The First Week

The first week in my new role has been rewarding. As excited as I was to join my new team in Arts & Architecture, anyone who has navigated a major life change will understand the little stressors and nagging anxieties that you just can’t shake until the unfamiliar becomes a bit more familiar. Prior to getting here, I was having those doubts about whether I would struggle to fit into a new team, environment, and workflow, and if making such a shift was just going to cause me more distress in the long run.

I am pleased to be able to say, “So far, so good!” While I have already encountered challenges that have required me to step out of my comfortable box and think about things differently, I am happy to have these opportunities pushing me in new directions. This kind of thing was what I hoped for when I decided it was time to try something new, and I’m glad that I read the situation well and seem to have positioned myself in a way that will allow me to truly grow as a designer and a professional in this field. Nothing that I’ve come across appears insurmountable, so I am optimistic that the next few months will be filled with experimentation, learning, and discovery.

A long term project that I am especially excited to be tasked with is figuring out a portfolio/showcase solution for student work. While there are many portfolio tools out there, our faculty, staff, and students would benefit from a content system that allows each category of user to display artifacts differently based on needs. I’ve been spending time comparing products and researching what other schools have implemented, and I’m looking forward to collaborating with the team on this! That said, if anyone’s got any ideas, feel free to send them my way!