Remix Week 6: Project Ideation and Execution
Plus, specific example projects for different careers
Now in Week 6, we’ll get into the culmination of this challenge. Ultimately, this is what the challenge has been leading up to: a project that you can include on your LinkedIn, resume, and/or portfolio. The project should not only teach you about your chosen career(s), it should also be something that you can reference with new connections and in interviews. It should be that specific example you can bring up when you get asked “tell me about a time you got out of your comfort zone” or “tell me about a time when things didn’t go your way.” Whatever your project may be, and however it turns out, there will be an outcome that you can either talk about or learn from, or, hopefully, both.
Here’s what your project should ultimately entail:
It can be completed within 4-6 weeks. It’s not realistic to expect a project of any significance to be completed within a week or two — that’s part of why I’ve structured this challenge to end relatively early in the summer, so that most students are able to hammer out the project before they get back onto campus in the fall.
It should be congruent with at least one of your career paths. The number one objective of this project is to build evidence of your identity as a professional or a musician. Your project should be relevant to that and be able to support your identity. For example, if your ideal career is being a Session Musician, why would you toil over a project in Excel? Make it make sense.
You should have a measurable outcome to associate with the project. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the project can’t fail - it is genuinely okay if it does, and especially for some careers as a Music Maker or in Live Music, this happens a lot. That’s okay. As long as you learn from it, that’s still a big win. Figure out what the attempt looks like, and figure out what the success looks like. If you don’t get to success, no worries, but you should still have the measurable attempt.
Out of the 34 different careers available, as I’ve established in the career guide, there are a variety of different ideas for projects in this sphere. Some of the more creative ones will be more straightforward, but I’ll give you some prompts and ideation exercises to help you along to figure out what project speaks to you the most.
Consider your deepest, most niche interests. Everyone has some random thing in this industry that they find particularly interesting. For me, it’s the money in the business. For others, it’s artist rights, AI (using it or vehemently against it), marketing trends, merch, sound mixing, or whatever else. If you find yourself interested in multiple things, try combining two into a single topic, i.e. marketing and merch as separate topics, but together could be “Marketing Best Pratices for Selling Merch on the Road.” Plus, if you find something hyper-niche to you, it will keep you more invested in the project from a place of natural curiosity.
Serve your friends (or artists you like). Ask your friends or local artists to see if they need help with anything that aligns with your career(s). This could be help selling merch, making flyers for a show, or marketing. Just ask around!
Optimize a process or solve a problem. All around you, there’s probably some process that you see that’s not quite as efficient as it could be. Maybe it’s a project within an extracurricular organization or at your internship. Figure out how that process is performing now, and then after you optimize it, figure out how much you’ve improved it.
Think about day-to-day activities of your ideal career(s). If you want your project to be congruent with your ideal career, the best way to do that is by doing things you might do in that ideal career. For example, if your ideal career is to work as a graphic designer, maybe you could design an alternate vinyl cover for your favorite album with a mockup of a more decorated vinyl disc.
Add constraints to a more “typical” project. This can often be a regular experience in an actual job, where you’re given a budget to pull off an event, or pay an influencer to market an album, etc. Figure out something that maybe you’ve already done and then apply some constraints to it. For example, “can I book a 3-band show without paying out a dollar of my own money?" This doesn’t mean you don’t pay talent, but it means you opt for a house show instead of a venue to keep costs low, or pay talent off of only ticket sales rather than a guarantee. It encourages you to get creative and makes for a good story.
Deliverables
Write down at least 5 ideas for projects you can do within the next 4-6 weeks. Make sure they align with your career(s).
Create a timeline with progress markers for your project, i.e. if you’re booking a show for a project over 4 weeks, you should have the venue booked by the end of week 1, talent booked by the end of week 2, etc.
Determine if you’d like to do 1 or 2 projects for each of your careers (if you have two already). I won’t hold it against you if you only do one, and I’d rather you are able to complete one project than attempt two. Use your judgment here.
Hopefully, by now, you’ve also had your Networking Conversation from Week 5, or at least have it scheduled. Use those learnings to fuel this project, too. See you next week!
For my Pros this week, I’ll be breaking down projects you can do for this challenge, vaguely categorized within the 5 career paths.