I started my career as most designers my age did, in print. In fact, it was only a few years after I graduated design school that this new-fangled “fad” called the Internet started making its way into people’s homes. I didn’t give a second thought to how this new media made it onto my computer screen, nor did I care. I just thought it was cool.

As a print designer I used to mock the web. Most of the websites I saw were really ugly, and you hardly had any control over what appeared. There were a few limited fonts, badly kerned, mostly drop-shadowed (because you could) and some really low-resolution imagery.

For me, websites were a second thought, usually coming up at the end of an intense print project, with someone saying, “Hey, how can we get our idea into the mainstream media?” We would send our assets out and a web developer would make it happen. Now, through some magical shift in the universe, and the introduction of mobile devices to society, websites and mobile sites are the first thing anybody thinks of when trying to market their product or service.

I wasn’t sure how to handle this transition. In fact I sort of started to panic. I wasn’t trained for this! I didn’t have the first clue how I was going to catch up, or re-train myself and get on this bandwagon. I considered going back to school, but as a full-time working mother of two, it really wasn’t an option at the time.

I tried to rebel. I said to myself “Okay, I’ll tweet and blog, but I’ll only tweet and blog about the latest in printing techniques, or cool letterpress ideas…I’ll show them.” (Who they were I wasn’t sure.) But, to my chagrin, no amount of rebelling was going to stop this train.

So instead I decided to swallow my pride and get on board, and in that small release of control I was so tightly holding on to, I realized that there was a really big, really exciting design opportunity waiting for me. I’m really fortunate to work here at tenfour. Not only am I surrounded by super-smart, super-talented people, but through osmosis and a basic sink-or-swim work ethic, I’m quickly absorbing the skills that will move me to the next phase of my career. They’ve afforded me immeasurable training, and I’ve truly begun to understand and unravel that interactive world that once seemed so mysterious to me.

Just last week I attended the first HOW Interactive Design Conference with my fellow senior designer Jennifer Rouse. When I first signed up I thought I might be in a little over my head—it was that word “interactive” that had me doubting myself. I imagined being in the middle of hundreds of programmers, developers and interactive designers completely geeking out on the latest coding tips and tricks. Yes, there was a little of that, but instead I found myself surrounded by hundreds of designers just like myself, who were now grabbing hold of the zip line that was taking them to the next step in their careers.

It made me realize that interactive design was no longer this daunting mountain that I couldn’t climb. I realized that it moves so fast, and that technology changes so quickly and so often that there are very few “experts” (although we have several here at tenfour!). We’re all just trying to keep up. And the one constant is that I’m still a good designer. It’s just learning new methods and new ways to apply my designs to the technology that’s out there.

I still love print. I love the feel of really good paper under my fingers, the smell of ink and varnish, and the tactile rush I get from unfolding a fabulously designed piece. But I’ve learned that no matter what the media, good design and marketing needs to answer the same questions. Who is your client, what do you want to say about them, what goals are you trying to achieve (Increase sales? Improve customer service? Increase enrollment?). Most importantly, have you met your client’s needs? If I’ve answered those questions successfully, while putting forth a kick-ass design, then my job description really hasn’t changed at all.

I’ll never be a hardcore web coder. But what I can do is understand the technology to the best of my ability, not only so I can make things a little easier on those hardcore coders, but so I can still showcase my design and my vision in the best light, while making a user-friendly and seamless experience for the end user.

And that is all a designer can ask for.

@pontomama