Success Secrets from Clive Piercy

• You really need to identify who you want to work with. I don’t think you should start your own business too early.
• If you do really good work, you get good work coming to you. I believe that’s the best thing you can do.
• The way to do good work is to attract clients who push you to do what you do best and know the difference between you and somebody else.

About Clive and Air Conditioned:

Air Conditioned is the Santa Monica-based design office of Clive Piercy. For the previous twenty years, Clive was founder, partner and Creative Director of Ph.D, a studio internationally recognized for work characterized by its appropriateness, character, style and wit.

A|C’s mission is to work together with smart, creative clients, on projects large and small, to produce idea-driven solutions that engage, enrich and resonate. Would you like to work with them?

Early beginnings:

I got a job while I was still in college, a great job at BBC Television in London. I got recommended for the job by the only tutor that I got on well with. It was a very glamorous job, but I realized afterwards that they really only hired me because I was a good soccer player, and I could play for their soccer team.

It’s the truth. The guy said to me, “I’m going to hire you. I really like your attitude, but I don’t particularly like your work.” I was very cocky. I thought I was really something. It was a good awakening.

Apprenticing with one of the greats:

I worked as an assistant there for 2 years for the guy who was generally regarded as the resident genius there. His name, Graham McCallum. And he was fantastic, but he was a lazy devil. He’d done it all really. And so he would give me his work to do, and because he was getting all the best work, as an assistant I was getting better work than all the designers there.

They very quickly made me a graphic designer, and I was actually the youngest designer, but when they made me a designer I went to the bottom of the designer rung. So I was getting worse work as a designer than I was as an assistant. (Laughter.)

Since I was kind of hotheaded, I just said, “I’m done with this. I don’t want to do this. I’m better than this,” that kind of thing. I was brash. I just left.

I’d always wanted to work in print. I kind of stumbled into BBC graphics, just because they offered me the work. I didn’t know anything about film or animation or live action or anything, but I survived fine. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was one of the greatest work experiences I’ve had.

Moving to America:

My wife, Ann Field, and I had previously been to America on a couple of jobs and we thought, “Let’s give America a shot.” You know? We came for six months and we we’ve been here 26 years.

I’d always wanted to come to Los Angeles. I’m a big fan. I tell everyone that I was surprised Los Angeles was in color when I got here. (Chuckling.)

I grew up watching Billy Wilder films and looking at Max Yavno photographs. I liked the notion of Los Angeles in the 40’s. I wanted it to be like James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, Nathaniel West and all that.

It’s a very glamorous place for anybody. If you ask most people, they’d like to come to California.

Starting out in Los Angeles:

When I came here, I went to work for Rod Dyer. I went to him because everybody great has worked for Rod. And so from my reputation, he said, “Oh, I’ll hire you. I’ll give you some work if you come over.” I became the creative director there, and stayed for 5 years.

As you know, Rod does entertainment graphics. Over time I realized I was not cut out for that. And so I decided I was going to start my own company, but I didn’t want to do entertainment graphics which kind of cuts out 90% of the work. But I knew I wasn’t right for it.

Thoughts on the dangers of charging too little:

When I worked for Rod, I had a slew of freelance clients. And because I had a full-time job, I was charging my clients virtually nothing. The minute I started my own company, I started charging properly and they all dumped me. (Laughter.) Right off. They all just dumped me. They were using me primarily because I was cheap, and not because I was good. There was another factor in it. It made me realize that you have to make sure that the financial side is in place before you do any work.

Going into business:

Since entertainment wasn’t my preference, I decided to go into business with my partner Michael Hodgson. We formed the company, Ph.D.. We’d known each other from college in England. But, there was no logic or rationale in it. It was just, “Oh, let’s…”

I found an old studio. But I still wasn’t sure I wanted to make the move. So, I went on holiday and said, “If I come back and this studio is still for lease, I’m gonna’ take it.”

New business acquisition at first:

At first, our business came mostly from word of mouth. I had managed to start getting a good reputation by doing good work, and people just referred clients to us.

We had no business plan or anything. But work started coming very quickly and we realized we needed to get a little bit more serious about it. So we consolidated and turned it into a real business. We worked together successfully for about 20 years.

Starting business as Air Conditioned:

After 20 years, Michael and I split up.

I essentially had a mid-life crisis and just did not want to do what I did anymore. We had a biggish company and I realized I’d been the creative director all the time. I basically had done the vast majority of the work and I found myself giving work to designers that I wasn’t proud enough to do myself, just to keep a big office open.

That’s a very typical dilemma that you run into when you become more established. As we grew, so did our staff. I felt that I had lost the me, if you know what I mean. I just stopped being a designer and I was finding myself doing less and less of what I wanted to do. I came to the realization that I really wanted to do something about the types of clients we were getting. I didn’t really want to do more corporate work.

I’d always enjoyed working with other creative companies. That’s really how I became successful, by working with other creative companies. And we were moving away from that. So after 20 years, we drifted apart. He had a family, and was more involved with other things. Besides, our chemistry had changed, and I wanted to see if I could operate in a more enjoyable way.

Thoughts on choosing projects:

By now, I’d been around a long time and lot of good will was being shown towards me from the community. And I really, really love that. I think I’m a popular guy in the business.

I could do a ton of work, now, but I really just want to take on the jobs I feel I’m appropriate for. And I’m able to see it in a slightly clearer light now.

I’m the creative director of a big clothing company, Roxy. So I have that as a massive monthly commitment. And then I’m able to choose the jobs I want to work on, and I have a small group – 5 people. At the moment that’s all I want. I really feel like this is the way. This is what I should be doing for a while.

