Working at my Dad for almost 2 years has been a rather relaxing experience, in terms of job responsibilities, not much is expected from me and that has made me pretty much useless in all my computer software skills. I have improved a little bit, but considering the fact that I am suppose to have 2 years worth of experience as an Interior Designer on my resume, the standard of work at which I am currently churning does is clearly not cutting it.
I've had wanted to look for a proper job for a while now, after being delegated to doing administrative and accounts related errands, my exposure to anything even remotely related to designing has started to dwindle. I've not been doing any interior designing for the past 6 months now, probably even longer. Instead of working under my Dad, I'm now working under him and the accountant who has been shoving me with a lot of different responsibilities an accountant should be handling, like chasing for rental money, writing invoices for the tenants, filling up CPF forms, mailing out cheques to other companies for their services, depositing company cheques, I've essentially become an errand boy for the accountant.
What used to be a small favor I did to lessen the workload for the accountant, who would ask if I was free in the beginning to do those small favors for her, has now become full fledged responsibilities, she has stopped asking me if I am free to do those task for her, now, I have to free myself from any work to do those task for her.
So I've kinda had enough of that and think it's about time to start looking for a real job. I haven't had a real job since 2014 when I was working as a baker.
I've been sending out my resumes to probably 5 interior design firms and furniture store, so far only 2 design firm have gotten back to me, I've reapplied to IKEA again, but I highly doubt they would get back to me, the last time I applied to them, despite the automated email telling me that I would be sure to hear from them within 30 days, I got no response at all, couldn't even check on their website if their HR department saw my resume.
Anyways, I had my first interview today.I had came across the job listing a couple of times on Jobstreet and I found it to be a rather unappealing position. It was looking for designers with at least one year experience, but it wasn't offering a salary that commensurate with the listed experience needed. A quick search on the company's Facebook page showed nothing but works the company has done.
Normally when I visit an Interior Design Firms' Facebook page, I would be able to see pictures of their office, an album of their Grand Opening, maybe a few pictures of the staff having a party or just works of other designers in the company being shown on the Facebook page to assure potential customers that the company had a bunch of top quality designers, well, none of those pictures existed, all the works I saw were done by a single designer and that was it.
Since I had only receive one confirmation for a job interview out of the 4 companies I had applied for, I decided to just try my luck and apply for the position, and lo and behold, I receive a text message on the very same day from the boss, scheduling to do a casual interview with me the following day.
We met at the location as per discussed today, a cafe near his office, and even though he told me it was a casual interview, I still decided to at least wear a buttoned shirt and jeans, the boss on the other hand was casually dressed, in a white t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
The interview lasted for probably over an hour and during it, he was telling me what he expected of me should he choose to hire me, sharing with me about his work ethics and his past work experience. He then tells me he was a one man company, I was the first designer he was interviewing and the position he has listed on Jobstreet would be for the very first employee he has ever employed, as if that wasn't reassuring enough, I later find out that he used to run a restaurant in the past, less than a decade ago, that didn't do so well.
It is one thing to work in a different field to explore your career options, but to actually be a boss of a business in an entirely different industry, to actually invest money in a business and then fail at it, then come to the design industry, it's just feels extremely really fickle minded and unstable. Had he told me he has been working in the design industry consistently for 10 years and only decided to run his own company after gaining the necessary experience and clientele needed from his the firm he worked at previously, I would be more confident in his ability to run a successful company.
What he shared with me about his work ethics also didn't really help boost my confidence in him whatsoever....
"I want to stand out from the rest of the design firm in Singapore, I'm not someone who follows the latest design trend, I like to think creatively and out of the box."
That sounds like something an ambitious and naive individual would say, it's the kind of bullshit I would see on Job listings..
"We are looking for creative individuals who can think out of the box, you must have a flair for design and a keen eye for the latest trend. " - And its a position for a draftsmen, where you are not suppose to think out of the box, you are suppose to follow the instructions of the lead designer, you have to think in the lead designer's box, design as per instructed and the only time your keen eye is needed is to spot if the AutoCAD file is missing any annotations or measurements.
I showed the boss my works and he showed me his, I have seen them before on his Facebook, and I thought they were decent, that is partly why I decided to apply for the position. But when he started to describe how different his work was from other Interior Design firm, that was when I kinda just wanted to roll my eyes, the works were alright, they weren't different, if anything, they felt a bit bare.
He talked about how he was thinking out of the box when he decided to use wall cornices to create a frame on the wall to accent a wall hung TV console
 |
| Not his work, but the idea is the same. The framing of the TV Console area using Wall Cornices. Think out of the box, by creating a box. |
I thought that is what most designers would do to achieve that frame.
And then he showed me furniture he had designed himself, which once again were very conventional, designs that were similar to those I had seen on websites like HipVan or FortyTwo, designs that are currently in trend at the moment.
I mean he was really tooting his own horn over nothing, sure the designs were nice, but he made it sounds like it was something so amazing that no one had ever seen before, when in fact, they were all designs I had seen on Pinterest before. In fact, the Interior Design works from the design firm I used to work at are all a lot more beautiful than his.
He continued sharing the experiences he had handling projects with his clients in the past, how they all trusted him as an Interior Designer by giving him full reign of the design of their house, how he would only design things the way he want it to be designed and his clients design opinions mean nothing to him, if they were not please with his design, they could go find someone else.
He would scold his clients if they bought furniture that didn't fit with his design, he even told me his clients were actually scared of him when they bought furniture without consulting him first.
What the fuck?
He is actually scolding paying customers for having an opinion that differs from his, rejecting jobs if they didn't bend to his design will. I can only imagine what would he do to someone who was working for him, who has a different taste in design from him, is he going to start verbally abusing his workers for it, for having a bad taste in design because it isn't the same taste as his?
I will admit, I am not like him, I actually like to follow trends, that is why when I found a 7-11 stocking bottles of Chun Cui He Milk Tea and Latte, I went and bought 4 bottles of it, they were kinda average, totally not worth the hype, the Latte was especially gross, but that's besides the point. I enjoy browsing Pinterest to get inspired by the latest design trends, that's how one grows as a designer, to constantly be inspired by the design of others and it is also what made me legitimately interested in Interior Designing.
Thinking creatively on your own without allowing yourself to be inspired by the latest design trends will only get you so far, and it shows because all his works look very similar to one another and it doesn't help that most of his works are minimalist.
So getting me to start working under him is going to be extremely unlikely. He sounds like a nice guy, but during the interview, there were several qualities about him as a designer that I was very apprehensive about and I have a feeling if I started working for him, on top of a meager pay check, there might be a possibility of getting reprimanded for being a blind sheep and following the latest design trends.
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