On Friday, March 18th I shadowed Mr. Kenney Ragland at Savage Brands. Mr. Ragland is a graphic designer who works as one of the lead designers on the Management and Operations side of the company.
Along with another EMERGE Fellow, I spent the day learning about his role as a graphic designer and his every day job duties and responsibilites, Mr, Ragland drove us to a printing press where one of his projects was being printed. Not only was I able to witness the process for reviewing the final product, I was also given a tour of the entire printing press. I saw the printing process from start to finish.
Afterward, we headed back to his office where he introduced us to everyone at Savage Brands. They greeted us with a smile and each of them gave us a quick summary of what they do for the company. They were very open to all of our questions about graphic design and even shared their personal interests and hobbies with us. They offered us advice and made us feel very welcome. Mr. Ragland then walked us through the complex process of creating and designing a project.
Once we had finished our talk, Mr. Ragland invited us to lunch along with Ms. Stacey Piefer-Havel, who is a strategist for the company and develops plans to deliver and successfully establish different products that the company designs for another company. Lunch took place at a nice Mexican restaurant called El Tiempo. It was a very nice experience because it took away all the formal tension and allowed us to ask more questions that we were too timid to ask before.
Take a Fellow to Work Day was definitely eye-opening. I really recommend it!