New business acquisition today:

The fact I have a new company with a new name and a little bit of a new image helps. I call the company Air Conditioned because I want to have a very kind of light touch on the work. I don’t want to be a show off designer.

I’ve done a new website and that seems to be very popular, but I’m not sending out pieces or doing brochures and all that stuff. I feel that’s kind of old hat.

As the creative director at Ph.D., I was on the front end, so I knew all the clients. And a lot of them just followed me when I moved. Also, I’ve never had a problem with repeat work. We never had much attrition, or falling off rate.

Design influences:

Tibor Kalman, influenced my work, for sure. And, more importantly the people who’ve worked through his offices have too. Steven Doyle, for example, is my favorite designer. And we’re good friends. I think there’s a mutual respect there, but I love his work. He’s the one person who I’m most envious of in this business, talent wise.

Also, I‘ve always had a great love of work of Pentagram. When I started being interested in graphic design, it was in the late 60’s, you know, the Fletcher/Forbes/Gill, Robert Brownjohn and all that great classic 60’s English design.

Classic work. Simple, idea-driven work. I loved all that. And I still really respect the integrity of the majority of Pentagram’s work. Paula (Scher) is the embodiment of a great designer whose work continues to develop and inspire.

Favorite accomplishments:

Teaching is a very big part of what I do. I only do it one day a week, but it’s an integral part of my life, and it has fueled my creative soul in a big way.

It’s allowed me to connect with students. I love doing that and it tests me every week. I’ll tell you another thing, in a selfish way, I get to see good students and sometimes they come and work with me. So that’s been great. And, to balance teaching with my work is the thing that I enjoy the most.

Thoughts on doing things differently:

I went into partnership with a friend who was a fellow designer, and neither of us had much business sense. And because I was the “better” designer, Michael said, “Well, let me try and do the business side.” And that ended up being a frustration all around.

I don’t think he particularly would’ve wanted to do that, but he knew he could be better served in that area than being entirely on the design side. So I guess that was a major error, not having much business sense. In the long run, it didn’t hurt us, but it was frustrating.

Other designers may have done better financially than I have, but I still have a nice little house, a beautiful wife, and I think I get great jobs and all of that.

Clive’s Toughest Challenge:

Well, undoubtedly the toughest thing I’ve had to face in life is the loss of my parents back in England, with me being in California. I’m not sure I’ve been able to translate those experiences into positives that I can bring into my business. I do think that I’ve gained a new perspective on what I consider to be important to me. My beautiful wife, the amazing Ann Field, illustrious illustrator and Chair of Illustration at Art Center College of Design is the reason I’ve made it through.

Tips for people just starting out:

If you do really good work, you get good work coming to you. I believe that’s the best thing you can do.

You shouldn’t be thinking, “We’ll do this. We’ll try our best on the next job.” You’ve really got to be turning out good work in order to get it, in order to attract it. And, by definition, that means then that you’ll get good designers coming in your doors who want to work with you. All those things help.

Thoughts on getting good clients:

I would say the same thing. Just do good work. I do feel that that is the key.

It took me a long time to realize this, because I used to think that the way to do good work was to find a client that you could force into accepting the things you want to do for them.

I used to joke that the client brief should be, “Give me a logo and make it look like I spent a lot of money on it.” That was it. And I realized that there are plenty of people that can do that, but it wasn’t for me.

It took me a long time to realize that the way to do good work is to attract clients that know the difference, who push you to do what you do best and know the difference between you and somebody else. That’s been the most enjoyable thing. It’s the most worrying too, because we all have egos and anxieties and everything. And you just keep wondering, “Can I do it this time around?” But that’s what keeps me going. I love that.

I’m looking for clients that are better than me.

Clive’s thoughts on careers:

You really need to identify who you want to work with. I don’t think you should start your own business too early. There are many pitfalls that you’ll go through. As I said, I teach at Art Center College of Design. I see all the graduating students and they still need a lot of mentoring. They need to go to work for a really good art director for a while and see how it’s done. That’s what I would urge and not to diverge too much from where they think they should be.

First off, they should know who they want to work for, and I find most of them don’t. The majority of them have never heard of the good people. And so you need to identify who you think you’d be right for and they need to bone up on what those people do and then really, really target the kinds of places they want to work. Then, they should gear their portfolio towards that. And I don’t see that. They’re often like lemmings pushed off a cliff most of the time.

Additional Thoughts:

I tell all students that the first day when I’m teaching them, “There are already enough graphic designers in the world. We do not need you.”

“But the difference is there aren’t enough great graphic designers. And that should be your aim.” I like saying that. I feel like that gets them into the spirit. It charges them up a little bit, most of them, if they can be bothered to get out of bed.

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Success Secrets from Mike Salisbury:

• It is very competitive. To get work takes getting attention. The attention of clients and the attention of people who will steer clients to you.
• There is a lot of stuff going on in graphic communications today. Unique and modern concepts and looks and a lot of creativity inspired by other periods.
• There is almost too much good design. Is it the computer? That’s the tool to get it done—the look and the finish –and it is the resource to explore and experiment and learn. A resource we have never had before. And there are more people with knowledge creating

About Mike (shown above with Tina Turner)

Mike Salisbury is recognized by his peers as one of the leading talents in American design and the man behind the imprint on a multitude of diverse products – Levi’s 501 jeans (a brand that Salisbury created), Michael Jackson’s white glove, Rolling Stone and Playboy magazines, O’Neil and Gotcha surfwear, along with some of the world’s most recognized corporate branding and product design for companies like Hasbro–the biggest toy company in the world, Volkswagen, Honda, Halo and Halo II–the world’s most popular video game.

