In this interview, Gary discusses the evolution of the Ascendum’s design department and challenges they faced along the way.
It became integral through leadership’s vision and their understanding of why design is important. The faith they have in the team’s ability to grow, explore and develop beyond from a primarily UI execution team into a multi-disciplined design studio. Strategy, UI design, UX Research, Motion, Branding, Video, Packaging are all disciplines that I am confident we have world-class abilities in now. Because we were given that freedom and trust, we can bring more to the table, not just UI alone, but expertise from a variety of backgrounds.
For the past two years, the team has grown not only in both new talent coming on, but also cross-pollination and skill sharing. Our growth has been possible due to the support of everyone at Ascendum, from sales bringing in new projects, our dev and QA departments making sure the design is showcased to its best, to our talent team and HR helping find and onboard more employees.
Additionally, having a strong working relationship with our clients provides the trust we need when innovating new solutions. Creating this trust has given our team more confidence in our creativity and has helped us sign new customers.
Making everyone feel part of one team has been and remains the biggest challenge. I wanted Curio to feel like it’s the team’s studio and not that they are working for us. I want them to feel ownership of a project. We have recently started the 'guess your teammate's bio' initiative. This started as quick Slack polls of guessing people's interests (www.bycurio.com/about), to creating “Ride Along” videos that are posted on our Instagram. Always learning and trying new things, some stick and some fall flat.
I feel it is very important to recognize everyone's individual passion and skills and share with others who want to learn. Our Brand Director Jon Plumb came up with the name Curio (a play on the word “curious”). Curious dictionary definition: Eager to know or learn something. On our website, www.bycurio.com, it states – “We intertwine individual design talent with future-thinking curiosity to create boundary-pushing innovation.” In other words, the magic happens when we work together.
Our tone of voice reflects our ethos. We showcase our professionalism and our seriousness about our craft, but also have a personality and like to have fun too. The website is full of Easter eggs, song lyrics, and other peaks into our individual personalities. This is showcased in our tone and positioning, and brought to life in motion. For example, the attention to detail in how our Curio yellow dot animates creates its own personality. As a kid, you are very curious. It is important not to grow out of that curiosity.
It is very important to make sure the team feels like it is their studio. The studio only exists because of the team within it. That is very important to me and something I genuinely think about a lot. What else can I do to ensure that everyone feels a sense of ownership?
I want this to be a space where the team can learn from each other, express interest in picking up new skills, and work on projects that seem cool under mentorship from others on the team. That branching out and cross-pollination is important to us. We wanted to create a studio that is based on curiosity and that leads to knowledge sharing and an eagerness to learn.
One team. Specialized designers. Meaningful results.
We thank Gary and his outstanding design team for their tremendous creativity and the boundary-pushing solutions they develop for our clients. Contact us to learn more about our UX/UI and branding design services.
