I was doing pretty regular design talks at various schools a few years back and Daniela, who used to teach at Shillington College, remembered me from a talk I once gave there. She’s been teaching design at Kogarah TAFE for the past few years and a few weeks ago she asked me if I’d be interested in talking to her students. Despite my initial hesitation (no matter how many talks I do I always cringe at the idea of getting nervous in front of a crowd) I said yes and today I headed in to talk.
I spotted this in the TAFE carpark. When I got to the lecture theatre I realised I needed to borrow a laptop to present with (!) and it turns out that the guy who owns this car was also the guy who lent me his laptop (I realised this because the desktop wallpaper on the laptop had this car on it!).
The room before students came in.
The students after the talk (I presented for about 1.5hrs).
The only catch was that there was no money to pay for my time but Daniela did promise to pay me with some good wines and that she did!
I’ve come full circle with talks. I used to focus on creative process but now I focus on getting to do the things I want to do through design (for me it’s cars, bikes, fish tanks or anything else I choose to be obsessive compulsive about!). It’s about being in the zone all the time because I want to be in the zone, not about forcing myself to be in the zone on something I’m not at all into.
As usual I walked away on a high. It’s rewarding to reflect on getting out of my comfort zone and hopefully I planted a few good seeds in the minds of the students too.
Great talk!, thank you for coming down out of your way to share some of your wisdom. Much appreciated!.
Hey thanks for the thanks Josh! Also much appreciated!