Incorporating junior staff into the agency talent matrix is a challenge, especially when they are the core of a burgeoning in-house creative team. BuilDesign is a program designed to elevate amazing, talented students into agency ready professionals in a 14 week program.

Key program components

• Candidates focused on design, development, UX, and product management. They all learned in a cohort together, and they were encouraged to switch focus as they learned more about each discipline and got hands on experience on real client projects. 

• The program trained and gave experience to aspiring managers who were paired with interns for the duration of the program. Mentor bootcamp training prepared them for this task.

• Hiring decisions were based on their collaboration, ability to learn, communication skills, and agency polish and understanding — specific subject matter expertise was important, but secondary.

Over three years of cohorts, the agency trained 41 and hired 18 thriving, diverse, and highly capable employees with an average tenure of over five years.