From Profile to Portfolio

I am lucky enough to work in an industry that provides technological, creative and business opportunities. There are many different types of talent presented and pitched in a lot of different ways.

Lately I have been spending time learning about how creative people present their versions of “resumes.” It turns out that many graphic artists, lighters, shaders, etc. use what is called a “demo reel.” This is DVD, tape or other media that contains snippets of the work that they have done. Many artists present a sort of story arc to their demo reel, showing how they have grown over time and how their skills have progressed. It providers the reviewer (fellow artists in the form of recruiters and hiring managers) with an opportunity to see the candidate artist’s career and skills trajectory as well as the quality of their work. The demo reel is the modern artist’s portfolio of work.

I am strong believer that an increasing part of everyone’s jobs over the next 20 years will involve creativity. The Creative Age is upon us, and the value we contribute will be the value we create. So I have become intrigued by the concept of moving from resumes and profiles to portfolios for all the positions for which we recruit.

When we are looking for a “super star” or someone to come in and really change our business for the better, we are looking for someone who probably has put together some really strong creative work over their careers. They probably started by developing spreadsheets, project plans and other analysis, and then moved to developing presentations, articles and other forms of communication. These are all part of their creative history and should be considered as part of their portfolio.

Questions:

1. How do we create the portfolio while still protecting the IP rights of the original employer?
2. How do we present the portfolio in a way that is integrated with a narrative and story arc about their career, aspirations, assessment of their talent and opportunity for contribution?
3. How do we provide an opportunity for other people who have worked these people in a creative setting to vouch for their work (sort of like LinkedIn’s endorsements)?
4. How do we as talent professionals provide a way for people to apply for jobs with their portfolio, moving away from capturing the least amount of data we can quickly to capturing the richness of the talent in a more complete and dynamic way?
5. How do we move these portfolios effectively from one hiring authority to another?

There are many more questions. But I thought this might start an interesting dialogue.

Comments

[Jim Durbin]

The portfolio question is a tough one. now that she owns her own firm, my fiancee downloads her content off of her website during presentations, because clients change the original sites so often that the lifetime of "your" work is often just a few months.

When I was faced with this problem, I created a job-hunting portfolio on CD that addressed the expected path of my work for the first six months.

It was a template that I customized for every interview, and had the added benefit of showing my presentation skills as a salesperson.

For a designer - a job portfolio increases their value because it shows what they are interested in, as opposed to only what they were paid to do. It also erases the concern about copyright or sharing client information.

We've all seen bad work - but sometimes that's the client request and not the employee. A job portfolio with a template could be reused for different interviews, and absolutely differentiates you in the minds of the employer.