Creative Protege - your thoughts on this?

thomashodgson

Senior Member
A recruitment consultant pointed me towards Creative Protege Ltd today and I thought I'd seek a few opinions on it. Basically they are a company who you pay to register with, then they sort out work experience for you to do at home.

I'm not really sure what to make of it! Anyone heard of it or better yet done it!?
 
So you pay someone else to get you unpaid work with a third party, and you work from home so you don't get the benefits of experiencing the studio environment?

They also spell their own company name inconsistently (both with and without the diacritics). Seems altogether pretty crap to me.
 
upon reading all the special text on that site.. i would avoid it like the plague...
 
Hi guys,

I'm Alex, a client of Creative Protege, I write and submit the briefs from my studio for the graduates to work on.

The idea of this project, is to give recent creative graduates the excellent opportunity
to work on live-briefs, submitted by some of the top creative agencies in the UK.

As a Graphic Designer myself, I know how difficult it is to get your book and your name seen by an agency you'd like to work for. This project can give you the opportunity to get noticed, whilst showing off your talent, tailored to their specifications.

If your work is used by the agency, you will be given creative credit for it (extremely important for your portfolio), and even if your work is not used this time, you will gain valuable feedback from the agency about how you did or how you could improve! perfect!

It's a reasonably new project, but already has the likes of Ripe Design on-board.

Check the Creative Protege website, and their page on Facebook, and you'll see some of the designers that have joined.. you'll even see me on there :D

I hope that has helped you a bit.

Keep on designing...

Alex
 
I am currently with Creative Protege and i think it's a great way of gaining work experience. You get to work on some great projects and in your own time. If you want to work on your portfolio or just gain experience i would recommend joining. Seems as though the other reviews are from people who have no experience from Creative Protege. My experience has been a very pleasurable one.
 
When I posted about working for free this website was one of the ones that I was thinking about that prey on graduates. Having had a good look at the website, I feel that there are some things that may be of some benefit to graduates looking for projects and placements. Offering career advice and tips is worthwhile but you can find this advice freely available anywhere on the net. If the site acts as a portal for graduates then fine.

What I don't agree with is charging for graduates to register. That is exploitation and is preying on the hopes of any potential candidate. Having seen that they have over 15 years experience with HR and recruitment why can't they charge as most of recruitment agencies do, where the freelancer is paid an hourly rate by the recruitment agency who charge a higher rate to their client to cover their costs. It seems to me that there is no substance behind Creative Protege's promises and they are just trying to get rich off someone else's back. They should change their business model if they want to make it work. No up front charges to register, no false promises.

The principle of representing graduates and showcasing talent is essential, there are limited opportunities out there. Contests and showcases like Computer Arts are more beneficial. If Creative Protege are going to do the legwork for graduates, all well and good, but don't charge to register.
 
At the moment, recruitment agencies dont want to speak to graduates at the moment because there is very little work out there and they would rather speak to people that they are more likely to get a placement out of. There aren't many companies out there that i would be happy sending a grad to for freelance work either unless they were top notch.

Its a tough time for everyone at the moment and companies dont like paying recruitment fees for juniors when they can just put an advert out themselves (although they will receive over 100 CVs). The problem comes when there are over 700,000 people studying a design course at the moment and 6500 graduate design jobs. The ones with the experience will always get the job first as they are tried and tested.

Creative Protege charge because there is a demand for help on these services and it takes a lot of time which cant be given away for free. The biggest reason we use Creative Protege is because grads get them as an employer on their CV whilst they are looking for work / earning a living and this makes them 100% more placeable than someone who has self made briefs for his / her mate.
 
lol I'm not spam! how dare you!

My friend at CP heard about this thread, and wanted me to give my opinion on it.
It just seemed a shame that it was getting slated, when I would have relished the opportunity for something like this a year ago.

If it's not for you, then that's fine, but I would suggest reading about it first.

Take it easy

Alex
 
I gladly stand corrected... but i'm sure that you can see where I thought it would be spam (with the same message from 2 different new 1 post users)... I do sincerely apologise Alex :)
 
hey guys, was just reading though all your thoughts on this post as i have just got a call from this company..i agree with the regestraion fee thing, i dont think that 50 pounds for 3 months is really fair to charge a graduate that has NO money! so does anyone have any other ideas on getting experience like this with out being charged???
 
Hi,
I work for Creative Protege and would like to set the record straight on a few points.

Firstly, The hours of personal service that go into each graduate that register with us has been proven to justify the fee of £50, with the results of a recent online survey of registered users saying that the fee was a low cost investment and they would quite happily recommend us to friends.

Secondly, we are a not-for-profit company which aims to help graduates improve their CV and portfolio, enabling them to become more appealing and capable candidates for a career in design.

Thirdly, we offer a 100% money back guarantee if any graduate is not satisfied with the service they receive.

People may be as skeptical as they like, accuse us of spreading spam and trying to fleece people for money; but I can assure you, all these accusations are false.
 
Button said:
lol I'm not spam! how dare you!

My friend at CP heard about this thread, and wanted me to give my opinion on it.
It just seemed a shame that it was getting slated, when I would have relished the opportunity for something like this a year ago.

If it's not for you, then that's fine, but I would suggest reading about it first.

Take it easy

Alex

Apologies Button. We have had a lot spam lately so I think we're all a bit more judgmental of newcomers.

Welcome to the forum all of you!

Regarding Creative Protege I don't think it's such a bad idea at all. It could be a good way of gaining some real commercial experience for people wanting to break in to the industry. And I think the fee is reasonable considering that people take time out to give you feedback and constructive criticism.

Thanks,
Soren
 
Creative Protege said:
People may be as skeptical as they like, accuse us of spreading spam and trying to fleece people for money; but I can assure you, all these accusations are false.

Welcome to the forums Creative Protege, nice of you to join and defend the site and what CP does.

With regards to spam that was simply directed at the Private Messages that were sent to forum members, I think posting some more information about the company and what it aims to achieve in this thread is far more beneficial for everyone :up:

Thanks,
Greg
 
i heard that...

if it looks like sh*t, smells like sh*t, and if you are brave enough... tastes like sh*t... it's most likely sh*t.

so, imho, i wouldn't trust it.
 
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