His work is everywhere in the motion picture industry. Mike created marketing campaigns for over 300 movies including Aliens, Jurassic Park, Rocky, Romancing The Stone, Raiders of The Lost Ark, the new Planet of The Apes and Moulin Rouge. In the film The People vs. Larry Flynt, Flynt defends the First Amendment based on a concept Mike Salisbury created for Hustler.

George Lucas collects Salisbury’s work and recommended him to Francis Ford Coppola who used Salisbury for the prototype for the photographer’s role in Apocalypse Now. The exploding boxing gloves that interpreted Rocky IV to the world – a Salisbury image so hot it became the visual symbol for the film that didn’t need the title for identification. This visual symbol became Salisbury’s most copied graphic.

Mike has photographs in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and his design work is in the Library of Congress, The National Archives and the Smithsonian, He has been invited to speak across the US, Europe and South America, His photography and graphic work have been featured in museum shows worldwide and he has a Grammy nomination.

His music industry work includes creating album covers for George Harrison, James Taylor Randy Newman, Rickie Lee Jones, Ry Cooder, Ike and Tina and developing branding identities for Blue Note, RCA, United Artists Records and PolyGram.

Mike has taught design, advertising, illustration and photography at UCLA, Otis Art Institute and Art Center. He has written for Forbes. Men’s Journal and other magazines and has photographed for Vogue, Esquire, Newsweek and more including stories of his motorcycling and surfing adventures all over the world. Surfing safaris to Fiji, Nicaragua, motorcycle adventures circumnavigating Alaska, across Peru from the Pacific over the Andes to Machu Pichu, to Corsica and Sardinia from Milan, into the Brazilian Amazon from Bolivia and around the Florida Keys, into the Grand Canyon and across the Gulf Stream from Miami to Bimini on Jet Skis

Appointed to the Naval Academy, Annapolis by Gerald Ford, Mike flunked the math test. (See all of the above.)

Who are you:

I remember trying to get a job but had no resume I really didn’t want a resume because it just seemed so cold. Instead, I always created something visual to get a job. I was hired out of school by Playboy magazine in Chicago. I wanted to come back to California. So I created a cartoon strip resume with m as the main character, and I got hired from that.

What do you do:

By creating ads on my own that I though fit their style, I got my first job as an advertising agency art director.

You need to show potential clients or employers or schools what you can actually do. And you need to do it well, even if you’re only creating samples for portfolio pieces. And you must personalize this communication. How? Use your name in your business. And adding your photo or likeness to resumes or websites or your card in a creative and/or tasteful puts a person with the work.

What did you do:

Everything you communicate with should be a reflection of your taste and talent. You can communicate with humor if that reflects you and your work. You can communicate with an idea or style.
All of my stationery–envelopes, letterheads and labels for packages and discs–are designed with samples of my work and have a small logo sticker that attaches to any work presented. I have my logo on e-mails, I have printed t-shirts with my logo and mailed them to clients and potential clients. A lot of my materials have been a bit humorous to take hard sell edge off.

How do you get more:

Building my business has always been promoting, promoting, and more promoting. Even now, I’m trying out anew ways to promote. I even had a press agent at times. I have sent out weekly postcards announcing new work or awards, advertised in the entertainment trade magazines, created mailers that featured one piece of known work in each category I work in—editorial design, motion picture marketing, apparel advertising, video game branding, corporate identity, packaging and the amount possibly earned for clients with each example.

I speak at conferences and events about my work. And I wrote a book about my work– “Art Director Confesses.”

Get out there:

Take every opportunity to learn new things and meet new people and network. As a creative director at Wells Rich Green, and Foote Cone Belding, I had access to big deal clients with big deal budgets and I learned and created what I couldn’t have working alone. And I met and worked with people who later became my clients. For my business.

Attend seminars and take classes. I have attended a lot of seminars and I’ve spoken at them: AIGA, Idea. But I’ve also attended different kinds of seminars not just those relating to design or advertising. I attended a guerilla marketing seminar which very beneficial. It reminded me to do things I should do that we forget to do like taking notes and asking questions. And their book is a good one too. It told me how to promote with obvious, easy-to-understand things I could do. Things, which don’t cost a lot of money, like letters. I send out a lot of letters. And people read them and pass them on. And with e-mail today it can be easier but at times there is no substitute for the real thing in writing.

When I network with anyone, anywhere, I subtly promote what I do. If I am asked what am I up to, I reply with a work related informative short answer—but not “ Uh duuno.”

Outside of work, my love of surfing and motorcycling and my interests in art and photography have created new opportunities and made new clients. I went surfing in Fiji with guys who were all in finance: stock brokers and bond brokers. They asked what I did, and I told them, and I ended up contributing to the bottom line of a lot of their companies.

From my experiences riding and surfing, I have been asked by people I meet from the surfing and motorcycle industries to create advertising campaigns and design and marketing materials and I have been asked by major magazines to write about surfing and motorcycling and design.

Show off:

Promoting is presentation and this business of advertising and design is presentation, presentation, presentation. I learned presentation studying architecture at the University of Southern California. This is one of the most valuable assets I have.

Something I developed creating for the motion picture business is conceiving and managing the creation of a lot of concepts to a lot of different directions for presentations. I have built entertaining and theatrical presentations once renting an empty new industrial space to hang teach two-page layout of a very large format brochure promoting a new movie, like an art gallery show. My presentations have been created in theatrical forms but explain the concepts very well.

Because of my presentations, I’ve been asked to create presentations for agencies for their clients or potential clients as well as –for Levi Strauss and Volkswagen–and to revise those presentations. And I can develop multitudes of revisions.

