How to get hired: Advice from creative directors

Here’s the harsh reality: the job market is competitive. For any position you apply for, you’ll be up against dozens of other highly qualified candidates.

What makes it worse is that, even if you’ve got the most talent, you still might not get the job. Research shows that 50% of interviewers make their minds up about a candidate in the first five minutes. The decision is based on lots of factors, from how you shake hands to how you present your portfolio.

We'll explore what creative directors and recruiters are looking for. You’ll find out how you can best prepare, what you should do, and which key mistakes you should avoid.

You’ve got the skills, after all. You’ve worked hard, and you know you could do a good job if given the opportunity. So maximize your chances of negotiating that final, awkward hurdle of the interview.

1. Have an opinion

As a Senior Creative Director at Starwood Hotels & Resorts, Stephen Gates has interviewed hundreds of candidates. There's one thing he expects from them:

"Show up with something to say, some insights you want to share and some ideas of how you are going to make our work better."

Having an opinion shows you’ve done your research and know the company and its work, he wrote on his LinkedIn page. It also helps him see how you think about design and branding, and how you communicate your ideas.

So the first step is to immerse yourself in the work of the company you’re interviewing with. Don’t just browse the website, but really dig deep. Look at as many of their projects as you can, so that you can start to formulate an honest, helpful opinion.

Then, you need to find a way to communicate your ideas most effectively. You don’t want to come across as being arrogant by trashing their work. But, on the other hand, you don’t want to just give bland praise.

Go for constructive criticism. Engage with what they’ve produced and acknowledge its strengths. Also, suggest a few areas in which it could be improved or extended.

2. Get your portfolio right

“I run a company,” writes Simon Manchipp. "It’s tough. Complex. Very time consuming. I am time-poor. So your portfolio has one purpose: Dazzle me."

How do you do that? Manchipp, co-founder of London-based design practice SomeOne, states what he is looking for:

"Beautifully crafted, brilliant ideas. And don’t worry, it needn’t have actually been accepted by the client (although that always gets extra kudos). Show me your cut. The one that floats your boat."

Dan Mall, founder of former design studio SuperFriendly, has a similar philosophy. He wants to see more than just "all the shiny results that everyone has on their portfolios." He wants to see "all the previous versions before you got to the final version that’s live." 

"Knowing how you think is what convinces me to hire you," he told me in an email. He added:

"Show me all your prototypes. Show me the photos of whiteboard sketches that you did. Show me the version the client hated, and show me how you fixed it. Show me all the versions that never made the cut. Show me that you can think through all types of problems, and you’ll likely get a job offer."

When Lee Newham was design director at Davies Hall, he liked to see candidates bringing not only their final work, but also mockups and sketches.  “We are as interested in how you got to the final solution as the solution itself,” he said in an article for graphic designer David Airey. “You can show other concepts.”

Here's one of the top recruiting tips: don’t talk about your work too much at first. If you’re talking all the time, the interviewer will look at you, not at your portfolio or CV. Newham advises giving just “one short sentence to engage the interviewer with you.” Then move straight to the work.

If you’re showing logo work, be sure that it creates what Manchipp calls a “brand world”. In other words:

"Make sure it is applied to something, inventively, progressively, interestingly."

He wants to see more than "just an Illustrator vector whacked on a LiveImage Photoshop file".

"Show me how the work goes deep."

And yes: bring your resume and portfolio to the interview, even if you submitted them before. The interviewer may have forgotten them or may confuse you with other applicants. Gates puts it very simply:

"Bring your resume and portfolio or go home."

3. Talk about the why

After you’ve shown some of your work, be prepared to talk about why and how you created it.

"It's not only why you're doing it but the strategy behind it as well, how you tell the message," said Skullcandy’s Nate Morley in an Inc Magazine article.

"A lot of it is the energy that comes from someone. When they start talking about an idea, when somebody's really got that creative juice, it's almost like they can't help themselves from being flooded with ideas."

Manchipp advises thinking of every project in the following terms:

• what the challenge was
• how you approached it
• what the results were
• why it worked
• where it worked

It’s a simple framework, but it can help you to describe what he calls “the creative work behind the creative work”.

Gates also places a high premium on finding candidates who can communicate the why. Here's one of his valuable recruitment tips for getting a job:

"It really isn’t very hard to find someone who can create a great visual design, but it is really hard to find someone who can put thought, experience, and originality into the thinking behind that design. So even if you have the best portfolio in the world, but you can’t explain why you did what you did, then there is a 98% chance I will pass on you as a member of my team."

