Masking My Fears with Clipping Masks
Hey, I am Chinmayee. My team calls me Comms Mom!
In January 2022, I started as a Communications Design intern at Quizizz. Before that, I was doing an undergrad in design. The journey to my college degree was one filled with twists and turns.
Before I realized that design was my calling, I was studying for CA entrance exams. I didn’t have a strong opinion on what I wanted to be, so I did the next best thing: I followed my parents’ footsteps. Both of them run a tax consultancy together.
I spent 18 months prepping for the exams. Within the first 3 months, I started feeling low because it was impossible to stay engaged. The prospect of it felt like a chore. Why am I doing this? There’s no love. There’s no pull towards it.
I wish I knew then that I could confront my parents and try to change their minds. Instead, I aced all my mocks and flunked my entrance exams. Not once, but twice. My father’s a pretty chill dude, but this was the first time I managed to make him angry. Meanwhile, I spent all my free time doodling with my friend in the library. Since childhood, I have collected anything that draws me in: packaging, illustrations, clothing tags. This obsession started when I was 9 years old because of a Hershey’s Miniature Christmas wrapper. This led to the realization I want to create stuff like this.
I started to inquire how to do this. I talked to anyone and everyone who indulges in creative work — artists, architects, you name it. They educated me on all the formal design education options available. I convinced my parents under one condition — I can’t leave Baroda. There was one option for formal design education in Baroda. No more decision-making, “yayy.” College was engaging, something I enjoyed doing. It felt like I was in the right place, at the right time. As I began working on various college projects, my parents noticed my progress and dedication. Gradually, they changed their minds about my career in design. Now, they are my biggest cheerleaders and support system!
In the last year of college, one semester is dedicated for internship. How do I know how to find an internship? I started reaching out to people non-stop for advice. One stranger who turned into a friend, Kshitij, laid out what I needed to do to get an internship. During the last pandemic wave, Kyoorius, the design conference, was happening virtually. Vijaya, aka Spreefirit, aka the person who ended up hiring me for Quizizz, was delivering a talk here. She put up an IG story that they are looking for interns. I reached out to her instantly and got on with the interviews. The panel made me feel like I was one of them during interviews. They looked at me being all shaky and nervous, and they succeeded in making me feel comfortable. I liked that.
At the beginning of my internship, Vijaya and I were on the Comms Design team. I sliced up the Quizizz logo on my first day to make a gift-wrappy pattern. It makes me happy to see it still in use.
During my three-month internship, I had fun doing some real work (that went out in the real world!). It was a great day when Adrienne broke the news to me that I have the option to convert full-time.
I joined full time in the summer of ’22. Quizizz was growing rapidly. Every week, every month, we welcome new employees. More people were trying more things. The volume of work was getting out of hand, so we decided we would need more folks on our team to tackle all the demands. After several failed attempts, we realized something: Web design isn’t our strength. So we got Jay!
The three of us worked together for a year. This particular year, we weren’t effective in prioritizing all the work as a team. Every time we would calibrate to handle higher volume — we were already too late. This required someone to step up and control this. We went looking for a comms design manager. Meanwhile, I was struggling to manage my work. In search of advice, I went to Prakhar, who led the Product Design team at Quizizz. He suggested that I was capable of dealing with it on my own if I tried. I gave it a shot because why not? I guess I did a half-decent job because we stopped looking for a Comms Design manager.
For real, thank you for giving me a shot, Connor, and for finding me a great mentor in Mehek, aka Giggling Monkey.
Transitioning from an IC to a manager was tough. Do I know how to manage myself? How will I manage a team? What is it even managers do? There were so many questions. Every day was hard. Every day is hard. Every day, I have to do something for the first time. One of the ways I’ve been able to cope with this is by having access to people like Mahesh and Carrie. People who never fail to lend an ear, and give much-needed perspective.
Aarya, Gayathri, and Cassandra today make the team 6 people strong. It’s been 9 months since I became a manager. During this time, I am constantly pushed out of my comfort zone. To be an effective manager, you have to be able to confront and have direct conversations. I wouldn’t call this my strength exactly. I was terrible at it. But I am proud of the progress I’ve made. I now understand the importance of confrontation and being direct. It’s growing on me. It’s an act of kindness.
As a team, we’ve done a great job when it comes to managing the volume of inbound work. We’ve done an okay job at improving the quality of our output. We have to start making enough space for Comms Design-led initiatives. Tackling deeper Comms Design challenges.
There’s so much still left to do. So friggin’ much. But we don’t plan to stop until we are world-class. @comms-design is looking forward to getting there!
