Ross Ackery

Foundations

Starting out in 2012 with some forum signature designs (full of fractals and artsy photoshop brushes) and pixel art I was able to get a graphic design apprenticeship in the fashion industry. Over the next few years I freelanced, I created illustrations for Microsoft, I designed documents for a Fortune 200 company, I designed paper toys of Arsenal players (downloaded hundreds of thousands of times globally). I even learnt to kitesurf in Brazil in exchange for designing (and building) the website for the hotel I was staying at.

Experience

I've worked for two brilliant agencies where both positions lasted over 4 years and both have resulted in freelance work continuing way beyond my full-time employment. Most recently I've been leading the design team at Crucible.io. This involves leading the creative aspects of web design projects from end to end, guiding clients through discovery sessions, mentoring junior designers and managing freelancers. I have also built entire Wordpress sites in a freelance capacity. I use that coding experience to improve the collaboration between design and development departments, that knowledge has allowed me to create better handover processes, reduce costs and improve internal relationships.

Motivation

I find motivation in the complexity of projects or challenges especially in design, UX and coding. I want to find creative solutions to complex problems and push boundaries. In design this could be working with a client that does something obscure for an audience I know nothing about - I want to dig deep and understand everything about them so I can put myself in their user's shoes effectively. In UX this might manifest as finding efficient ways to handle a variety of use cases or a huge amount of content types. In coding this means nothing is impossible, when a layout or animation is difficult I want to learn how to make it work. I often find being told “we can't find a way to make this work” is not a dead-end, instead it's an invitation to invent new automations and processes or to learn a new skill.

Coding

When I was freelance I struggled to find cost-effective, creative developers for my projects so I figured out how to do it myself, learning HTML, CSS, JS and the PHP I needed to build the Wordpress projects I was working on. I have found this has its benefits even when I'm in a purely design role. I communicate efficiently with developers through handover processes and I design with less back-and-forth over what is in budget and what isn't. As I've worked my way up to senior designer/head of design this has helped when working directly with clients to push projects creatively whilst simultaneously managing expectations of what can be achieved within project restrictions.

I didn't stop there, learning how websites worked sparked an enthusiasm in me. I got a C# tutor so that I could build games (in Unity) that I wanted to play. I took courses in, and started building, React based projects and more recently I have been working with Node.js/JSON/MongoDB to build personal projects.

Let's get personal

Design plays a big part in my life. E.g. when making a complaint to my failing landlord I found myself wireframing a customer complaint portal that would improve the lives of their overworked employees. I enjoy learning how to design and build digital products but we all know hiring a new team member requires more than just the qualities to complete the projects. You want someone that fits on a personal level too. So some personal facts: I've attended a range of sporting events including Premier League, Euros, Copa Libertadores football matches, NFL and NBA games in America and a fair few esports events. I am worryingly good at Rocket League and Football Manager. I find inspiration in dada, surrealism and post-modernism. I have a cute but insane dog named Rocco who has been confused for both a tall dachshund and a short doberman.