How to Land Your First Job or Internship as a Graphic Designer
- XAN
- Jun 7
- 9 min read
Landing that first gig in any industry can be intimidating but for artists and designers, we are being evaluated on our portfolio of work along with soft skills and cultural fit within the workplace. Whether you are fresh out of school or looking for a career transition, there are certain steps you can take to set yourself up for success before applying for your first job in the graphic design industry.
Use this outline below to jump to a specific section of the article:
What Makes Me Qualified to Talk About This?
While this is intended to be an educational blog post to help you succeed as an up-and-coming artist in the professional world, I have sprinkled in anecdotes about my personal experience to help support key points in this article.
I first started selling art in high school, painting canvas shoes for friends, teachers, and family members. While I had always loved art, I found my passion for design at a technical high school that had Commercial Arts courses.
I landed my first graphic design position when I was in college in 2014, creating complex wooden picture puzzles for a small company near my hometown. I worked there for the next two summers and after graduation until I was able to land my first full-time position.
My first job in the corporate world was an internship with a large technology company in 2016, where I spent the next five years climbing through different titles up to the Senior Graphic Design role. During my time with that company, I was involved in interviewing candidates for new design roles, and I know from experience what it is like to be on both sides of the interview table.
I remember being the nervous (and excited) college graduate looking for my first corporate job, and I want to share the lessons I have learned with you so you can put your best foot forward.
Choosing the Type of Design Job That Is Right for You
If you have a direction in mind already for what kind of “graphic design” job you want, that is fantastic! For a lot of artists, it is easy to know that you want to continue to do art and become an artist professionally at some point, but it isn’t always clear what opportunities are out there.
“Graphic design” can also be a broad term, and to add complications, I have noticed time and time again that job boards can get these positions confused with other positions using “designer” in their titles, such as “Course Designer” or “UX/UI Designer.” While they may have some crossover, the skill sets required can be completely different from what a “Graphic Designer” is trained in.
Here are a few steps you can use that will help you filter and narrow down your job search to find positions that are relevant to your interests and skill set:
Research artists in the industry whose work you admire and look at their job titles.
You can find these artists using your favorite search engine, exploring artists on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Twitter/X, and YouTube, and in networking groups from your school(s) and LinkedIn. What is their current job title, and what titles did they hold leading up to this one?
Read the job descriptions for a variety of different positions online.
How do they describe the day-to-day activities of someone in this role, and what skills are they asking for? What types of positions are frequently catching your interest? This may be a good direction to pursue.
As you do this research, gather related keywords that you come across frequently.
These will be important in helping you refine your searches. The same can be said if you see experiences and skills in certain job titles that you DON’T want to be involved in. It’s okay to steer clear of those positions if they don’t feel right to you.
Hopefully, by doing research on industry artists, you can start to get a feel for a direction that suits you. Keep in mind, when you are applying for a position, it is okay not to have every qualification on the list. Don’t let this hold you back from applying, especially for an entry-level position. Employers looking for interns and entry-level designers are often understanding and willing to provide the training needed once the job begins. They are more interested in knowing you have the capacity and willingness to learn new skills.
Even after this research, if you are unsure about which industry or design jobs you are interested in, that’s okay! Apply to multiple internships and gain that experience under your belt. When you are working in these positions, you will learn more skills and get a better grasp of what you like, what you don’t like, and what opportunities are available to you.
For me, I have had the most success applying for jobs with an open mind and being open to new opportunities. I had no marketing experience before taking on my first internship as a marketing designer for a technology company, and I learned so much, including how to be a designer on a marketing team!
Building Your Professional Resume and Portfolio
A resume and portfolio are essential parts of landing most graphic design roles. In this section, I am going to explain some of the best preparatory steps you can take before you begin interviewing for a position. We are going to explore how to:
Make a Statement
The number one most important thing I learned in my career development was to “make a statement.” You are potentially one of a hundred or a thousand applicants these people are going to see. How are you going to stand out above them all and make yourself memorable? Do you have a skill that you excel at or an interesting hobby related to the company that you are comfortable sharing?
Here are some examples that would leave an impression on a potential employer:
You are trying to get a job at a company that designs patterned prints, so you send them your résumé and portfolio in a box wrapped with custom paper you designed.
You are trying to get a position working for a magazine, so you create a magazine about yourself, showcasing your work in a style like theirs, which they can flip through and keep after the interview.
Come to the interview prepared. Do your research on the company and develop an understanding of what they do, who they are, questions you might have, and potentially a mock campaign idea you could suggest (and show designs for) that promotes their product.
When I was in high school applying to colleges, my high school Commercial Arts teacher had told me to “make a statement” when sending my portfolio with my college application so I went to the store, bought a set of toddler shoes, painted them with the school colors and logo, and placed my portfolio flash drive inside the shoes, which I then shipped to the school. Later the following year, I noticed the shoes were displayed in the admission office and the staff were so excited to meet the student who had created them. It became a great talking point and networking opportunity for me as a freshman in college.
