As a Design Strategist Intern at the Spill Teem, I led the research & design of a case study portfolio of Spill Teem’s previous projects, as well as designed a newsletter for a webinar on social design and the economic and social determinants of inequality. It was an amazing experience to work alongside Joshua René (the company CEO and Head Design Strategist) in such a supportive team and a company that places great value on design. Initially, I wanted to write a short article in my portfolio to reflect on what I learned from this opportunity. Therefore, I’ve decided to share my thoughts here.
This is my first experience working in a corporate setting as a Design Strategist intern, so some of the thoughts might be limited to my own experience. As an intern, I’m still constantly trying to learn and grow, so please let me know if you agree/disagree with what I wrote — I’d love to start the conversation! However, I still hope that future students and interns can find these thoughts to be helpful :)
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To give a high-level summary, the most important things I learned during the internship involves how to work within the business context, the design-thinking process, creating for innovation, and how to learn from failure.
THE BUSINESS SIDE
Understanding the Brand
During the very first week of the internship, I had very little understanding of what The Spill Teem even was, let alone what my specific duties were during my internship. We had a kickoff meeting with Joshua René, in which we discussed…
The Spill Teem’s Brand:
What is the company? What are its values? What perceptions of the company do I perceive when looking at their website? Are these perceptions different from reality?
What The Spill Teem Does:
What is “design consulting”? What are Talks and Keynotes? What are Design Thinking Workshops? What makes a company a “thought leader”? What are my assumptions about these services with no prior knowledge?
Design Thinking:
What is it? What are its steps? What tools does one use? What makes it distinct from human-centered design?
Going through each of these topics, we covered that, no, The Spill Teem is not a visual design company, though it is highly visual in its execution of its projects and ideas. I learned that The Spill Teem® is a thought-leading design consultancy whose focus is to shift the thinking culture of organizations by serving the people in them. Using design thinking as their toolbox, they place humans at the center of strategy through crafting solutions through a people-focused, empathetic lens. Through Human-Centered Design, The Spill Teem offers creative approaches to problems that require out-of-the-box thinking, providing tailored learning experiences to work with clients and expose growth opportunities that were previously missed. Additionally, through innovative Talks & Keynotes, Workshops & Trainings and Consulting, the Spill Teem educates the masses on how to apply human-centered design to small and large business, evangelizing the design-thinking processes so that users can have better experiences and businesses gain respect. From this discussion, I learned how to extrapolate meaning from a business or company that I did not necessarily understand at first in order to better perform at my job.
DESIGN THINKING
Before working with The Spill Teem, while my experience with design thinking was a bit higher than the average person due to taking a Hack Cville UX Design Bootcamp the previous semester, I still had a lot to learn regarding the process, empathy, and human-centered design as a whole. Therefore, during the third week of the internship, we had a kickoff meeting with Joshua René, in which we discussed…
What is Design Thinking?
How do we understand the user?
How do we foster innovation?
I will admit, I was feeling a bit overconfident with my “superior” understanding of design thinking when comparing myself with other interns. After all, I spent the past several months learning this in my UX bootcamp, so this shouldn’t be anything new that I would be hearing. However, during that meeting, I learned that design thinking, while being a process that utilizes empathy to craft a product from a user’s perspective, is so much more than that. According to Joshua René, design thinking more-so a concept than a series of steps one has to take in a specific order. Through describing it as a “non-linear, iterative process that teams use to understand viewers, challenge assumptions, redefine problems, and create innovative solutions,” he placed an emphasis on the iterative nature of the process, that it is long and messy and that you are going to fail repeatedly until you finally get it right. However, through understanding the user, exploring new possibilities, and materializing solutions, we have a blueprint for fostering innovation.
That isn’t to say that design thinking is the same thing as human-centered design. While design thinking focuses on designing an object or process from scratch, human-centered design works to make an object or process that already exists even better for users. At the beginning of the internship, I was using the terms interchangeably, though after learning the distinction between the two, I have a much greater understanding of both of the processes as a whole.
CREATING FOR INNOVATION
During one of our team meetings, we had a discussion on how to create for innovation, and how to be comfortable with the uncomfortable parts of the process. Using a coffee cup as an example (the company’s logo), Joshua created an analogy saying that there are two major zones in both filling up a coffee cup and creating innovation. You have the “safe zone,” where the coffee cup is half full, and your risk of spilling is relatively low. In design thinking, the “safe zone” is where you can be creative, insightful, and challenge new ideas without the risk or uncertainty of implementation. However, it is when you get out of your comfort zone, when you fill the coffee cup up where it is at risk of spilling, that you get your greatest ideas. At The Spill Teem, we challenge clients to take risks with their ideas, to deviate from the status quo and to utilize design thinking to create something innovative. Through this example, we learn that failure is alright, it is okay to be uncomfortable with change, so we should embrace the discomfort, since that is where our greatest ideas will come from.
As someone whose thinking has always been centered around results, this concept was particularly difficult for me to grasp. In fact, I am still having difficulty with it now. I’ve always been afraid of failure, and in order to avoid it, I’ve always focused on getting the results I need without taking the time to slow down, understand, and take risks. For example, lately I’ve been rushing through the understand phase so quickly for my case study project, I failed to truly conceptualize what I’ve been learning for fear of not getting done in time. In the process, I’ve completely missed the purpose of the activity, which was to understand, and failed in a far worse way.
Learning From Failure
Arguably, the most important lesson that I’ve learned during my internship is how to learn from failure. For most people, myself included, success is a positive thing, whereas failure is perceived to not just be something negative, but shameful on a personal level. Fear of failure has been something that has been so inextricably linked with my desire for success that often, it can get in the way of trying new things and learning along the way. After all, failure is the opposite of success, and success brings satisfaction and happiness, so it makes sense to try to avoid failure at all costs, right?
Well, maybe. Failure can also teach important lessons that success never has the ability to teach. It teaches us that life can be sometimes difficult, but with the right attitude nothing is impossible. It teaches us that failing is part of the journey, one with many obstacles on the way.
Midway through my internship, I began learning how to deal with my personal perception of failure. Things such as ego, fear of failure, a perfectionist mindset, and attributing my personal value to success have all acted as roadblocks that have prevented me from moving forward from this bump in the road. However, after taking some time to reflect on myself, my values, and how to have both a fulfilling career and life, I began the process of learning how to change my mindset surrounding the concept of failure, to move the ego away from it and to see it purely as an opportunity to improve. This is a life-long lesson that will likely take longer than a 10-week internship to fully resolve, but the most important thing that I can do in this moment is redefine my definition of success:
Success does not come from external measures of self-worth. It does not come from an accumulated tally of successes and failures, from any number of prizes or superficial forms of validation. Success comes from giving your all to do the best that you can do, and working to create positive change for whoever you are working for or with.
CONCLUSION
From my short time with The Spill Teem, I have learned a lot about slowing down, understanding the process, and taking the time to acknowledge my fear of failure and learn how to deal with it.
I’d like to say thank you to Joshua René and the rest of The Spill Teem for supporting me throughout the summer, helping me to recover from roadblocks, giving me valuable advice, and believing in me the entire time! Thank you for creating such a supportive environment to help me learn! I have grown so much as a design strategist during this internship, and I wish whoever’s reading this a great day!