Business advisor advice:

I can be prolific with concepts and revisions because I have learned from my business consultants and from just working in advertising and editorial the value of research. And listening. I work by first developing concepts to my instincts re: the project and then work from the clients’ input and from research about the market, the product, the customer.

So, find good consultants. Two more heads of course are better than my little one. David Goodman has been an adviser of mine for over 10 years. He builds strategies with for solving client assignments and advises me on tactics for dealing with clients He is here in the LA area. Emily Cohen. Is another advisor from the East Coast. She writes my proposals and contracts. She at times has one point of view, and Dave has another. So together we construct proposals and I take advice. One thing I always disagreed with both of them on, is giving anybody revisions to a job at no cost to the client. I mean if the client’s not satisfied the first time, how are they going to be satisfied the second time, even if it’s for free?

Mike’s perspective on specializing:

I never specialized—magazine design, advertising, graphic design, illustration, photography, film, architecture, writing– I have done it all. That creates some problems in marketing myself. So, what I do is simply position myself as a sales tool. Today, branding is the best term to describe what I do.

Beginnings:

I started taking pictures when I was a little kid, about six or seven. And I earned my camera selling greeting cards door to door. I could always draw, and I would draw for people’s attention especially girls’ attention. I still draw for the preliminary stages of working. With my sketches I have something to communicate to the people who work with me. And it doesn’t take a computer.

When I was about 9, I lived next door to an art director on the Kellogg’s account and he asked me to do some lettering that looked like a kid’s writing and that introduced advertising and me to design.

Take every opportunity to learn:

In junior high, I began a business painting flames, surrealistic murals and pin striping on cars.

I lived near George Barris Kustom Kars and I would ride my tricked out bicycle over there and just watch Von Dutch pinstripe and spray paint flames on the custom cars and hot rods. I practiced and practiced on everything and everywhere. My entire bedroom was pinstriped. I then went on the road painting at car shows and drag races.

Pin striping took concentration to make designs symmetrical with just a brush. Also in junior high I learned to set type. Learning both skills took concentration and both were invaluable in my work.
Words are the coin of the realm..make them look good like money.

Take every opportunity:

I like to believe I always picked what I wanted to do. I wanted to design a magazine so I promoted myself to the editor, John Severson, for the job as the first art director of Surfer magazine. Being in that arena brought me design work for clients like Gordon and Smith and Birdwell Beach Britchs. Later, that beach industry experience got my own firm hired to create memorable ad campaigns for Gotcha.

That was after I wanted to be in advertising. After Surfer, I picked the agency that I thought was doing the best work and prepared those sample ads to show what I could do and I was hired.

I say I like to believe I always picked what I wanted to do and just did it but I was fortunate that when and where I started, there wasn’t a lot of competition for creative jobs.

And, I could see opportunities that other people couldn’t see. For example, when I went to be the art director of West, everyone said it was horrible. It was a supplement of the LA Times, and they wouldn’t be interested. To me it was like a blank canvas. They had a circulation of two million and they really didn’t have a format or a look.

I gave it a format and a look. The format organized the editorial material so it could be read, and I gave west a look with the content. I wanted to make it about Southern California and the culture we live in and LA is all about the visual.

And I used the magazine to promote what I did. I mailed copies all over the world. People could not get enough of California. I lived it and could tell the story and got more work to do that.

Another opportunity no one saw was the position of creative director for United Artists Records. I took the job and was nominated for a Grammy with one of my album covers. That led to me being hired as the art director of Rolling Stone. A magazine that never had a strong visual presence. That gave me the opportunity to create one for it.

Don’t stop:

My aunt was a high school English teacher who always gave me books. Learning to write has been a passion of mine so I started writing for magazines like Men’s Journal and Forbes because of my Rolling Stone connection.

From Rolling Stone I went to work creating ad campaigns for movies. A hard, supposedly dead end job but I did get to create the Jurassic Park and Raiders of the Lost Ark logos and as campaigns for over 300 motion pictures including Aliens and Moulin Rouge.

When the big time New York ad agency Wells Rich Greene opened their Los Angeles office they were looking for someone with entertainment industry experience. That was me. But, the guy that told them to hire me, worked at Wells and was a fan of West. I’ve always been in a place where I could see an opportunity especially one handed to me.

And either on my own, or working for a big company, I would use the opportunity to learn.

At West I had pushed myself learning more photography and I got assignments from magazines like Vogue and Esquire and I took pictures of recording stars like George Harrison. At Wells, I stayed long nights looking at reels learning all I could about commercials.

Mike Koelker was the Executive Creative Director on the Levis account at Foote Cone Belding in San Francisco. He hired me to be Director of Creative Services. I was asked why? Koelker does everything creatively for Levis and he does it great. At FCB, I introduced the 501 brand. That work was on billboards all over the country, on TV, featured in the Wall Street Journal and is in books sand museums. Howe many kids do you named Travis?

There were a lot of people who couldn’t understand why I would want to go to work for the LA Times for West Magazine, or people would ask why would I want to go back to work for an agency like Wells.

It was all opportunities to create, learn new things and meet new people–network. A lot of times the pay was really good, but there were other times when the pay wasn’t the issue. You know, and I know, salary jobs can’t always be the best paying jobs in the world.

So I look for what I’m going to get out of it, what I’m going to learn. And I get to work with that client’s money and make samples for myself. You know, going back to the Wells and Foote Cone agencies, they had big deal clients with big deal budgets, and I got to create things that I couldn’t have created working alone for myself. Sometimes people don’t see those kinds of opportunities.

