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Lynda Weinman: After my informative chat with Ric, I caught a cab across town and headed
to the Empire State Building to meet with Debbie
Milman, the current president of the National Board of AIGA.
She is a dynamic force in brand design, and also hosts a fantastic podcast on all
things design-related, called Design Matters. I wanted to talk with Debbie about her personal
experiences, and how she got involved with the organization, and what she
thought the value a professional association could provide to its members.
Also, as a fellow board member, I was curious to hear her ideas and goals for her
term as AIGA's national board president. What drew you to AIGA and what keeps you so
involved? Debbie Millman: I am a very social person,
and I love being connected to other people, and I
felt that AIGA was the best organization of like-minded people that I could
learn from and be inspired by. And so I always, throughout my entire career,
had the aspirations to be part of the organization. But very early on in my
career I didn't feel worthy, or that I could contribute anything, and didn't really
know what I was doing, and not that that much has changed now,
but I think with age comes a certain amount of courage.
And so because I'm so aware of that feeling and because I'm so aware of that
need to be able to help others, I'm very involved in trying to give other people
that boost up that they feel that they might need.
And so for the last five years or so I've been very involved with all the
local chapters. So I visit the local chapters, and I talk
to anybody that'll listen about AIGA and the value that the organization brings
to inspire community and to inspire connectedness.
Lynda: As President of the Board, what are your goals for your tenure?
Debbie: I have three big goals. The first is what I call the Connectivity
Initiative. So that comes directly out of what I just
talked about, in terms of really being able to connect what the local chapters
are doing to the entire organization. Over the course of the last
five years, and all of the visits that I made to the local chapters,
I was constantly amazed by the level of energy, by the level of programming, by
the level of output, by the level of creativity; it was just incredible!
And I felt, as I went from chapter to chapter, it was sort of one best-kept
secret after another, where there was no way to announce all of the
extraordinary efforts that were being made to all the other chapters and all the
other members, that there should be a way for us to be able to capitalize on all
of this collective inspiration. And so part of what I'm trying to do now is
provide a way for all of the local chapters to feel that they are really part
of one big movement. And so that's part of the AIGA Connect Initiative
on Twitter and on Facebook, and its social media is so wonderful for this
type of sharing. So the Connectivity Initiative is the first.
The second is what I'm calling the Inclusivity Initiative, because part of what
I first experienced, and it might have just been my own lack of self-esteem,
but part of what I experienced when I first joined was a real fear that I
wasn't good enough or smart enough, and I felt, probably of my own making,
excluded from things. But because I think that that's something
pretty universal, and people feel just in general about things, and it has nothing
to do with AIGA, but just really human nature,
I want people to feel very, very welcome. I want them to feel very accepted.
I want to encourage people from all different disciplines.
This is not just a print design organization. This is about every type of design:
design, cultural anthropology, behavioral psychology and every discipline under
the sun of design, whether it's online, offline, books, print; everything can
be accepted and admired and respected it within our organization.
So that's the Inclusivity Initiative. And then the third is to really provide a
strong support of our Mandate, the AIGA Mandate, which is about getting more
information out to members, providing better membership benefits, providing
ways to communicate and include all areas of what we're doing for everyone;
so those three things: Connectivity, Inclusivity, and the Mandate.
Lynda: I am glad that I am on the board with you being the president, because those are
fantastic initiatives. Lynda: They are really exciting. Debbie: Thank
you! Debbie: Well, they are big and they are lofty,
but I also think they are grounded in reality, and I think they are also grounded
in what people are really asking for now, and what they expect and demand of an
organization. We're 20,000 members.
We should be able to feel that it's small enough and yet big enough to do
really big things.