Team 7 Vlog - Episode 14 - Mavstoberfest!

Mark Cuban's Crowdsourcing for a New Jersey Design

Recently, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban posted on his blog a sort of challenge to help redesign the team's jersey. What's the reward? We're not even sure yet. All that Cuban guarantees in his blog post is bragging rights and he "may even throw in some tickets." Who will own the design? The Mavs as soon as you post it on the website.

Many critics are questioning the morality of such an act. You do all that work and you're not even guaranteed a reward and you lose your rights to your work. But this is actually a very smart move on Cuban's part. Why spend so much money to hire a designer to make your jersey when you can have someone do it for free? Sometimes even the public's work can be better than a designer's. No wonder why Cuban is so rich.

For those who aren't really business savvy, there's a term for what Cuban is doing. It's called crowdsourcing. He's using the cheap human capital that he has to try and get new ideas/concepts for his company. It's not an uncommon thing for businesses to do. Doritos has done it before by holding contests to help create their Super Bowl ads and look at how that's worked for them. The crowd responded with some really creative, low-budget commercials.

As to whether or not I will choose to participate in Mark Cuban's little game, I'm not sure yet. For those who are interested, the deadline to submit a jersey design is May 31st. You can read more here:

http://blogmaverick.com/2013/05/13/help-the-mavs-design-our-next-uniform/

Dreading Graduation: Trying to Find a Graphic Designer Job in Dallas

I have about a month left until graduation and December 8th is becoming more of a date that I dread rather than something that I'm looking forward to. I only turned in my order for graduation announcements 2 days ago and it takes about 2-4 weeks to be finished so I don't know if those will finish on time. My cap and gown haven't come in yet so I can't do photos with those til later. My parents keep bugging me about what I want to do to celebrate my graduation. "Do you want a party?" At this point, I don't know. I'm not much of a party person. Gahhh. On top of all that, I still haven't heard back from Reynolds and Reynolds. I think they dropped me as an option. Now it's back to job searching. Dohhh. Or I can just stick with Studio Movie Grill until forever and ever. YEAH RIGHT. I'm getting a degree for a reason and it's not to work as a server forever. I guess whenever I have time I can go back to applying for more jobs. Hopefully I can find a place close to home so that I don't have to worry about paying for housing and leaving my friends and family behind. But I keep falling behind on homework and stuff because of work and thieu nhi. Grrr. I need better time management skills. I hate stressing about these things.

ACTUALLY, what if I tried to apply as a graphic designer for Studio Movie Grill? I could design the menus and promotions and stuff... Maybe being a server could serve as a start towards that road. Dohhh. I wished that the Richards Group would contact me back. That design internship from Disney based in Dallas isn't available anymore either. Fossil and the Dallas Mavericks rejected me, too. Could someone just plop a graphic design job opportunity in Dallas in front of me? That would be awesome.

Anywho, that photo was from my graduation photoshoot with Tien. Click the link below to check out the less flattering photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hungrytien/archives/date-taken/2012/11/01/

IF you are indeed interested in potentially hiring me for a graphic design job, click the link below to check out my portfolio:
http://www.ae221.co.nr/

Don't Be Afraid to Aim High

So here's my official rejection email from the marketing team for the Dallas Mavericks. My buddy Leon was surprised that I even applied because he said he wouldn't even have the confidence to try. It's not about confidence. It's about going after what you want. 

Long ago, back as a senior in high school, my advertising design teacher talked about when her son was going job hunting for a graphic design position. He applied starting at the most prestigious ad agency in Dallas and landed the job. When you aim high, you have a chance of actually starting out with a great job without having to climb from the bottom. Plus, it's not like your chances of getting hired somewhere decreases just because you were rejected somewhere else. I'm taking the tactic of applying at the most prestigious places first and moving down to the least prestigious. Rejected by the Mavs? Fine. Let's see if the Richards Group will take me. If not, there's still Reynolds and Reynolds. Worst case scenario is that I'd be stuck making brochure templates for printing shops. Let's hope I never have to apply for a job at that level. 

That being said, I will accept my rejection with a smile. Why? I've managed to impress a senior designer AND he gave me good tips. His advice actually does make sense, though. I use too much sans-serif fonts in my design and don't branch out into other typefaces. Adding logos to my portfolio is going to be tricky, but I can try. I'm not sure about going to portfolio school, though. I don't even know any portfolio schools nor am I really sure what is the definition of a portfolio school. I tried Googling it and all I got was stuff like the Art Institute and I cannot afford that. What to do...

Welcome to the Real World, Alyssa!

So I haven't really written a post in a while, and if you follow me on Twitter, you know why. Anyways, this is a just a little update about me getting thrown into the real world after living in my ivory tower so long. Recently, I've started a job at the new Studio Movie Grill that opened on Spring Valley. Honestly, I kinda hate it. I work as a server so my pay is really unstable since most of my pay depends on tips. Base pay is only $2.13 an hour, which is average for a waiter job. Everything else is tips, tips, tips. It's like the first week that this location has opened so the managers kind of overstaffed just cuz most of us are new and might need help. The bad thing is that the more people that we have in our little team, the more times we have to split our tip pool. Saturday I walked away with an okay amount of money for 10+ hours of work. Sunday was okay. Monday I only walked away with $10 for the 6 hours I was there. They put me in a 6-man team for a 2-man job. Bleh.

Another thing I hate about working at SMG is the fact that we don't have a definite end time for our shifts. They give us a start time and they'll keep us as they need us. Saturday I started at 10am and got stuck at work til 8pm. Sucked balls.

At least the people I work with are pretty cool (for the most part). I just hope that everyone I work with is reliable. Sunday I had a team member barely do anything. Every time I saw him, he was in the kitchen taking a drink break. And he walked away with an even share of the tip pool even though he didn't do scrap. Seriously? Ugh.

On to life after college. So you know how I went to a job fair back in September with Hien? Well, I got a call back from the Reynolds and Reynolds place. Went through an interview on Skype and got to the second step of the interview process. If I get this job, I'll be set the moment I graduate from college. The thing is, I know nothing about what to ask for for a yearly salary. It says on most of the websites I've been to that the average starting salary of a graphic designer is around $30,000 a year. Landing a job at Reynolds and Reynolds means that I would have to pack up and move to Houston. Can I live on $30,000 a year alone in Houston? Maybe. My parents were making a huge deal out of it saying that I should've tried to push for more and whatever. Ugh. I don't know what to do.

In the meantime, while that second step is going through, I'm still trying to find a job closer to home. I applied for an internship at the Richards Group and got rejected. Now I applied for a full-time position as a designer. If I can land this, then I can drop Reynolds and Reynolds and live at home and stay close to the people I know. I also applied for a graphic design internship for the Dallas Mavs. If I can land either of those jobs, I'll be fine.

So the moral of the story is, start applying for jobs before you graduate so that you'll have something lined up as soon as you get your diploma. That way, you won't have to bum around for a few months after graduation waiting for a job offer. The second moral is that waiter jobs are hard. Don't do it.