Year Two Reflection — Kendra Yoakum
There was a time in our lives where we wished to become a pirate, ballerina, or even a space-ninja with a monkey sidekick… but as we get older, not many of us pursue our childhood dream job. During a reflection of her second year at Little Taller, Kendra Yoakum tells us how we were able to make her childhood dreams come true… along with a slight fangirling moment over her favorite author.
Little Taller: Just a quick recap, tell us a bit about your position with Little Taller.
Kendra: My position with Little Taller is as a designer, which mostly entails Web Design, Social Media Design, Print Design, and every once in a while, Product Design. Basically, I design all the things, all the time.
Little Taller: Has your position with Little Taller changed any over the last year?
Kendra: Last year, I was finishing up my time as an intern and was mostly focused on web design… since then, I’ve been focused on a lot of different projects and have branched out from that.
Little Taller: What type of projects have you branched out into?
Kendra: I went from being strictly Web Design all the time to working on social, print, and product design. I’ve even started designing garments and scrubs for our client, Impala Scrubs.
Little Taller: How do you like that? Is it new and exciting, or are you finding it to be difficult?
Kendra: It’s very new and exciting. I like it a lot, but there’s a lot of little things that I wouldn’t have known I needed to know, and it’s all interesting because there’s not a specific process of how to design for clothing, but at the same time, there is. So you can do whatever you want when you’re designing the garment itself, but things get technical when you have to list out the specs, measurements, finishing touches, and details like where the seams, buttons, pockets, zippers, and panels of fabric should go. It’s just a lot of little things that I had to learn as I went.
Little Taller: Do you have any new responsibilities this year?
Kendra: I’ve kind of become the head designer for Impala. I’ve also stepped more into branding and ironing out the agency’s branding process as a whole. We’ve done branding projects before, but we don’t have a set in stone systems for how we get it done, so I’m coming up with that system and model of what it looks like and how we’re going to present brands.
Little Taller: What is the branding process looking like so far?
Kendra: A lot of discovery and research. We meet with the client and see what they’re needing, and then we’ll do a lot of research on competing brands, similar brands, or well-presented brands to figure what they’re doing and how we can incorporate that into creating a long-lasting, strong brand. I typically start by doing sketches by hand, and then once we narrow down to a few sketches, I’ll start making physical mockups on the computer. Then we’ll present a few different ideas to the client and either iterate on all of them or pick one or two to iterate on, and then after that, it’s just fine-tuning until we get it right.
Little Taller: How would you change the Little Taller brand if you had the freedom to do whatever?
Kendra: Oh, good question. I like our brand’s foundation, it’s very strong and bold, but I would bring in more organic elements to kind of balance our industrial feel. I would market our team more as brand builders and people who have bold personalities but aren’t afraid to be down to earth, get things done, work late hours, and get their hands dirty doing projects.
Little Taller: So, other than getting into garment design, what new skills have you learned over the past year?
Kendra: Probably in using work applications like Slite and other third-party platforms that we use to keep notes or share files. Also, getting better at presenting work to clients and being more of a front-facing contact for them. Lately, I’ve been interacting with clients more and sitting in on more discovery calls. I’m growing in the area of problem-solving for clients… Like going from saying, “here’s what I built for you,” to “here’s what it sounds like you need to care for your problem.”
Little Taller: Looking at this past year, what accomplishments are you most proud of?
Kendra: Probably Impala Scrubs because it’s different from anything I’ve worked on before with Little Taller. When I was little, I thought I wanted to be a fashion designer, but I realized I would rather go the web design route when I got into college. So, it’s kind of funny to see that childhood dream come back and get the opportunity to play around with “fashion design”.
Little Taller: What was the hardest obstacle or project you had to overcome this year?
Kendra: We’ve had a lot of busy months this year where we have a lot of projects going at once. It’s been a good challenge to learn how to juggle all the projects efficiently. There are some days where I’ll have two or three big projects to finish in one day, and I have to figure out how to schedule my day around those projects to be efficient and get everything done — all while making sure no other small projects fall through the cracks.
Little Taller: What are your goals for year three?
Kendra: We work with a lot of existing brands, but the past few months, we’ve been helping create brands, which is super exciting and fun. So, I’d want to keep growing that for us and keep developing our branding process. Eventually, I want to make it one of our main focuses in addition to web and dev.
Little Taller: Do you have specific types of clients that you enjoy working with?
Kendra: Yeah, I like working with clients who are willing to meet frequently and talk through the process with us. I enjoy getting to collaborate on their ideas and how we can solve their problems, so when we can come up with different designs or directions, I’m able to come up with something that best fits their needs.
Little Taller: What advice would you give to incoming design interns that are about to embark on their Little Taller journey?
Kendra: I would say pay close attention to the feedback that people are giving you, but don’t be afraid to go one step further. It’s important to hit on each point that you get the feedback because if you’re only changing three out of four things, you aren’t meeting the required ask. So change it to be like how they asked, but then make sure you improve the project as a whole. It shows that you are a strong designer and someone who is willing to use their thoughts and talents to support their project.
Little Taller: If you could go back in time, what is one thing you would do differently with Little Taller?
Kendra: I’m sure there are some things, but anything that I would maybe change, wouldn’t benefit me now. All the mess-ups, miscommunications, misunderstandings, falling short of the client’s ask, or not meeting objectives, that’s all the stuff that’s helped me grow as a designer.
Little Taller: Yeah, for sure. Final question, it isn’t related to Little Taller in any way, but if you could have dinner with anyone in the world, who would it be and why?
Kendra: There’s a lot of people I would want to have dinner with, but the first one that pops into my head is the author of my favorite book series, Pierce Brown. He wrote the Red Rising series when he was just 26 and is one of the most well-spoken men I’ve ever met. He has an incredible imagination; it’s so impressive how he crafts his stories and is equally as eloquent in his everyday life. I’ve actually already met him twice at his book signings, and I drew a picture of him once and he posted it on his Instagram — before I met him. So when I brought the drawing to the first book signing I went to he saw it and was like “Oh wow you’re the girl who drew that amazing portrait?” Outwardly I was like “Yes, that’s me!”, inwardly — freaking out. “My mother just loved it so much,” he said. Thanks, Pierce’s Mom. So even though I’ve already met him I’d love to spend more time asking questions and learning more about him… plus, he lives in a beautiful cottage on a hillside and has a writer’s shed. So he’s just really cool.
Little Taller: What do you think you guys would talk about at dinner?
Kendra: His writer’s shed… because I want it. And his books. I would love to know his inspiration for them and how his life experiences have shaped them. When he was trying to get published, he was rejected hundreds of times, but he just kept trying until he finally found a publisher that would accept his books, and now he’s a New York Times Bestselling author. It would be cool to hear about how he went through all that without giving up.
As one of the first designers to partake in the Little Taller journey, Kendra has continued to find new ways to grow and push herself to be the designer she aspires to be — much like how Pierce Brown continued to persevere as an author.
