12 Essential Art Direction Interview Questions *

Experienced art directors should have a process for how they familiarize themselves with a new brand or company. This should be well-thought-out and provide them with the necessary information to dive into creating new campaigns and improving upon existing ones.

Exceptional candidates should be able to answer this question easily and should have a plan already in place for starting with a company. The plan should include getting up to speed on the brand’s goals and current positioning (including in comparison to competitors), past campaigns, and any campaigns currently being developed. The first week on a new project should also include getting to know the team the art director will be working with.

美术指导是一个领导职位，大多数美术总监都有一个团队在他们的领导下工作. 强大的领导能力和指导能力是成为优秀团队领导者的必要条件, and the best candidates should be able to reflect on their career to identify instances where they’ve effectively shown these skills.

寻找那些与团队成员分享合作故事的候选人. 优秀的领导者能发现团队的优势，并给予支持, while helping compensate for their weaknesses. Art directors who attempt to micromanage their teams often suffer from high turnover and reduced morale.

美术总监在项目中的成功可以用几种方法来衡量, 而哪一个是“正确的”取决于公司的目标和内部文化. 应聘者的回答是否符合公司对成功的定义?

If an art director candidate defines success purely in terms of revenue while the company is more concerned with raising brand recognition, then the fit may be off. 应聘者通常给出的一个答案是，一个成功的项目是他们引以为傲的. Encourage them to expand on what makes them proud of a project to get at the real things they value in terms of success.

因为艺术总监监督广告活动的创作, 他们可能会遇到各种各样需要解决的业务问题. Look for candidates who show an understanding of how business problems can be identified and addressed with creative solutions.

Candidates should have a firm grasp of how advertising and related campaigns can be used to bolster a business’s market position, mitigate a public relations issue, or launch a new product successfully. 要小心那些似乎不了解业务问题的候选人, 或者不确定他们的工作如何有助于解决问题.

因为美术总监是团队的领导者，所以他们必须具备出色的领导能力. One of the most important of those skills is the ability to lead a team through a tough project or to meet a tight deadline.

寻找那些渴望迎接这些挑战的候选人, rather than those who seem nervous by the prospect. Experienced candidates should have multiple times in their career that they can pull from to answer this question, and some may relay multiple anecdotes.

Pay attention to their particular strategies, too. 他们的方法是否符合公司的价值观和文化? 他们采取专制的方式还是合作的方式? How a candidate performs under pressure will influence the way their team works when the pressure is off.

对商业战略的把握是美术总监成功的必要条件. 如果广告活动不符合整体品牌战略，它们就不可能成功. Design has to serve that strategy.

而不是将设计和战略视为潜在的对立力量, the best candidates will see the strategy aspects of a campaign as a positive challenge to flex their design chops. Look for art directors who embrace strategy alongside design and view the two as interlocking parts of a cohesive whole.

The best art director candidates should have an idea of where their strengths lie and should look for team members who complement those strengths. 他们还应该寻找能够互补的团队成员. It’s rare that designers excel in every area of design, 因此，创建一个具有互补技能的团队对于项目的成功至关重要.

An ideal candidate will want team members who fit into the overall company culture and can function well as a unit while working on a campaign. 选择背后的理由比“理想”的细节更重要, 应该鼓励候选人进一步阐述哪一点.

There’s no right or wrong answer here. The answer to this question should give the interviewer a better understanding of whether the candidate being interviewed has the appropriate skills to fit the position. 如果他们表达困难的领域是填补空缺的人需要擅长的领域, then that candidate won’t be a good fit.

If the areas where they struggle are a minor part of the job or are easily compensated for by other members of their team, then those are less of a concern. 问问应聘者他们是如何应对这些挑战的也是个好主意. Any experienced art director will have developed strategies to deal with the parts of the job where their weaknesses lie.

Experienced art directors should have numerous successful media campaigns to pull from to answer this question. 注意他们是如何定义“成功”的——是基于收入吗, or the way their team came together, or the quality of the work they produced?

确保他们对成功的定义与公司的一致. Make note of the campaigns they mention and research them after the interview to make sure you agree with their assessment of success and that their approach was one that made sense within the brand’s goals.

一些候选人可能会对讨论他们不太成功的项目有所保留. But this is a good way to gather whether they’ve learned from past mistakes or failures and applied those lessons to future work.

要特别注意他们会有什么不同的做法. 他们是把责任推给其他团队还是自己的团队成员? 或者他们在项目失败中承担起自己的责任? 提到其他团队的缺点并不一定是件坏事, as long as they also take responsibility for their own role in the campaign and where they could have done better.

Any art director candidate should have a well-thought-out process for creating and executing campaigns. 具体细节并不重要，重要的是知道他们已经开发了一个有效的系统.

也就是说，任何美术总监的工作流程中都应该包含一些内容. 在早期，他们应该有一个阶段，在这个阶段他们对项目进行发现并定义其范围. 之后便是为活动创造和设计理念, followed by collecting feedback and making adjustments. 该活动的执行也应该经过深思熟虑.

Good candidates should be able to adapt their usual working process as necessary to fit within the established workflows of the company.

Expert art directors should keep track of current trends and technologies and understand when and how to incorporate them into their work. The answer to this question should give insight into how the candidate considers trends and what their decision-making process is on whether to incorporate trends or not.

优秀的美术总监不会因为潮流是新的或流行的就盲目地追随潮流. They should be able to grasp how a trend or technology can be used to enhance a brand and when it will detract from the brand’s promise.