Luckie & Company is looking to add its first UX Designer to its staff. Our UX Designer will be responsible for crafting user experiences that are intuitive to the user, impressive to the client and described as “kick-ass” by your Luckie team members.

Core Duties/Responsibilities:

• Help organize and frame platform capabilities in a meaningful way to the breadth of audience segments who will use it
• Be knowledgeable of content layout and interaction design best practices to facilitate intuitive and effective user engagement
• Harmonize third-party technologies and platform capabilities through good experience design
• Develop and maintain user experience artifacts such as user profiles, sitemaps, task flows, wireframes, basic prototypes, etc.
• Support user research and usability testing
• Help develop marketing material in support of business development
• Work collaboratively and in an agile fashion with other experienced professionals and technologists

Qualifications:

• One to three years of professional experience as an information architect, interaction designer, or experience designer (or similar role)
• Degree in a related field, such as Library Science, Industrial Design, Graphic Design, Human-Computer Interaction, Technical Communications, English, History, Anthropology or Economics
• A basic understanding of the channels that comprise the digital marketing landscape (Web, paid media, social and mobile)
• Ability to visually articulate ideas and create basic prototypes using any number of available tools (Axure, Flash, Omnigraffle, Visio, Dreamweaver, HTML, etc.)
• Proficiency in a variety of office productivity tools, including PowerPoint, Word and Excel
• Visual design skills (e.g., Photoshop), experience with Content Management Systems and visualization of data are a plus

If you’re detail oriented; eager to work with an intimate and multidisciplinary team; and you love barbecue, pigskin and appreciate Southern hospitality, we’d love to hear from you. Submit your resume to melissa.wheeler@luckie.com.

Edward Bowser is Community Manager at Luckie & Company. You can contact him by email or follow him on Twitter.

Luckie & Company, one of the fastest growing agencies in the South, seeks a talented Digital Art Director with four to six years of experience to work in our Birmingham office.

The ideal candidate will have a strong portfolio of interactive and online work focusing on motion graphics, progressive Web design and UX, but will not be limited to just that. Our new Digital Art Director will understand the fundamentals and implications of Web technologies and video. Strong typography skills are a must, along with a BFA or BS in graphic arts backed with advanced Illustrator, Photoshop, and After Effects skills. Our director will have a strong understanding of bleeding edge digital technology and know when and where to use it. Experience with HTML & HTML 5, CSS, Javascript and Flash is preferred but most important is a passion to tell stories though interactive content, motion graphics, and video.

Responsibilities:

• Well-versed in Web best practices, information architecture, and fundamental usability principles.
• Conceptual thinking surrounding branding and campaigns designed for the interactive and motion graphics space
• Work with the collaboration of a Creative Director, Design Director, Writers as well as Information Architects to concept, prototype, and design for the Web
• Work with the teams to concept, create, and execute motion graphic driven campaigns
• Responsible for creating look and feel explorations, concept boards, final execution of a large variety of websites, online content, and rich media applications.
• Strong understanding of Web standards and technologies, including: database, browsers, CMS, (D)HTML, XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, XML, AJAX and SEO implications (this is not a programmer position, but basic knowledge and understanding is preferred)
• Documentation of projects through the development of interactive style guides
• Provide expert guidance to Information Architects, Designers, and Production Artists throughout the life of a project
• Presentation of work both to internal teams as well as clients

Qualifications:

• Minimum four to six years experience as an Interactive Art Director
• Expert in Photoshop and Illustrator
• Good front end development skills
• Strong understanding of Motion Graphics and video (After Effects, Final Cut)
• Video and camera techniques
• Knowledge of FLASH (Knowledge of action scripting a plus)
• Good illustration skills
• Good wireframe and prototyping skills
• Knowledge of PHP and PHP Frameworks
• Ability to demonstrate and execute great usability and Web user experience
• Strong understanding of Web standards and technologies
• Strong understanding of 3-D applications (Cinema 4D, Modo) and Panasonic HVX-200 and Canon DSLR experience a plus

Luckie is an idea-obsessed 140-person agency with offices in Birmingham, San Antonio and Atlanta. Our clients include AT&T, Schick, Little Debbie, Regions Bank,Glaxo Smith Klein, Gulf Power, Asheville Tourism, Alabama Tourism, Bayer Advanced and Chick-fil-A.

