Ildiko Gaspar

what's more useful: this watch or that nft you bought?

The shortcut to a successful design career does not exist. "I can't put in years of work to get better at design. How can I do it now?" You can't. This shortcut doesn't exist. Putting in the time is how you get better which leads to better work. There are no shortcut to it. It's repetition. It's practicing over and over again for a long period of time. It's designing even when you don't have clients. It's trying to design something without someone asking you to. It's designing even when you're not getting paid. You need all that plus some luck. I often tell the story about how my first client out of design school, literally as soon as I graduated, was redesigning The North Face's website with an agency called Fluid. On paper, it looked like I got lucky. An overnight success. A shortcut taker. Day 1 out of school you land a huge project? Impossible. You had to know someone? You cheated. You just got lucky. You're right, I did get lucky. But I put in years of work prior to that to increase my odds of becoming lucky. You see, what people don't understand or even try to consider is that on top of all that luck, I spent over 5 years prior to that already designing things everyday, pushing myself to get better. I spent 4 of those years in college designing everyday for class. I also looked for freelance opportunities locally or with my teachers that I could help with for free or for a couple hundred bucks. When teachers gave us design assignments, I did multiple concepts not just the 1 required. I was always pushing myself as far as I could. I paid attention to what my classmates were doing and always tried to one up them. (I'm very competitive which works to my advantage as well). On top of that, I worked multiple jobs. When I wasn't in class, I worked at the mall till closing almost everyday. On days I was off work, I had side business detailing cars any chance I could. I also lived an hour away from school. So, I drove 2 hours everyday. All that plus the everyday life of a college student—there were plenty of ways to make excuses and hunt for shortcuts. I didn't know it at the time, but I was living the "secret." I was living this non-existent "shortcut." The secret was always that there wasn't one. There wasn't some magical course I could take. The shortcut was more of a long journey of hard work. You've got to make a strong effort. You've got to put in the time. You've got to increase your odds at luck. You've got to do these things to find your "shortcut." My "shortcut" was landing big clients right out of school, but it took 5 years to do it (and some luck). If you're just starting today in design or are only a few years in, please remember how long it took me to get going—5 years. I guarantee you most others have a similar story. That shouldn't be discouraging. That should be exciting. Exciting because anything is possible if you put in the time and stop chasing shortcuts. More excitingly, if you're already a few years in then it sounds like your time might be getting close! And if you're just getting started remember the shortcut you're after doesn't exist. What does exist is time—take advantage of it.

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