Before the beginning of the project me and a few classmates of mine made an agreement to be in one team. During the kickoff week I was absent from the Netherlands and found out that the people I made an agreement with, were not allowed to have me in their team because I was not currently there. This situation caught me off guard and I found myself in a situation without a team. I asked in the group chat of my class if somebody wanted me and Rania and Indre answered. They needed one more person in their team and I was the lucky guy to be invited. We conducted a small interview while I was waiting in front of mall toilets (it was very funny). I made it clear that I would like to take up the design/advertising campaign and not work on coding. They needed exactly that in their team and that is how it all started.

The following days we conducted some skype meetings, working on a concept they had in mind. To be honest in that period of time I wasn’t sure if we could click and work as a team because they already had something in mind and I felt a bit like an intruder. One day they approached me with the question if I could think of a concept, so I was very glad to let my imagination fly. In a day or so I came back to them with a concept and they liked it. I was very pumped up to work on the idea.

When I came back to the Netherlands we met face to face and the communication started running smoothly. I found out that all of them are amazing people and we clicked. Everyone was enthusiastic and willing to work. We quickly organized ourselves and the work started flowing. If I can explain the whole experience in one word it would be with the word “MATCH”. Each of us was good in something specific, but also our competences overlapped a bit which left no competence gap and we had an amazing symbiosis.

The concepting phase went amazingly smooth. Everyone was listening to each other and gave constructive criticism if needed. In this way we managed to filter what we need and what we want to work on. From that moment on I feel like everything ran so smoothly, that I still can not believe it. I have never had such an experience before. The way everyone did their job and helped the others at the same time was amazing. For the first time I feel like the work load was shared equally and I didn’t feel like I am doing all the work, as I normally feel. The spirit was up all the time which helped me immensely not to crumble psychologically. There was also no pressure. What I normally feel when the deadlines approach is anxiety and pressure, but not this time. That happened to keep my motivation up throughout all the 9 weeks of the project and delivered great results.

One of my biggest achievements through this project was to learn to accept criticism and take a step back before I become defensive. This happened during my firs brand book design draft. I got feedback which implied changing what I have done until that point, and I became defensive. After a conversation with a teacher, I realized my mistakes and took a step back to think how I could fix them. After going through everything I already had and seeing what the final product should be, I sat down and “translated” my ideas into a design guide which everyone could understand and follow. This was my best design until now. What I got from that experience was that I am biased about the work I do and need an external perspective to achieve the best result possible. I believe that will help me for sure in my future career and I am glad I could learn that on such an early stage of my development.

As a conclusion I would say that this was the best project I have worked on until now. Also, the team was the best one I’ve worked with. Special thanks to:

Max, Sacha, Rania, Marieke and Indre.