If you think you have what it takes, submit your resume to melissa.wheeler@luckie.com.

Edward Bowser is Community Manager at Luckie & Company. You can contact him by email or follow him on Twitter.

Luckie & Company is again expanding its ranks and we’re on the hunt for a brilliant person who can help share our clients’ stories.

If you love research and consider yourself an expert on the latest marketing trends, we’d love for you to become our Director of Brand Planning. The candidate will be our go-to guy or gal for qualitative and quantitative research. Ideal candidates also will provide leadership in the agency’s creative briefing process, identify key customer insights for each creative project and persuasively support those insights with research and trend information.

Our new director will focus on raising the agency’s profile externally via creation of newsletters, speaking engagements at industry events and blogging.

Qualifications

• Minimum six years of high-level brand planning experience
• Degree in marketing, anthropology or psychology
• Must possess extensive knowledge of marketing trends
• Strong leadership skills and researching ability

Interested? Submit your resume to melissa.wheeler@luckie.com.

Edward Bowser is Community Manager at Luckie & Company. You can contact him by email or follow him on Twitter.

As the economic recovery continues its uphill climb, many millennials are bearing the burden. Statistics from various reports average around 18% unemployment for 16-24 year olds and 10% for 25-29 year olds. That’s a harsh reality for the recent college grad who scraped to pay bills in school while dreaming of a million-dollar job after graduation.

I don’t have the solution to the employment crisis but I can share common mistakes some millennial job seekers make when trying to break into the working world.

Observation 1: Proofreading is not a thing of the past
Surely you should proofread your resume, right? Well, apparently not everyone thinks so. I recently received a resume for a Proofreading position at the agency that had several spelling errors. Uh, no thanks. I dismiss candidates with mistake-riddled resumes as not being serious about the position.

The same goes for emails with attached cover letters and resumes. Emails referencing attached documents are fine (although I prefer the text of the cover letter copied into the email). Just don’t use slang, misspellings, or ramble. Keep in mind that this information represents you and your work.

Observation 2:  Treat all tools with respect
Tools to aid your job search are endless: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, etc. It’s a great idea for a candidate to reference a blog or Twitter feed to show his or her writing skills but remember to treat those spaces with the same planning and preparation you would in a job interview. Those outlets are a representation of you – if your Facebook or Twitter feeds feature scantily clad or drunken pics and captions with foul language, that’s how you’ll be perceived.

And you might want to ditch that partyguy@gmail.com email account and goofy voice mail message while you’re at it. Answer every phone call as if it is the final stage of an interview. Always carry yourself just as you would in a job interview, even if you think no one is watching.

Observation 3: Job seeking is your job, not mine
I’m dumbfounded at the number of emails and voice mails I get each week that follow this exact pattern:

“Hi, this is Sam Smith. I’m a recent college graduate looking for a position with your agency. Can you call me and tell me if you have a job open? Call me at 123-4567.”

Such messages show a lack of initiative. Follow our blog, check our website – do some homework. I love candidates who make an effort to tailor their resume to a specific job position and tell us how their skills will benefit the agency.

Observation 4:  Congratulations, you’ve got an interview – don’t blow it
Please avoid these interview faux pas:

• Ladies, if you wear a skirt or dress, test it while sitting down – make sure it’s not too short. And test your top while you’re at it, too.
• Don’t chew gum.
• Don’t answer calls or text while you’re interviewing.
• Don’t tell me you want to work for our company because our website is cool – tell me something about specific work we’ve done for a client. Do your homework.

Most importantly, ask questions. I’ll remember your interview better than the 15 others I conducted that day if you’re engaging.

Some of these tips may seem obvious, but job seekers continue to be plagued by them. Competition is fierce, even for entry-level positions.  I can’t solve the economic problems overnight (or ever) but I can try to help you avoid being your own worst obstacle.

Melissa Wheeler is Human Resources Director at Luckie & Company. You can contact her by email.

Photo credit: GangPlank HQ via Flickr