Online Showcase

   OK…. the photo is more ‘bookcase‘ than ‘showcase‘, but you get my point I hope!

The big Q is: how do you ‘showcase‘ your talents to a prospective employer in such a way that you can impress him/her enough to be placed on the ‘To Interview‘ list…?  This is perhaps especially important to students/aspiring professionals in new technologies who have been designing and developing websites, creating artwork and logos, managing social networks etc.  Unfortunately that doesn’t necessarily come out well in a letter / résumé/CV….  but, could it, with a little imagination….?

The idea for this came out of work I have been doing on ‘candidature‘ as they say here: helping degree and Master’s students acquire the skills of letter and CV writing.   The vast majority of the time I find myself writing comments like: ‘OK, so you say you are good at using Illustrator or Photoshop… but where’s the examples, the evidence, the proof?’   Saying is one thing, but seeing and believing is another…so why not produce an online repository for your ‘greatest hits‘, if you like, and link or QR code to various parts of it from a covering letter / lettre de motivation?  When going to interview, why not ask in advance for internet access so that you can showcase your best stuff (the interviewer will remember that!)?   So, being pretty certain that you all have tons of good ‘stuff‘ to showcase, this project is to enable you to add value to them and to your chances of being hired!

Perhaps you don’t realise that most people just ‘mine‘ the web for ideas and information to ‘extract‘, whereas it is pretty rare for individuals to actually post materials beyond the bounds of Facebook, Twitter, TikTok etc.   How many of you actually have your own websites and/or blogs which are open to the world and actively maintain and develop them….?  Perhaps you should – it could set you apart and distinguish you positively from your competitors……………….which, of course, is the whole point of the recruitment and selection function: ‘differentiation‘.

INSTRUCTIONS.

1. From your years of creative output, select a number (minimum of TWO) of your most impressive works which you consider to be the sort of things that would positively influence a recruiter viewing your covering letter, CV or at interview.   These might be artwork, logos, photos, videos, websites, blogs , social network sites/communities that you operate etc.
2. For each one of your personal/professional ‘Greatest Hits‘, provide a well-developed, accompanying text in your very best English (it has to be excellent because it is for public viewing and may just help you in your quest to find your perfect job) which is explained in detail the following:

• What is it and why did you produce it?  Was it the result of a personal creative impulse or were you working with a client and to a particular brief (cahier des charges – professional or even academic). Explain the context and the requirements / constraints you had to work with.
• How you went about selecting the best way and the most appropriate software tools to realise your objectives.
• What were the particular challenges/problems that you had to overcome in order to finally produce your end-product and how did you resolve them?
• How do you feel about the final output?  What did you learn in the process / on your journey – Looking back now and reflecting, is there anything you might have done differently and why?  If you were working on a brief from a client, what was their response/reaction when you presented it?  Is there any evidence that this output has been ‘successful‘ (in whatever terms you feel that might best be measured)?
• Which aspect of the production of the final output gave you the greatest sense of pleasure and achievement and why?
• How might you use this learning experience in future projects and commissions?

3. House your work / links to your work online (making sure there are no copyright issues and that you are claiming only work which is 100% your own) and provide me with a link so that I can view your output and your personal evaluation (in impeccable English!) of your ‘Greatest Hits‘.   It might help to imagine me as an HRM manager reviewing your covering letter / CV and being intrigued by the prospect of following a link / QR Code.  Impress me (and, perhaps more importantly, yourself)!   [Also… when you write your covering letter or CV, don’t just ‘dump‘ the link / QR Code without explanation – use it / refer to it where you are speaking of something impressive you would like a recruiter to look at…. you never know, they may well go and look!  Give them a ‘call to action‘!]

I gather that in L3 in 2022 you are likely to be producing an online showcase of your work…  It is a great idea and will help you with recruitment and selection.  All I am asking is for you to EXPLAIN what is there for an international audience IN ENGLISH (following the instructions / guidlines above) in the hope that if you wish to work internationally this exercise and its output might just help you!

I don’t know quite when I will launch this with you, so the SET and SUBMISSION dates for the assignment will follow later – perhaps after we have done the CV.

I hope you will enjoy this task as it is conceived to help you compete in the labour market.

T