Advice for someone just starting out:

My daughter Victoria graduated from college in fashion and she wanted to put together a resume, but she hadn’t done anything professionally. I suggested that she make a presentation piece, because she’s a fabulous designer, and she’s really good at the construction of fabulous high-end clothes and her designs have all been photographed. She did the presentation work.

She got hired and just completed the design of an entire line of women’s wear, which sold out when shown at a trade show.

The thing to do is always show people what you can do. The words aren’t going to do much in a resume for a visual person, unless you’re demonstrating market experience. And if you don’t have anything to show people, do what I did to get my first agency art director job at the Lansdale Agency. I saw what he did, the most clever stuff in LA at the time, I created ads that might have come out of his place, presented them to him, and got a job.

You need to show people what you can actually do. And you need to do it well, even if you’re only creating samples for portfolio pieces. No one really cares as long as long as they can see what you’re capable of.

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Success Secrets from Michael Bierut:

• Clients are most afraid that you’re going to go off and design something without really listening first.
• Just keep asking questions: the more you ask, the more you’ll understand what the client is looking for in a designer.
• Life’s too short to spend your time talking on the phone with people who make your knuckles white during the course of the conversation.

About Michael:

Michael Bierut is a partner in the New York office of the international consultancy Pentagram. His graphic design work has been collected by major museums around the world. He has served as the president of the AIGA’s New York chapter and of its national organization. He was elected to the Art Directors Hall of Fame in 2003, received the AIGA Medal in 2006, and received the Design Mind award from the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in 2008. He is a co-founder of the world’s biggest design blog, DesignObserver.com, the author of 79 Short Essays on Design from Princeton Architectural Press, and on the faculty of Yale University’s School of Art and School of Management.

Early Beginnings:

I decided when I was in high school that I wanted to become a graphic designer without ever having met one or really knowing that much about what they did. I liked art, and I particularly liked commercial art.

I’m from Ohio, and in my state the University of Cincinnati had a program in graphic design at their school of design. I got my degree there. And right after I graduated, I moved to New York and got my first job working with Massimo and Lella Vignelli at Vignelli Associates.

I worked there for over ten years and then joined Pentagram. That was my second, and last job.

The business structure at Pentagram:

Pentagram currently has 17 partners and probably just as many retired partners or ex-partners. So there’s an enormous body of work that’s been done on Pentagram’s behalf by people working at Pentagram for the past 35 or so years.

And because of that, our name is fairly well known, and a great deal of business comes from referrals.

But also, because of the way we’re structured, we actually don’t need that much work to stay busy and to run a good business. Our overhead is really low. We don’t have account executives or new business people.

Every one of those 17 partners is a working designer with clients. Each of the partners hires his or her own design team to support the work that they do.

Each team runs its own profit and loss. So each team is financially accountable, and tends to be very careful about how it uses money and how many people it hires to be as efficient as possible. As a result, each of those 17 studios within Pentagram really doesn’t need that much work to keep busy. It’s not like a typical multi-national firm that has a pyramid structure, where they need constant new business activity just to feed a big monster that consists of a lot of non-billing overhead people.

People who’ve influenced Michael’s work:

I could name thousands and thousands and thousands. While I was in school I interned for a guy in Cincinnati named Dan Bittman. He’s a star in Cincinnati, but isn’t as well known anywhere else, but he had a real influence on me. I also worked as an intern in Boston with Chris Pullman at WGBH. That had some influence on me I’d say. And then, I’ve been working in these two jobs, my first job for ten years with Lella and Massimo, and my second job, here at Pentagram, for 18 years and counting.

When I was younger I had dozens of heroes who ranged from the obvious people, like Paul Rand and Milton Glaser, to less obvious ones like Corita Kent and Don Trousdell. From classic designers like Armin Hofmann and Josef Müller-Brockman, all the way to great MAD magazine illustrators like Don Martin or Mort Drucker.

You can see I’ve always had very eclectic tastes and have admired lots of different people. And now at Pentagram, I have six partners that I work with side-by-side. They’re just as influential on me today as anyone else.

Favorite Accomplishment:

About 15 years ago, I was having a conversation with one of my partners, Paula Scher, and we were talking about our clients and our work and I remember saying back then, “If I only had a half dozen clients that I really liked, that I really liked talking to and who I really respected for the way that they made their money, and I really felt I was making a contribution through my talents, and that I could give the best of what I do, if I could just have six of those people, that would be all I’d ask for.”

I sort of dreamt about that for a while, and a few years ago, around seven years or so, I just decided life’s to short to spend my time talking on the phone to people who make my knuckles white while I’m having a conversation. I decided that I was not going to do that anymore.

I think I’m a very polite guy. I don’t have it in me to actually fire clients outright. You can probably tell that from the fact that I’ve only had two jobs and I’ve been married to the same woman for 28 years, and she’s the first girl I ever kissed. So I’m not much for breaking up with careers or with women or with clients.

I can’t say I went out and fired all of them. But one by one, I managed to trail off from doing things that I didn’t like. So if I’m proud of anything now, it’s that I have clients that I work with where the client is someone who I first met as long ago as 1981 or 1982, and I’ve done every single thing that they’ve ever commissioned a graphic designer to do between then and now.

When one of them comes back and they have some new project they think might be interesting for me, it’s always really, really nice to feel that I have those kind of relationships over the long term. I end up learning a lot from people like that who are smart and do interesting things and who introduce me to worlds that I wouldn’t have access to having just gone to design school.

Michael’s thoughts on the keys to success:

Most of the stuff we work with in our profession has some kind of text that goes along with it. Graphic design is about putting together words and pictures, and I’ve always sensed, even in design school, that a lot of designers weren’t into the words. To them, the words were just areas of gray space to be manipulated, moved around, and dispensed with.

