My official title at Ingage was Intern for Purpose. My role was to work on various projects for the Purpose Team. I learned about the technology consulting space while taking on design and community initiatives with the leadership team.
Deliverables:
- Company Culture Book
- Champion a Cause Video Production
- Karnival 2019 T-shirts
- Client Project Wireframes and Design
- Logo Creation
- WordPress Updates and Research
- Social Media Planning
- HR Work
Timeline
May – August 2019
Ingage Company Culture Book
The Ask:
Design and print a company culture book to internally and externally promote the culture of Ingage.
The book tells a story about being an employee at Ingage and an active member in the community. This book is given to every employee, investor, and applicant that walks in the door of Ingage.
Step 1: Research
I began the process by researching company culture books. This taught me about the purpose, position, intention, and importance of a company culture book. Here are a few links I had some insightful learnings from:
https://management30.com/practice/culture-books/
https://www.fastcompany.com/3064523/how-to-create-a-handbook-employees-actually-read
https://www.ideo.com/post/the-little-book-of-ideo
https://blog.hrpartner.io/best-employee-handbooks/
https://www.slideshare.net/reed2001/culture-1798664/33-Isnt_Loyalty_GoodWhat_about_Hard
Step 2: Mood Boards
The next step was creating mood boards for each section of the book. It gave me a head start on the general design direction and book organization.
After researching and creating a mood board for each section of the book, I felt I had a deeper understanding of what needed to be included in a culture book to tell a story.
Step 3: Interviews
My favorite part of the project was holding interviews with 25+ employees in all different positions across the company. This helped me get a deeper understanding of what employees thought of the culture and environment of Ingage.
Each time I interviewed someone, it helped me iterate my questions for the next conversation.
Step 4: Design Skeleton
When I finished my several iterations of the design skeleton on Canva, I sat down with the head of marketing and branding and walked through my work. I was ready to start transferring the design to Illustrator. As this was a large project for me, it came with some cautionary research before starting such a big print project.
I crafted a table of contents after concluding employee interviews. This table of contents was integral in my design of the culture book.
Step 5: Implementation
Printed 100+ copies of the company culture book and digitally uploaded it to be virtually shared.
Challenges
This project pushed me outside my comfort zone and allowed me to become familiar with alternative design programs. Using InDesign and Illustrator for such a large print project allowed me to get familiar with the programs quickly and learn the ins and outs of ordering prints. It was not always easy, but by using agile methodology over the course of just 3 months I was able to deliver the final culture book to leadership before my internship ended.
Champion a Cause Videos
My supervisor brought an issue to my attention – Ingage has a “Champion a Cause” program that is often forgotten or confused with other company initiatives. To combat this and bring light to the true meaning behind being a cause champion, we wanted to make a video that highlights people’s causes. Through ideation, the idea to highlight a few members who were extremely passionate about their cause or had events coming up came to fruition.
I crafted the interview questions, scheduled and prepped the video recordings, recorded the video, and edited final footage on Adobe Premier for four different videos over my time with Ingage.
These videos were sent in the weekly emails that gave company updates. After the completion of my internship, Ingage continued to utilize my video design skeleton with instructions I left behind on how to make and publish the videos.
Karnival T-shirts
The Ask:
Design t-shirts for the yearly company event, Karnival. Incorporate the location, event, and culture of the company.
I had the opportunity to work with the printing company FreeSet, an impactful non-profit that supports ending human trafficking.
Logo Creation
The Ask:
Created a logo for a scholarship program.
Social Media Planning
The Ask:
Assist with social media planning to boost follower count and interaction. Highlight company values to widen knowledge of company principles.
Deliverable:
Social Media Calendar
What I Learned
My summer at Ingage taught me to fail fast, learn from my mistakes, and push myself outside of my comfort zone, allowing me to gain new perspectives. For my challenging projects, I learned by doing and sought frequent feedback to understand how I could improve my work. By the end of my internship, I had met with every leadership member and most of the employees at the company. This led me to getting involved with additional projects that allowed me to strengthen my skillsets and learn more about the consulting world.