I failed as a designer at a consultancy firm

It has been well over two years since I left the startup I once worked at as a UX designer. I don’t remember if I wrote about it at the time, but the reason I left was that I had to leave. Again.

I failed. Again. Photo by chuttersnap on Unsplash

This was the second time I had to go. I was thinking about leaving myself and had some talks with other companies planned. However, it didn’t come to that as we had to separate due to a lack of investors that wanted to provide the startup with funding (and me with a salary). I wrote about my time as a designer at a startup below.

I failed as a designer at a startup

This was earlier than I expected so I had to improvise on my next career move. After some talks here and there I got invited to an informal coffee talk at a company which later turned out to be a consultancy firm for back-end software solutions. I didn’t find out until much later since I wasn’t aware of what consultancy was. The manager and I had great chemistry and even though I had to go through three rounds of interviews with the company after the initial coffee, I knew then and there that I would get the job. I was right. About a month or two later I walked through the door for my first day as a designer at a consultancy firm.

What does a (designer at a) consultancy firm do?

Consultancy is about consulting people. As a consultant, you’re an expert in your field. In my case, that would be (UX) design. I’m currently working as a UX design consultant and designer. Consultancy used to be a thing of business and management but nowadays you see consultancy firms in almost any field.

As a consultant, you give advice and solutions to your clients by providing them with your expertise in a certain field. In most cases, your clients lack this kind of expertise. That’s why they need to hire you. In some cases, you’re hired as a temporary employee to fill a gap in the workforce.

You could do this as a freelancer or via a consultancy firm. Working as a consultant at a firm is luke a safe way of freelancing. You get the freedom of working variable…