I’ve always been a very faithful reader, even a compulsive reader, and I’ve found that if I read and try to understand what I’m working on, that the words gave me a surprising edge in the situation. At first I thought it was just other designers who weren’t reading the text, but then it turns out, a lot of times, that the clients haven’t read the text either.

It’s amazing how many people don’t take the time to actually read the stuff that they’re saying, the stuff that is so important and has to be designed and mass-produced and distributed to the public.

And a lot of times, if you engage with the content, you find out ways to design more precisely for the assignment. You find out ways to improve it. And sometimes you can make the suggestion to throw it out all together and replace it with something better.

The designers that I’ve always liked, the ones that I’ve always hired, the ones that I’ve liked working with, the ones that I respect, always seem to be ones that are very attuned to the content of what they’re working with, and connected to whom the audience is for that content.

I think there are plenty of designers out there who are good at resolving a formal composition. I’m not even sure I’m really that good at that to tell you the truth. But I’ve found that if you sort out the substance of the message, you end up getting a result that’s not just more effective, but actually might have more resonance with the people it’s intended to reach.

On doing things differently:

I have three kids, and if any of them proposed to me that they want to go directly after an MFA in design, I probably would try to stop them from doing it, to tell you the truth.

Instead, I would recommend that they get some general knowledge first. For example, right now my daughter’s about to graduate from a four-year liberal arts college, and she’s spent four years reading books and learning about everything. When I was her age, I was spending hours and hours and hours doing the kind of things one did in design school: hand lettering type, cutting things up with Xacto knives, hand painting color swatches, and cutting them out and combining them, things that people don’t do at all today in the computer world.

I spent literally months on end doing that sort of stuff and my daughter meanwhile has been reading the great books and communing with really intelligent professors and engaging in stimulating discussions with fellow students.

Throughout my adult life, I’ve been imagining that a time will come when I’ll be able to go back and do all that. And then you start to realize that point may never come. That would be my greatest regret I’d say.

The toughest thing Michael’s ever had to do:

The hardest thing to do is to own up to making a mistake. A few times in my life I’ve made big mistakes that, in some cases, have ended up costing me a lot of money. If I’ve gotten inspiration from where in these situations, I think it would be from the story of a structural engineer named William LeMessurier. He was the engineer for the Citicorp Tower in Manhattan. After it was finished and occupied, he realized that he had made a miscalculation that meant the building might topple over in a high wind. This is a career-ending mistake. But instead of covering his butt or calling in an army of lawyers to protect him, he simply went to the head of Citi and said he had made this mistake and he wanted to fix it. They were so disarmed by his forthrightness that they actually worked with him to fix the problem and he came out with his reputation intact. Being honest like that requires real bravery, but LeMessurier’s story proves that it’s worth it

Michael’s tips for getting new business:

I am really good at getting new business. And there are simple tricks for doing it. But sometimes I’m reluctant to tell many people these tricks because I feel like I’m able to go in and get a lot of work just because no one else seems to know them.

One is, if you spend a lot of time asking questions and are sincerely interested in the client and his or her business, a lot of times they’ll think that you’re really smart and you really “get them.” You may not be smart or get them at all, but because you’re open to the idea of learning about them, they’ll give you more credit than you perhaps deserve.

What to avoid in a new business pitch:

Most designers, when they’re going in to pitch a new client, have prepared very, very carefully. They’ve selected the portfolio they want to show, they get all their talking points worked out, and they’ve perhaps even researched the client in advance and actually are going to demonstrate their acumen by telling the client what kind of conclusions they’ve drawn about their business already.

All those things are worth doing, but a lot of times the result is they’re so eager to start rolling, that if they’ve got sixty minutes for the presentation, then they have sixty minutes worth of solid material to fill that, and then some.

I’ll go into meetings and I’ll put off the moment where I have to present my work as long as I possibly can. I’ll just keep asking questions and questions and questions and questions and of course, the more questions, the more they’re telling you what they’re looking for in a designer.

Thoughts on how to present your work to new prospects:

The more you talk with them, the more they tell you what they want to know about you. So, after you’ve asked a lot of questions, when you start showing them your work, you know what to focus on, things that you know now are relevant to their situation and that are answering questions that they have, that are in the spheres of interest to them.

I’m not sure why everyone doesn’t present this way, but every once in a while I’ll get a client who will tell me what the other presentations were like. And it’s funny to hear sometimes.

Dealing with prospect insecurities:

Clients just want to be sure they don’t make the wrong decision. And if they don’t have that much experience working with designers, they’ll go into a presentation ill at ease and feeling insecure. It’s just the way it is. For them it’s new and uncomfortable. It’s different from other situations in their life because they usually feel very capable and in command.

But when meeting with designers, they might not think they have any taste or know anything about design or something like that, right? They have a kind of fear and insecurity.

Most designers, when they’re pitching, when they’re selling themselves, think the way to allay the client’s insecurity is by demonstrating absolute confidence. They try to let the prospect know that they shouldn’t worry: “I really know what I’m doing. I’m a real expert. Look at all this stuff I’ve done. I really know your business. I spent time researching it. I’m on top of everything. You have nothing to fear. I’m really competent. You have no reason to worry.”

The prospects greatest fear:

And the problem is they miss the one over-arching fear that clients tend to have, that you’re not going to listen to them. That’s what they’re really afraid of. They’re afraid that you’re going to go off and design something, and not really listen to whatever it is they need. And, if you’ve managed to fill a sixty-minute presentation with sixty minutes worth of bragging about your skills, you’ve basically confirmed exactly what it is they’re most afraid of.

