talent pools from where you recruit and invest in heavily training. Why not re-train a developer in your agency that has the right mindset. Or better still hire a PM from a software background and develop their skills/knowledge.
• Start paying better salary’s for perm SPM’s and factor in career development plans to progress PM’s through your organisation. To put it into perspective an SPM on £50k could earn £65k as a freelancer (assuming they worked every day for 10 months of the year on £300 per day).
• The life of a PM is a tough one; protecting agency margins and keeping clients and other agency departments happy. Even the most diplomatic PM can get on the wrong side of people in other departments and sometimes the issues can be tracked back to badly run processes and heads of PM departments without the internal clout to address and resolve these. If you have high staff turn over in your PM department (and then struggle to recruit because of a shortage of talent) then maybe the solution might lie with the management structure of your organisation.

For freelancer SPM’s…
• Often when freelancing your skill base flat lines, as when interviewing for a role you are judged by what you have done previously and then offered a role to do the same (or less) for someone else.
• Sometimes the agency’s best work will go to their perm PM team and unless you are a specialist (e.g. a video and digital producer combined) this may effect the quality of projects you work on.
• Finding a company that will invest in your development and give you progression could be a good option. Though taking a pay cut to do more of the same might not be! However, it is worth remembering that taking a permanent role means you get paid holiday’s and benefits.

SPM’s working permanently…..
• You are in a good place to manage your career and look for progression and development opportunities.
• If you are considering switching to become a freelancer you should try to maximise your progression opportunities in your current company before making the move. Earning £800 more monthly might not satisfy you for long.

The future outlook….
The lack (could read absence) of agencies hiring of junior PM’s during the recession means this issue will become far worse in years to come. Also the fact that digital projects are becoming very specialised and agency models vary greatly the problem is going to get much worse before it gets any better.

Generally there are no formal digital PM standard courses, of course institutes such as Prince2 and PMI organise general PM training, why don’t the big players in digital get together to organise some industry standard training to develop the talent pool and make digital project management roles more accessible to people entering the market or growing their skills.

My final thought would be that the industry look into remunerating perm PMs’ differently, perhaps giving bonuses for the delivery of projects on time/budget that meet client (and agency) expectations. More people would consider perm vs freelance and agencies would be paying for results.

For creatives, whilst a CV is sometimes needed, your portfolio clearly carries more weight. For people working in tech some of the points below are relevant but you will need more detail and possibly another section on your tech skills.

How much detail should I put in?

The most important thing to consider is that your CV needs to be concise and easy to read.  If you ‘waffle on’ and the only way to get your CV onto two pages is to use font size ‘4’ and no margins, then you might need to cut some content out.

If you work in a big company and want to move to a similar sized company in a similar role, or one step up, then it’s likely your job spec will be the same. This means that you won’t need chapter and verse about your responsibilities for each role in your work experience (see key areas of a CV below).

If you work for a small, lesser-known company and hold a broad role; you will want to go into more detail about your responsibilities as prospective employers will be looking for requisite skills.

Write more about your most recent roles, you don’t need lots of detail about a role that you held five years ago.  For example, if you have ten years experience then your first role might only be one line of content on your CV.

Ideally your CV will be two pages, but three is fine if you have a lot of experience. If you have one to two years experience you should be able to get your CV onto just the one page for example, particularly if you have worked for a well known company in a recognised role.

Formatting, spelling and grammar.

 Have someone else proof-read your CV! Even if you need to get a CV together quickly, spelling or obvious grammatical errors speak volumes about attention to detail.

The format you choose is your chance to show your personality in a CV.  Some of the CVs that we receive show lots of personality; they incorporate design, imagery, and creatively written content.  This can backfire if you get the tone wrong but similarly if you go for a very functional, facts-and-figures-type CV, you run the risk of coming across as dull.  Have a think about who will be reading your CV, and what impression you want them to have of you.  If you are applying to more serious and bigger companies, then most likely your CV will be filtered by an HR department first – and there is a chance that a more creatively presented CV might not work. It all comes down to the type of role you are applying for or the type of person they want to attract.

Key areas on a CV.

Contact details

Personal statement – personally I’m not a fan of this, but in some cases a concise summary of your experience and salient personality traits can be relevant.  If you find yourself writing just about your personality and saying “I’m a go getting and dynamic team player with the drive to achieve my goals” then it’s probably best to leave it out!

Key skills, achievements or major projects – as an alternative to a personal statement you could favour a more punchy section on the main points of your background – but if you then go on to repeat yourself in your work experience section, it might not work.  It can sometimes also be unclear exactly when in your career you gained this experience.  That said, if brief and relevant this can be a good way to start a CV and make the reader want to keep going.

Work experience - Broken down by date (month/year to month/year). If you have held two or three roles in the same company then include the dates at which you held each role as it shows progression. You should break each role into major achievements and key responsibilities. That said, achievements from roles 10 years ago may not be relevant.

