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Design Planner Demystified



What is your job title?

Planning Director at Coley Porter Bell

If you had to describe your job in one sentence, what would differentiate it from other planning and strategy jobs?

More visual, (even) more focused on intuitive responses, closer to the brand - you're often creating the brands first tangible manifestation/incarnation (its design, identity, name, packaging) v communicating about it.

What is the first thing you normally do in the morning when you arrive at work?

Coffee, toast, e-mails.

What specific tasks do you do that makes you a Design Planner?

Understanding and decoding brands, consumers, cultures etc visually as well as in the more traditional ways.

What is the point of your job?

My mum often asks me the same thing...

Give us an example of the kinds of problems/task you have worked on in the last week?

Running a Visual Planning workshop to create a new european confectionary brand, finishing off a brand story for an electronics company, naming brainstorm for a food brand, looking at Visual trends for a pitch

If you had to describe what you do to a kitten from Mars. What would you say to sign the kitten up as a Design Planner?

If you think visually and like creating brands this is the place to be. (Plus we do good cake)

What is the best thing about your job?

Great designers, nice culture, variety.

What has given you most fulfillment in the last week?

Winning a pitch (we pitch a lot - and thankfully win a fair bit too!)

What kinds of people are best at this job?

Visually literate / curious, in touch with their intuitive side, brand savvy.

What are the boring but necessary bits of your job?

I honestly don't really have any.

What is the oddest request you have had recently?

To visualise how we would take a new brand concept in an extreme '50 shades of Grey' direction...

What do you look at all day?


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