Build a Strong Design Portfolio
If you are new to this industry, you might be thinking, “But I don’t have a portfolio yet,” or “I haven’t worked for anyone before,” and that’s okay!
These are some steps you want to follow to build a strong portfolio:
Do your research!
Research companies you are interested in and the kind of work their designers produce. Content may include emails, eBooks, brochures, digital ads, gifs, videos/animations, website designs, app mockups, magazine layouts, social media posts, etc.
Create new work.
Pick existing companies and design new content in their style or make up companies and create work for a fake brand. The goal here is to showcase the skills you want to highlight, which can be determined by your strengths and the industry you are looking to get into.
Build both a digital and a print portfolio.
Your digital portfolio will be essential when initially applying for a job, as most employers look at this before choosing who will move on to the interview process. It's likely the interviewer will have some kind of sample of your portfolio accessible to them during the interview, but never rely on this. Put the extra effort into compiling a strong, printed portfolio that you can bring to the interview itself if it's relevant to your art or design, or a digital portfolio you can transport on a laptop or tablet and access offline.
Include your name and contact information on your portfolio.
If someone comes across this, you want to make sure they know who to credit the work to.
Treat the design of your portfolio as a portfolio piece.
Your portfolio is a reflection of yourself and it is another opportunity to showcase your ability to design, both digitally and in print. Bonus points if you create a brand for yourself and continue this design through your portfolio, resume, cover letter, etc.
A strong, clean portfolio will go a long way toward helping you land your next interview.
Write a Powerful Resume and Cover Letter
If you are in college or fresh out of school, you might feel like your resume doesn’t have a lot of meat to it, but there are still ways you can build your portfolio to stand out among other contenders who are applying for the same position.
Design your resume. Don’t submit a boring resume from a basic template you found in Microsoft Word. Showcase your layout skills, choose thoughtful colors and fonts, and turn your resume into a portfolio piece. Often, designers will match the theme of their portfolio and portfolio website with the theming on their resume design to tie them together.
If you don’t have former career experience, showcase volunteer opportunities you have been involved in and what soft or hard skills you used and learned from those experiences.
You may also be able to include club experience from school, scout experience, sports, etc. This is only a solution until you have real opportunities under your belt, and then those should remain your highlights.
If you have some internship opportunities but are looking at adding more to your resume, include a short “highlights” section that talks about hobbies and extracurricular activities you are involved in that can be used as talking points for an interview. Only include highlights that you are willing to talk about and consider ahead of time how you can relate these experiences to a workplace environment.
Include a skills section that highlights what soft skills and artistic skills you excel at. This can be a bulleted list of keywords based on your discoveries during the career research phase and based on keywords that are in the job description you are applying for. It is not uncommon to modify one’s resume to better fit the keywords and job description in an application.
Research other artists’ resumes online and get inspired by content you like (and dislike).
Write and design your cover letter. Your cover letter will stand out more if it carries a theme that matches your resume and portfolio. Not every company requires a cover letter, but not everyone submits a cover letter either, and doing so lets employers know that you are serious about the job, you have done your research, and it’s your opportunity to explain what you have to offer them by joining their team.
Don’t copy and paste from a template. Be creative. You can reference resume and cover letter templates for inspiration on design and formatting, but an employer is going to know whether you copied and pasted from an online template or if you took the time to be thoughtful about your writing and designs, and they will appreciate the latter.
Succeed on LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a social media platform designed with business in mind, where you have the opportunity to network with like-minded individuals and showcase your skills and experiences to employers. I recommend looking for “groups” on LinkedIn that you share an interest in and begin networking. A lot of groups exist already based on keywords that you would use in your resume, like “Digital Marketing," “Graphic Designers & Art Directors,” and “Adobe Photoshop Group."
Some benefits to being involved in groups include:
Networking and visibility.
By joining a group, you raise your chances of being seen in job searches by other users who also belong to the same communities. If you actively post in these groups, you have the opportunity to get yourself in front of whatever audience number that group has. In the case of the Digital Marketing group at the time of this post, each post has the opportunity to reach over 2 million people.
Inspiration.
Actively joining groups aligned with your interests will help provide interesting and engaging content on your feed. Engaging with this content helps your visibility as others in the group will be able to read your comments and see that you have reacted to posts.
Educational opportunities.
Participating in groups focused on subjects that interest you, particularly those where you're acquiring a skill, can be highly enlightening. These groups are often filled with experts and others eager to learn.
For additional support, you can read this article on Creating and Improving Your LinkedIn: For Artists.
Conclusion
Following the steps elaborated on above will help prepare you for your first job opportunity as a graphic designer. If you have any questions about this content or would like me to elaborate on any of the sections, please leave a comment below.
Comments