Marc was particularly interested in how I got into the design industry and the story behind starting Toward.
"Getting work was tough. We were actually really fortunate because we picked up a few pieces of work from colleagues and friends which quickly led to other work. On the first day, we got the phone book and Mike started ringing random companies."
We covered how we managed to hire our first employees and what I look for when hiring…
I like bringing in disruptive people. I don't want people that just fit snuggly in and don't shake the place up.
We talked a lot about personality and why we focus on it…
"If you ask a client that, the client will always say they want to stand out. No one wants to blend in. Often the best way to make them stand out was to add some personality into the work and into their messaging."
Marc also wanted to know how we’ve developed our Toward culture over the years…
You can't create culture. Culture creates itself. It just appears from the accumulative environment that everyone works in.
We also talked at length about our processes, tools, how we price up projects, avoiding burnout and a look at the future of what we do.
We spoke for around two hours and Marc has done a great job of turning my waffling into a sensible insight into agency life. You should head on over to his blog to read the full interview.
Thanks to Marc for asking me to be a part of his interview series. I’m a big advocate of sharing knowledge, so if you’ve got questions of your own why not drop me an email or fire me a tweet?
