Artist Job Applications

I never thought I’d be writing about this of all topics… yet with my new job I find myself on the other side of the table and combing through stacks of artist applications. It’s been a really interesting experience, where I’ve learned a lot and realized just how much I personally wasn’t doing with my resume and cover letter. In today’s post I’ll be sharing some tips/thoughts that I’ve picked up while trying to hire artists!

Please Don't...

I’m going  to start with a bunch of things that I’ve seen, which you may not want to do when applying for a new job :

• If you’re applying to be a UI Designer, and your resume doesn’t have a nice layout… I’m not going to hire you.
  • Honestly guys… You’ve got to think more critically about presentation. If you can’t present your information in a clear and concise way, why would I think you’d do any better at work?
• Know what you’re applying for. If you’re applying for a job in video games and have only ever worked on websites… you better have a kick ass cover letter.
  • I get a lot of applications with no previous applicable work experience, which feels pretty odd.
• Double check your links… A few times I’ve received URLS for a portfolio, and the applicant has misspelled their own name.
• If you can, make your resume a PDF. Links to your portfolio should be at the top, I don’t want to have to dig around looking for it, and make sure it’s clickable.
  • There have been a few instances where I’m trying to copy and paste a URL from someone’s resume, and accidentally copy an extra letter or line… it’s frustrating and you don’t want the person hiring you to start with a bad experience.
• Maybe don’t mention your “rate” in the first correspondence with a new employer… unless you’re dirt cheap.
• Your portfolio link, shouldn’t be to your facebook page. It’s unprofessional.
• Please don’t give me large blocks of text and expect me to read all of it. You’re an artist, make things succinct, bold your points, and make things as graphic as possible.
• Try to make your resume one page.
• Be honest and upfront about your planned vacation time.
  • Do not wait to receive an offer to tell your new employer that you’re going on vacation later that month. ​

Please Do!

Now not all things were bleak during this process. I actually saw a lot of interesting ideas and unique way for artists to showcase themselves! While I can’t show actual examples from artists, I’ll try my best to showcase and describe these methods.

• One Artist actually created an Invision click through for their cover letter, portfolio, and resume. I thought this was a really innovative idea, while this artist didn’t quite pull it off well, I’m sure someone else could. I would also consider making something to share from Axure.
• A repeating theme I saw were that people would give themselves ratings on their skills, rather than list them out long form.​

• In a few resumes I saw people had written a brief description of their expertise at the top. Now this could backfire if it’s written poorly, too long, or just not displayed well… but often it felt like a nice merge of a cover letter and a resume.
• Clickable links/areas of your resume that directs employers to examples of your work, portfolio, linkedin, etc. Since recruiters are often looking through many resumes in a day, whatever you can do to ease them into your information the better off you’ll be. Unfortunately there were a few applicants that I gave up on, only because I couldn’t access their information easily.
• I had a few artists do Art Tests after our interview, and one artist went a step further to create a fake marketing image with their mockups. They had stock photos of someone holding a tablet, and they had photoshopped their mock up onto the tablet. It was a bit cheesy but definitely made their submission standout.

I’m realizing now that this won’t be a very long post, but I wanted to share some of the good and bad things I noticed while attempting to hire new artists. It’s been a learning experience for me and hopefully this post might give you some insights on your own job applications in the future. It’s definitely enlightened me to a few details. 

Thanks for reading! ​