They’re not afraid that you’re a bad designer. They’re afraid you’re a good designer who is going to go off and do something that has nothing at all to do with what their problem is.

Thoughts on the importance of curiosity:

If you read a lot and you’re genuinely curious about the world, you’ll go far in this profession, because there simply aren’t that many people who are able to combine graphic design talent with genuine curiosity about the world.

The great thing about our profession is the nature of the designer/client relationship. You’re always put together with someone who is coming in with a new perspective. And I think designers complain about that sometimes. They say, “My biggest challenge is educating the client.” I never, ever talk about educating the client. I don’t believe in it.

Avoiding bad design:

In fact, when I see bad design, it’s not because the client hasn’t been educated. It’s because the designer hasn’t been educated by the client. I don’t mean taking orders from a hack client. I mean genuinely becoming sympathetic and interested with what the client is trying to communicate, what makes them interesting and special.

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Secrets of Success from Jack Anderson:

• Starting the office is one of the best things I ever did professionally.
• Chasing the dream of being “one of the most influential design firms in the United States someday” is what really drove us through the challenging times.
• Our naivety, not knowing what was around the corner, not knowing what was ahead, and not knowing the challenges we would face is what’s grown us into the successful business we are today.

Early beginnings:

I started out studying engineering, transferred into architecture, then into industrial design with a little stint in interior design, and ultimately landed in graphics, all in the very limited environment of Montana State University. I managed to extend their 4 year program into 5, before graduating with a degree in what was called Professional Design back in 1975.

Mixed in there were a lot of art, photography and industrial arts classes, and frankly, I graduated feeling somewhat handicapped that I had a little taste of a lot of things and really not much skill in any one specific thing.

As it turned out, it was probably one of the greatest gifts I could have ever received. When I look back now, a big part of the reason Hornall Anderson is what it is today is because of that diverse background.

After graduating in 1975, I came to Seattle, accepted a job at an architectural firm called TRA Richardson Associates and, for 5 ½ years, I did title blocks, the occasional brochure, and a lot of environmental graphics or way finding.

When I started branching out into the community I met a gentleman by the name of John Hornall. This was when I was still in college and showing my book around. I courted him for nearly the full 5 ½ years that I was at the architectural firm. Ultimately, we got together at Cole & Weber, where he managed the design group. We were there for a year and a half together, before striking out on our own in 1982 when we started Hornall Anderson.

Deciding factors about going into business:

It was an interesting set of circumstances. John and I had a thriving little design group within Cole & Weber. We were in a satellite office in Seattle. One of our major clients was Westin Hotels, and when they changed their name from Westin International to Westin Inn, we had the opportunity to do a lot of really cool projects with them. We were out on our own and enjoying a fair amount of success, but the main agency wanted to pull us back into the mothership.

Simultaneous to this, I’d had a number of partnerships in small-scale real estate ventures. I’d bought homes and was fixing them up with some buddies of mine, and had experienced the process of what a partnership looks like, both contractually and in reality.

So, when Ron Elgin formed a brand new agency called Elgin Kirkland Syferd, which later became BBD Seattle, he asked John if he would be the design department inside their new agency. I said, “Wouldn’t it make more sense to have our own firm?” Long story short, we started Hornall Anderson Design Works, and Ron Elgin, Dave Syferd and Terry Kirkland became investors in our firm.

It was a nice deal for everybody. It was good for us because, not only did we have a little bit of financial stability, we also had access to some of their shared clients—specifically a client by the name of Princess Tours. This served as a foundational start for us.

We hit the ground running. You’ve heard that axiom: practice-based business versus business-based practice? We wanted to be a practice-based business. It was for the love of the craft and the freedom to do the kind of work we wanted that drove us into business, not because we wanted to be business people that happened to do design.

I don’t think one way is right and another way is wrong, but I do think that chasing the dream of being “one of the most influential design firms in the United States someday” is what really drove us through the challenging times.

On acquiring new business at first:

We experienced what I think a lot of young firms do. We were so busy doing the work that was in front of us, we neglected marketing to get new work. We experienced some of the roller coaster where things slow down and we would either answer RFP’s or call friends of friends. It was more of a guerrilla effort to make sure that at least our name was being considered locally for some of the assignments that were coming up. Little by little we established a presence in the community. And at least we were getting invited into the consideration process.

Acquiring new business today:

It’s a whole different game. Today we have about 120 full time staff people and probably another 15-20 contract people. It takes a lot of work to keep everything in a fluid state of optimism and with us playing to win.

We’ve been really, really fortunate to have a lot of continuous work from long-term clients, and from people who’ve moved on to new companies then returned to us for work. So ,we’ve built a lot of loyalty. Not just with companies, but with individuals. That growing network of friends and family has really been the key to a lot of our success.

Jack’s strategy for developing new business

We have a Director of Revenue. She’s got a team of people that report to her.

We also have a sales force, plus a support group that serves them. And for our existing clients, we have a very aggressive account service group that’s been able to garner a lot of our business.

We’re into year two of experimenting with this sales strategy mix, and it’s been getting us invited to some bigger conversations outside of the RFP process.

Biggest accomplishment:

Starting the office that would grow into a stand-out company is probably one of the best things I ever did, professionally.

Jack’s biggest success secret:

Most of all, our naivety, not knowing what was around the corner, not knowing what was ahead, and not knowing the challenges that we would face is what’s grown us into a fairly major business. That innocence, that naivety, is what allowed us to go forward and play to win. It’s been a challenge at times, but I sit here today and feel like the luckiest guy in the world.

