Wednesday, October 10, 2007

The Interview Continues....

Describe yourself in 3 words
Punctual, pleasant, practical

How would you measure the effectiveness of your products?
I could, and probably should, create a feedback form so that viewers could speak their minds. I should also consider web statistics, that lets me see how many hits I receive. This would give me a good idea of if my sites are being used or not.

Talking and receiving feedback from peers and client's is also an excellent way. This can also help with measuring if my site suites the specified target audience.

I personally feel that the colours, fonts and images that I have chosen are all suitable for the required target audience. This hasn't been acheived the first time around in some cases.

How do you handle criticism?
Generally I would be offended, although I know it is a must to be distant from your work as not everyone will like it. If I dislike the end product myself then I wouldn't mind. This is something that only experience can teach and hopefully it will come around to me.

Describe a difficult problem and how you have overcome it?
I guess the biggest problem that has hit me lately is CSS. Figuring out the basics is a big task, and actually being able to use CSS effectively and creatively is an even bigger one. CSS first came around during our summer assignment, where we were asked to create a page using CSS and XHTML. I guess my methods of learning back then was to take as many online tutorials as time would allow, and then through my own practice.

I do admit that my first CSS website is extremely poor, but I didn't stop learning there. The next assignment with John also implies that we use CSS. Practice and more practice is the way I went about learning this language, as well as lectures from Steve and John.

The box model was also something that I didn't quite understand, although I haven't admitted this, but kept trying to learn it by myself. I now understand its concepts and how it affects the layout of designs.

Describe how you fit into a team?
I generally enjoy working in a team with skills that would suite me as Designer or Developer. If I was to have answered this 2 week ago it would have been designer solely, but as I have had more practice I am beginning to enjoy development a lot more. Giving and receiving feedback to team members I would insist happened, as it's a great way to learn from each other and improve the team's final design.

I guess motivation would be a downside, but if I am happy with the team and I know what I am doing then this won't be a problem. I could never take place of project manager I don't think, as I tend to be messy, and sometimes unorganised.

Do you have any questions?
Will team work be a role played often in this specific job?
Would we be given roles or would we be able to discuss them and choose between ourselves?
Will we be required to learn any other languages?
Do you follow the web standards?

10 comments:

Chris Towell said...

I think that Punctual is a very good characteristic to have (as long as you can stick to it). I hate being late and hate people who are late. I always turn up to interviews 10 minutes early to let them know I am there, which may lead to them asking you in earlier.

I think punctuality also implies enthusiasm. If a person is continuously late it may imply they may not want to be there.

I like the languages question as it implies that you do not mind travelling for a start and it could also show them you could translate the Interactive Media projects into other languages broadening the Target Audience.

I had a similar question "Would there be the possibility to work abroad?" or something like that. I would like to travel in my design career and take in all the different cultural designs.

Marc Pugh said...

Yeah I guess travelling would be good as long as theres some experience or something to be learnt. I wouldn't want the time and effort of travel if there was nothing to gain.

About punctual - I guess i'v always been punctual. I usually start work 35 mins early and don't get paid. Although sometimes it's jsut to keep the boss in a good mood haha

Chris Towell said...

Yeah I start about 15 minutes early.

I'd love to travel about though in my work and see the different cultural interpretations of design, especially Japanese art. So in a way you would still learn something taking in some design ideas.

Marc Pugh said...

Well I guess inspiration is always worth learning and seeing. Travelling abroad would be good experience as well. I was going to add this question but felt I had already asked too many.

Chris Towell said...

Off Topic: your CSS is whizzing around because your A:links are set to different sizes some say 0.??em and the hover states and others are set to pt change that and its fine (to ems).

Hope your not panicking too much

Marc Pugh said...

Sorted it now :D It wasn't sorted by the "pt and em" differences. I noticed it when I went to upload my site.

The main error was because I had defined the padding both in the a:link and the div containing the links. I think this just confused the browser.

I am glad it is sorted anyway.

DREW said...

CSS has been my biggest hurdle so far on the course. I think for me it is all the words that are used when you are trying to learn it. For me I felt as if I had to learn the language twice over, first of all to understand what all the terms were and second of all the actual language itself.

I think your attitude to learning matched my own too, you have to keep trying otherwise it won't sink in.

Ben Waller said...

I think you are right about CSS, learning the basics have proved to be tricky but using it effectively is going to be an even bigger task. Due to the fact that there are several methods to do each technique you just need to find the method that you are most comfortable with. Experience with CSS would certainly be key so I am looking forward to see how I can improve when we have to create our next CSS page.

Scott Dunwoodie said...

CSS will be the key to our future success.

I admit that I have struggled putting the theory into practice but practice is the best method to learning a new skill.

Chris Towell said...

All you can do is practice, I think the best way to do CSS is to start coding and see what happens. I do have a structure when I do it but sometimes its just a case of tweaking until its alright.