Education and professional qualifications – Use the following layout: date, institution, qualification, grade.  If you choose to leave your grades out, people will assume you didn’t do very well.

Key skills – (assuming you didn’t go with a Key skills, achievements or major projects section) – here you should include skills that might be relevant such as language skills.

Interests – Being brief here is a good thing as you don’t want to be judged by what you do in your spare time.  Some people will think its great you’re a dolphin trainer in your spare time, others might find it odd.  As with work experience, achievements are a really good thing here to demonstrate commitment.

If you are in any doubt about the points raised above, please drop one of our consultants a line and we’ll be glad to help.

Our April 2010 Salary benchmark should give you a good indication.

CREATIVE

Creative Director Perm 60k to 100k Freelance £300.00 to £500.00 per day
Creative Lead 45k to 55k Freelance £275.00 to £400.00 per day
Senior Designer 35k to 45k Freelance £250.00 to £300.00 per day
Designer 25k to 35k Freelance £200.00 to £275.00 per day
Junior Designer 18k to 25k Freelance £150.00 to £200.00 per day

DEVELOPMENT

Head of Development Perm 55k to 75k Freelance £350.00 to £500.00 per day
Development Consultant 45k to 60k Freelance £350.00 to £450.00 per day
Senior Web Developer 35k to 45k Freelance £250.00 to £350.00 per day
Web Developer 25k to 40k Freelance £200.00 to £350.00 per day
Lead Tester 35k to 45k Freelance £300.00 to £400.00 per day
Software Tester 28k to 35k Freelance £250.00 to £350.00 per day
Application Developer 30k to 45k Freelance £300.00 to £450.00 per day
Technical Project Manager 40k to 65k Freelance £250.00 to £450.00 per day

SALES & MARKETING

Head of Sales and Marketing Perm 60k to 100k
Marketing Manager 35k to 60k Freelance £250.00 per day
Marketing Executive 25k to 35k Freelance £150.00 per day
New Business Development Director 60k to 100k
New Business Development Manager 35k to 60k

PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Head of Project Management Perm 55k to 75k + Freelance £350.00 to £600.00 per day
Senior Project Manager 45k to 65k Freelance £300.00 to £450.00 per day
Project Manager 30k to 45k Freelance £250.00 to £300.00 per day
Junior Project Manager 25k to 30k Freelance £150.00 to £200.00 per day
Project Administrator 20k to 25k

CLIENT SERVICES

Client Partner Perm 70k to 100k +
Senior Account Director 60k to 75k Freelance £400.00 upwards per day
Account Director 45k to 60k Freelance £275.00 to £350.00 per day
Senior Account Manager 30k to 45k Freelance £175.00 to £200.00 per day
Account Manager 28k to 35k Freelance £150.00 to £200.00 per day
Account Executive 22k to 28k

STRATEGY

Head of Planning / Strategy Perm 90k to 150k + Freelance £600.00 to £1,000.00 per day
Planning / Strategy Director 70k to 100k Freelance £400.00 to £750.00 per day
Senior Planner / Strategist 50k to 70k Freelance £300.00 to £450.00 per day
Planner / Strategist 30k to 55k Freelance £200.00 to £300.00 per day
Research Analyst / Junior Planner 25k to 40k Freelance £150.00 to £200.00 per day

USER EXPERIENCE & IA

Head of UX Perm 70K to upwards Freelance £600.00 to upwards per day
Senior Information Architect 45k to 70k Freelance £400.00 to £550.00 per day
Senior UX Architect 50k to 70k Freelance £400.00 to £550.00 per day
Information Architect 35k to 50k Freelance £300.00 to £350.00 per day
Usability Consultant 30k to 45k Freelance £250.00 to £350.00 per day

 -  You may need to set up as a Ltd company or work through a PAYE umbrella company such as www.marchmutual.com but there is a monthly charge for this, £50 – £75.  You pay slightly less tax if you set up as a Ltd company although you need to meet certain tax legislations to do this.  You can offset your day to day expenses against your income to save tax, but with both options you don’t get holiday or sick pay so if you don’t work you don’t get paid.

-  If you are on £50K and work for 6 months of the year at £300 per day you would gross £39000. (130 X £300 – there are 260 working days in the year).  So provided you find enough work for 9 months a year you’ll be better off.

 -  It can be a big move to go freelance and you’ll need to be happy being dropped into difficult situations and working with new people.

 -  The main problem with a freelance career is you put any chance of future prospects on hold as the companies you work for will be investing their time and resources into developing their perm staff.  So as a freelancer you’ll stay at roughly the same level.

In short it doesn’t suit everyone but could be a good way to pick the projects you work on + get a pay rise assuming if you think you can find enough work……..