I’ve surrounded myself with a group of people that include some of the smartest, most entrepreneurial, talented people with which I’ve ever worked. And we’ve got a distinct culture. It’s been a lot of work to get us to this point, where we have this phenomenal group of really bright people that totally believes in the “one plus one equals five” theory.

There’s an interesting mix of people from different nationalities, different walks of life, different professional backgrounds. It’s a brain trust that allows us to do some of the most exciting, innovative work we’ve ever done. I’m really proud of that. The group of people I work for is the best we’ve ever had.

The “one plus one equals five” theory:

You may know a lot of people who are incredibly talented, and in their own moment of genius, could sit in a cubicle and create greatness. But there are other factors that influence their success.

Being truly talented is one thing. Being a leader and the best-of-the-best is another thing. But to be a leader that can actually inspire other people to greatness, well, that’s the “plus” factor. Those people in our company are the most valued. A single genius is appreciated. But someone who can inspire and cajole, or whatever you want to do, to get a group of people going in the same direction, and where people are building on each other’s ideas, well, that’s ideal. This is an example of when one and one, instead of equaling two, equals three or five. That’s what it’s all about.

Thoughts on Teamwork:

Teamwork is a cheap phrase, and it’s a cheap concept, because everybody talks about it. But it’s harder to actually create an environment that is built on a team with people in the creative business. I’m really proud that we’ve been able to do that.

Thoughts on executive coaching:

Three years ago, we joined Omnicom. And prior to that I had hired an executive coach to work with me to transform myself into more of an inspiring leader. The process of getting some executive coaching ultimately lead to an opportunity back at Harvard though Omnicom called The Senior Management Program for two summers in a row. That really changed the face of this office. Currently, all three of my partners, in addition to myself and a few of my direct reports, all have executive coaches that basically help in our leadership.

On transforming a company:

Coaching has totally transformed what I believed was a good office into a great office. I’ve had numerous conversations now and again with either peers or people at Omnicom, and am asked, “What was the single thing that happened to you guys as an office that really helped you leapfrog out of where you were into something greater?” And though the coaching certainly wasn’t the only thing, it definitely played a big part.

On the value of business seminars and workshops:

We have a sizeable budget for career development inside this office, and a lot of things fall inside of that. We have on-site training and also send people off-site to attend courses and seminars. In my day, I attended a number of those. I don’t currently, because I’m involved in a lot of meetings back in New York and on the West Coast with the Omnicom network, while still trying to get some work done. (Laughter)

Granted, that doesn’t mean I don’t believe in them. I actually think staying in touch with colleagues and both people of like mind and of different backgrounds is the secret sauce to this whole thing.

On the importance of staying balanced:

I’m absolutely in favor of maintaining personal balance. I’m an avid cyclist. I ski, I’m a climber and I work out every day. It’s part of the way I manage my energy level. Those are the physical things that I do to keep me balanced.

I’m also fortunate to have a great partner and support in my wife. We’ve been together thirty-seven years, and have a wonderful daughter. I’m also a closet architect/developer with a project or two always in the process of either being designed or built.

New opportunities:

Actually, one of our current greatest opportunities for growth, and probably some of the most exciting work we’re doing, is in the area of built-environments, similar to what we did at the top of the Space Needle. We’re also working with a number of developers. We’re actually doing interior architecture and creating experiences comprised of both analog and digital. It’s huge. And they are all branded. I guess it’s in our DNA.

Tips for someone just starting out:

It’s all about relationships.

I’m making a gross generalization, but I think a lot of people get into it for either artistic or selfish reasons to express themselves. Those aren’t bad. It’s just that in order to really be successful in this business, you’ve got to put your clients’ needs in front of your own (without compromising your values or standards, obviously), and then figure out a way to give them something that really makes a difference to their business, while at the same time, provides you with a sense of fulfillment.

Building relationships:

It’s a dialogue. It’s not a monologue. It’s a relationship. And I think when clients sit across the table from someone who is truly inquisitive and interested in solving the problem in a way that actually makes a difference—whether it makes the phone ring, means more clicks on the mouse, or brings someone through the door; that’s what it’s all about. The problem needs to be solved and the client needs to feel like they’ve got a partner sitting across from them, an interested problem solver and not just a graphic designer. That’s what builds relationships.

Thoughts on trust:

To me, relationship is the key to all of this. Without relationship, you don’t have trust. And once you’ve got trust, you can do some amazing design work. But until you have it, it’s a we/them, or vendor/client situation.

There are a lot of people out there, and we deal with this in our own office, particularly with some of the new kids, coming to us with a little bit of entitlement. They think they do great work, and in a lot of cases they do. But doing great work isn’t enough.

Thoughts on the opportunities today:

(Laughter) I wish I was just starting out. I think this is such an amazing time to be in the marketing services business. Years ago, when we first started, we spent a lot of time trying to convince the clients that what we were doing for them had value. A lot of clients thought it was a necessary evil and more of an additive thing, as opposed to what I call a legitimate business weapon. Thank God for Phil Knight, Howard Schultz and Steve Jobs, who actually showed the world that branding, marketing and advertising were in fact legitimate business weapons.

Tips for someone just starting out:

First, be as inquisitive as you can. I truly believe that someone who’s inquisitive, curious and asks questions, and who’s got an appetite for a lot of different input is ultimately going to be able to solve the problem in a more unique, well-rounded way.

The people who are successful in our office think in different media. They don’t think in terms of just print. They think in terms of digital. They stay abreast of all that’s going on in the industry. They really don’t think about it as graphic design, per se.

So stay fresh. Stay informed. Don’t be one-dimensional. Be and think three dimensionally, literally and figuratively. And buckle up, because it’s a roller coaster ride.

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