4. Look ’em in the eye

Remember that stat about interviewers making up their minds in the first five minutes? It’s from a 2014 Harris Poll on behalf of CareerBuilder. Even in 2025, we don't have reason to believe that this has significantly changed.

Said poll also found that by minute 15, that percentage rose to 90%. So first impressions certainly count.

In fact, other research suggests the window of opportunity may be even shorter. Psychology student Tricia Prickett showed videos of job interviews to observers. She found that they could predict whether the candidate would be offered the job based on the first 15 seconds of the clip.

In 15 seconds you barely have time to say more than “Hello”, so clearly non-verbal cues are important. The CareerBuilder survey also found that hiring managers complained of some mistakes made by candidates:

1. Failing to make eye contact: 65%
2. Failing to smile: 36%
3. Playing with something on the table: 33%
4. Having bad posture: 30%
5. Fidgeting too much in their seat: 29%
6. Crossing their arms over their chest: 26%
7. Playing with their hair or touching their face: 25%
8. Having a weak handshake: 22%
9. Using too many hand gestures: 11%
10. Having a handshake that is too strong: 7%

Some of this stuff is just how you naturally behave, and some of it is how you react to stress. For example, when I’m under pressure, I tend to reach up with my right hand and rub my temple. As habits go, it’s not the worst one you can imagine, but any nervous tic can get pretty irritating after a while.

The fact that these habits are so ingrained and unconscious makes them very hard to correct.

If you can afford it, you could hire a body language coach. But a quick and free home remedy is to record yourself while doing something awkward or stressful like giving a speech in public, and then analyze your performance.

This can be a large topic, but if you work through the list above and drop any of those from your interviewing approach, you’ll be ahead of many other candidates.

5. Show you want it

This one may seem obvious, but it comes up a lot when creative directors talk about what they're looking for. Louise Coaker-Nugent, Director of The Fix Creative, told me in an email:

"Freelancers can tend to be too laid back. It can seem like they don't want the job sometimes. We have had that a lot recently."

“Get excited,” advises Manchipp.

"If you don’t want it more than the next person, the next person will probably get it."

So how can you communicate that? Well, first, notice that the title of this section is not: “Say you want it”. I used the word “show” for a reason.

After all, pretty much all the candidates are going to say they want the job. That part is easy. Most of them will even make up convincing reasons for wanting the job (other than needing the money).

But showing you want the job is much harder. Part of it is following the other four steps we’ve outlined so far.

It’s also about doing the basics right. I asked Nick Finney, Director of NB branding agency, for his one piece of advice on getting a job. He wrote:

"Don’t be late. Nothing says ‘I don’t care’ like turning up late to an interview—even if you really do care. Transport will let you down, and maps will misdirect you. Showing up stressed and sweaty won’t give you a chance to present the best version of you. So, plan ahead, get there early and relax; and while you’re waiting soak up the atmosphere, get an impression of what it's going to be like to work there."

Be sure to ask questions. Show an interest in everything about the company, and in the interviewer too.

Companies routinely research candidates on social media. So you can turn the tables and research your interviewer. Find out something about their career and ask questions that establish a personal connection.

Also, prepare extra questions in case the topics you’d planned to ask about were already covered. There’s only one thing worse than not asking any questions, and that’s asking one that's been answered.

Time to give these tips from recruiters​ a try!

It’s a tough industry out there, but people are getting hired every day. There’s no reason why the next one shouldn’t be you!

The good news is that, in many of the creative directors’ comments, there’s a note of exasperation. Many candidates disqualify themselves by making basic errors. They keep arriving late or forgetting their portfolios. If you meet these basic requirements, you're on the other side!

And you can always go the extra mile. Boost your portfolio and resume with the tools available on Envato. For a low monthly fee, you get unlimited downloads of graphic templates, fonts, and more assets to improve your portfolio!

• What Is the Best Font for a Resume? (Professional Size & Proper Type for 2025)

  Charley Mendoza

  11 Feb 2024
• 26 Creative InDesign Portfolio Templates (Best for 2025)

  Melody Nieves

  18 Nov 2023

Nothing can guarantee success, of course. Sometimes you’re just up against a better-qualified candidate. Sometimes you may be interviewing for a job that’s already been filled for reasons that have nothing to do with qualifications.

I know you probably want to get hired fast​​. Don't worry too much about that. If you follow the tips from recruiters outlined in this tutorial, you’ll increase your chances of getting hired and embarking on the career you deserve. Good luck!