Oen is a Distinguished Design Executive at IBM. He's also held titles like Visual Designer, Creative Director, and Design Principal. However, at his core, Oen is a Designer, an Advocate, and an Educator. He's served on several AIGA Boards, is recognized as a FELLOW by AIGA Austin, and has taught at Austin Community College for over 15 years. I met him in 2010 while he was my Portfolio Development Instructor. You can connect with and follow Oen on LinkedIn and see work samples on his website, visualnotepad.org.

Questions for this interview.

• Can you give us a quick summary of all the places you worked before IBM?
• How did you know it was time to leave Y&R and move on to something new?
• How many people do you think you've interviewed at IBM?
• What does someone need to have or need to do to get hired at IBM?
• Is there a portfolio piece or a specific interview moment that has stuck with you until now?
• (Listener Question) What do you think is important to showcase in a portfolio in 2024?
• What's the driving force behind your involvement with education?
• How do you approach failure, and how do you react to it?
• Is the way you process failure influenced by where you grew up?
• What do you think a successful mentorship needs to have?
• What impact does international travel have on your design work?
• What do you think makes a typeface great?

---

If you LIKE what you hear, please subscribe and keep listening. Sharing this episode with someone is the best way to support the podcast. 

If you LOVE what you hear and want to help me keep the interviews coming—consider buying me a coffee on Ko-Fi.

Also, I'm always looking for questions from listeners. If there's a burning question you want to hear answered on the podcast, please email it to me at [email protected].

Follow @studentsofdesignpod on Instagram for updates, episode drops, and behind-the-scenes content.

The music you hear on the podcast is Accident by Timothy Infinite and PUSH !T by Nbhd Nick.

studentsofdesign.simplecast.com