How would you describe what you do at Anna Freud?
I am a junior designer at Anna Freud, a children’s mental health charity. This is my first in-house design role and I’m responsible for helping expand the brand and developing their guidelines after the charity recently rebranded.

What does your role involve?
I’m responsible for creating case studies and social and web images and working on campaigns and toolkits for schools. I also assist with business proposal documents and support the wider team with design requests.

In my personal life, I’m into digital and physical collaging, and I collect lots of magazines.

What are the main influences and inspirations behind your work?
My manager at Anna Freud has helped me a lot in my current role. She’s a midweight designer and she has really helped me push my designs.

Another inspiration is David Carson. I love his approach to design and the fact he went from a psychology background into design and used the experience to inform his practice. It’s inspiring to know you don’t have to study design to be good at it.

Carson’s work is also inspiring because corporate design can sometimes be draining, so it’s nice to keep a balance between fun and creative work alongside branding work.

I also love DR. ME Studios, a studio based in Manchester that also has some incredible work. I have bought two books with collections of their work and use these to inspire me.

Would you say you need any specific training for what you do?
I underwent a design bootcamp before joining Anna Freud. This equipped me with client experience, UX experience and also marketing experience. I also built a portfolio of personal projects and read a lot of design-related books.

Overall, I don’t think specific training is necessary but I would advise any designer to watch webinars and read as many books as possible, even if they’re just image collections to get inspiration.

Are there any specific books you recommend?
Branding In Five and a Half Steps by Michael Johnson, Book of Branding by Radim Malinic, Identity Designed by David Airey, Not Dead or Famous Enough, Yet and Cut That Out by DR.ME.

What’s been your favourite project to work on from the past year, and why?
It has to be the children’s mental health campaign we ran. It was an opportunity to work with everyone in the company and push the boundaries of our guidelines as much as possible. I worked on social imagery and created our first fully designed social carousel to launch the manifesto, which has gone on to be a massive part of our social media planning.

Knowing that the work I’m doing is having a positive impact is extremely fulfilling, and I can see myself staying in a similar sector for the foreseeable future.

What was your journey like when you were first starting out?
I struggled for many years after graduating during the pandemic. I applied to anything and everything for nearly four years. To get by, I worked part-time at Sainsbury while applying for jobs on the side and tried to upskill with extra courses like motion design and UX. I got close to jobs a few times, but every interview built my confidence.

As I mentioned previously, I also did a 12-week programme with the Agent Academy (free for 18 to 30-year-olds living in the North West), where I built new skills while working as part of a team. I also signed up for a mentorship programme. My mentor, Andy, has been an amazing addition to my life and has helped me so much in getting my current role.

How did you go about landing your first job at Anna Freud?
I freelanced while working as a customer service assistant at Sainsbury’s and did a lot of side projects for law firms and startups. The pandemic saw a lot of people starting businesses, which was a great opportunity for me to work with them as clients. These were mainly through word-of-mouth.

What has been your biggest challenge along the way?
Getting my first entry-level role was the hardest. Before getting it, missing out on final stage interviews was heartbreaking and I was hard on myself. Despite this, I kept persevering and it eventually paid off. I also had a difficult choice between two interviews at the same time, and neither was able to reschedule. I had to choose the company I imagined would be better for me and it paid off, as this was at Anna Freud.

What are three things that you’ve found useful to your work or career, and why?
Participating in a mentorship programme massively helped my confidence, gave me insight into the recruitment process, and provided overall support with job applications.

Then, my design bootcamp gave me valuable knowledge and LinkedIn connections. It also allowed me to use real-life examples in my job interviews.

Finally, YouTube videos! I watch design processes and tutorials a lot to learn new ways of working and shortcuts and also for inspiration and motivation in my passion projects.

Have there been any courses, programmes, initiatives, access schemes or job boards you’ve found helpful or would recommend to get into your sector?
I’d recommend the bootcamp I’ve just mentioned, especially to anyone working part-time, coming straight out of uni or looking for a career change. I think there are a lot of similar programmes to this, but I found out about Agent Academy after someone tagged me in their Instagram post.

What have been your greatest learnings with making money and supporting yourself as a creative?
I think it was important for me to learn to be more assertive and ask for 50% of payment up front. This filtered out the serious from the non-serious clients. It’s important to put your foot down and not be shy, at the end of the day we all need money. These YouTube videos by the Futur helped me, as well as the book The Win Without Pitching Manifesto by Blair Enns.

What’s the best career-related advice you’ve ever received?
Tailoring your CV and cover letter to the specific points raised in the job description and prepping for interview questions based on the job description. Also, prepare for a few different questions and answers that hit those points so you have examples ready.

What advice would you give to someone looking to get into a similar role?
Be open to possibilities and get yourself out there as much as you can. Knowing people and making connections is what led me to my bootcamp, which is then what led me to getting my first job. Being kind and being yourself is also a huge thing.