Ask Anna: How can I avoid coming across as a master of none?

If you specialise in more than one creative discipline, how can you present your work to clients in a way that does justice to all your skills and isn’t confusing? Here our columnist Anna Higgs has some advice for a jack of all trades

Illustration by Sean McSorley

Dear Anna, 

I do several different things from video direction to illustration, creative and art direction.

How do I split those verticals so clients don’t get confused when looking at my work on social and website? I started splitting them in different accounts and tabs in my website but it would seem that it’s not enough. Seems it should be almost completely separated. ‘Video clients’ don’t even want to know I do illustration (for example). Until I work with them and then I can show them other skills but at first impression they just want a ‘specialist’ – even if I can deliver the same quality work in a lot of cases (not always the case, but very often).

Ferran

Dear Ferran, 

This question is interesting because it touches upon the age-old specialism vs. generalism debate. Is it better to be deeply focused on one area and seek mastery in it? Or, on the other hand, have a toolkit of skills that you can draw on and be a proverbial ‘jack of all trades’?

The answer to that question is not all that straightforward. Thinking in these two groups somewhat misses the seismic changes that have happened in the creative industries in recent years.