History Future Present

Gamesmanship …..

GAMESMANSHIP

For the last year i have been teaching a class called ‘Final Crit’.  This is a class geared towards freelancers and how to engage, find clients and generate business. The most important thing to communicate, and I try, is the importance of STRATEGY, that without strategy you can have the best portfolio on the planet and no one will know you exists. The work that you have spent days, months, years developing will live under your bed and no one will know your greatness.

Many of my students enter the job market with out a plan, with out an understanding of the game that they are about to play.  So i have some advice.

1) This is a game (and you must play the game as if it is for keeps)

2) Understand the rules of the game

3) Master the rules of the game

4) Exploit the rules

5) Step and repeat

Game and Gamesmanship

Gamesmanship is the use of dubious (although not technically illegal) methods to win a game, such as golf or snooker. “Pushing the rules to the limit without getting caught, using whatever dubious methods possible to achieve the desired end.”  …  it may be inferred that the term derives from playing for the game (to win at any cost) as opposed to playing for sport.    (Thanks Wikipedia)

Gamesmanship is that perfect intersection of strategy and game playing (recreation / hobby).  In order to elevate your game to gamesmanship status  you must committ yourself to mastery, which often means applying a level of commitment to your pursuit.  I have taken dubious out of the conversation as it has a negative connotation.  When a basketball player makes the comment that a particular person has “Game” they are refering to the fact that the person has mastered a complete set of skills.  In a photographer’s case the complete skill set includes not just their ability to communicate an idea, or their technical competency but their implementation of strategy that will move their career forward.

Strategy includes knowing how to promote one’s self in the traditional sense but also being aware of the changing rules that govern the game.  One has to remember that the game is organic, it lives, it breathes, it grows, and it morphs, and if one is not able to make the necessary adjustments one’s career is doomed.   

These ideas and strategies for a sustainable career have always been present.  The difference is that the rate at which this organic ecosystem changes has become faster and faster.

I was in a meeting today with another photographer who made a statement that I believe to be true but have no way of verifying.  And that is, that if you compare the camera to computers cameras have seen far more real change then computers and in a shorter amount of time.  According to Wikipedia computers using vacuum tubes were in use as early as 1946, in 1959 transistors came and from then on it was about the refinement of the transistor.  (Excuse me if I am over simplifying this.)  Photography’s switch from film to digital and now  from digital still to motion has occurred in 25 years plus or minus.  Rather than an evolution we are amidst a revolution.  

This does not even speak to changes in the photographic business model. Assignment, assignment / stock, managed stock, royalty free stock, micro stock.  All these variants have lived a useful life albeit short and sweet.  Those who recognized the trends and were able to make adjustments have been able to survive, and will continue to survive because they have learned the game.  They are the players with the most “game”……… GAMESMANSHIP

150,000 MBA’s and counting

So I was sitting in the “Universities in the Free Era” session yesterday when an unbelieveable stat was thrown out, that one university currently had 150,000 students enrolled in its MBA program.  Astonishing when one considers that the estimated population of Pasadena, CA as of 2008 is 148,126, (for those of you who do not know where pasadena is, it is in the San Gabriel basin 10 miles north east of downtown Los Angeles.)  This number is 3 times the size of University of Texas at Austin.  (50,000 undergrad and grad students) This is not counting all of the other schools nationwide that offer MBA programs. Did I forgot to mention that the degree from this university of 150,000 MBA students is well regarded?  Who is this school and where is their campus?  If they have 150,000 MBA’s how many students in other majors do they have? The winner …… The University of Phoenix .

It was once believed and maybe still is believed by some that an MBA was the ticket to a high paying job and a good life with the white picket fence, the golden ring, etc. But with that many students in the pipeline what kind of high paying jobs will be available?Will these students have to go back to school because their degree’s value has been diminished? Does this mean that an MBA is passe´? And if it is will an MFA from a design institution become the new MBA and if so how long will it take for us to reach our 150,000?  As an educator at a design school and one who is always worried about the value of an education not to mention its relevance, i just have to sit back and think about what we are doing and how we are doing it.

As higher education chases  after students and the dollars that come with those students will we put limits on the amount of graduates degree programs?  How can design schools maintain their brand and compete with online education?  Will there be enough jobs for the MFA’s?  In the future will one need a degree or will there be another method of showing acquisition of knowledge?  Will degrees become outdated?

Just a few more questions to think about…..EAVB_LTJZUJFFMS

In the beginning…..

It is the first one that is the most difficult to start with and had a student of mine (thanks emily) not called me out on my promise to blog i might still be hiding out. So here it is.

History Future Present is a place where i can discuss those things that i am curently passionate about, blogging is not one of them, education, photography, and audio.  For now we will leave audio out and concentrate on education and photograpy / design.  I work at Art Center College of Design as a full-time photography instructor and chair of our curriculum committee.  the school at large is going through a re-visioning process at the request of our newly appointed president.  This is long over due and is one of the reasons that I am attending the SXSW Interactive Conference in Austin TX.  As our department looks to the future and we see the change in technology and business ecosystems there is much to learn.  In the 2 days that I have participated in seminars (over 10) one thing is clear the landscape is not just changing IT HAS CHANGED.  These changes are not just in photography but more importantly in education.  Open Source, Low Residency, Tradional or a hybrid of the listed types.  These are the current questions not just for Art Center but for the educational community PEROID.

While I am sure that I will not have any answers I will most certainly have tons of questions that will get asked by my department and school.

Next post? …. Soon

E