Tony Lamadora

“We are designers, not free trial software.” Applied for a design role today. Instead of checking my portfolio (which already has my hard work), the reply I got was: “Send me a free demo logo.” Seriously? This is where the problem starts. 👉 If you don’t trust my portfolio, why ask me to apply? 👉 If you want a logo, hire me — don’t test me for free. Every line, every color, every logo takes hours of thinking and years of practice. It’s not a hobby, it’s a skill. And when someone treats it like a free sample, it doesn’t just insult one designer — it insults the whole community. I’m tired of hearing “yeh bas ek demo hai.” No. My time and creativity are not baseless demos. #stopfreework #freepalestine

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Communication in Design: It’s About Connecting A great idea is only as powerful as its ability to be understood. As a brand strategist and designer, my goal is simple: to bridge the gap between creativity and clarity. I’ve always believed design is a conversation—a dialogue between the brand and its audience. Without clear communication, even the best ideas can fall flat. My work is about ensuring the stories we tell through design are understood and resonate with clients, stakeholders, and consumers. From concept to execution, I translate creative visions into design systems that speak clearly, powerfully, and authentically. Whether through packaging, branding, or marketing materials, every element is crafted with intent. I ensure the message is clear, the vision is aligned, and the audience connects. Effective Communication in Design Means: • Crafting simple, clear, and engaging messages • Ensuring consistent brand voice across touchpoints • Making complex ideas easy to understand • Building strong connections between brands and their audience Good design speaks, but great design sparks conversations, builds trust, and drives action. It’s about creating a dialogue that leads to connection. Design that speaks. Because I do too. 👉 Explore my work at bradlovesorange.com to see how I help brands communicate more effectively through design. #DesignCommunication #CreativeLeadership #BrandKisner #BrandStrategy #BrandStorytelling #VisualIdentity #ClearCommunication #DesignThatSpeaks

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From Sketchpad to Screen: The Design Process Unveiled Every great brand identity starts with a solid process. It's not magic, but a structured approach that ensures strategic outcomes. I often start with research, then sketching. What's one non-negotiable step in your design process? Share below! #DesignProcess #BrandIdentityDesign #CreativeWorkflow #StrategicDesign

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Reviewing a guidelines document for a new client. It’s not always overhauling something, but making meaningful change and practical use cases for design!

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Most designers are just making things pretty and calling it branding. Real brand strategy digs into why you exist, who you serve, and what makes you different. ❗The pretty part comes last. If your brand doesn't have that foundation, you're just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. 

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Most design conversations still focus on personas and motivation. What working in collections has taught me is that neither matters much if you don’t design for emotional state as well. People don’t avoid action because they’re lazy or have bad intentions. They avoid it because the first step feels heavy. It’s like telling an overweight person to “just hit the gym”. You think they’ve never thought of that? Stress, avoidance, confusion, being overwhelmed…  these matter more than just their age or whatever segment we’ve internally filed them into. So instead of asking “who’s this user?”, the more important question is: “how are they likely feeling right now?” Asking this simple question led to a big shift in how we redesigned our payment plan experience at InDebted. We focused less on motivating people, and more on helping them make a start to clearing off their debt. Shorter paths, a simpler UI and clear next steps. Reducing friction to help people in debt make early wins that build momentum and confidence. As a designer, a lot of this starts as intuition. What’s been powerful is seeing that intuition show up in the data, because the results actually blew me away: People paid off their debt up to 8.2x faster with the new journeys I designed 🤯 My takeaway: when the goal is easy to see, it feels achievable, and people are much more likely to commit.  Once momentum kicks in, behaviour changes naturally. P.S. If you’re interested in more insights around engagement patterns and behavioural economics, the 2026 Collections Playbook is worth a read. Link in the comments 👇

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👉 I’ve been seeing a lot of posts lately along the lines of:  “Graphic designers are NOT motion designers, video editors, illustrators, photographers, etc. Employers need to stop asking them to be.” I get where that frustration comes from, but I think this sentiment can come across as rigid. Some of the most rewarding moments in my career have been when I've stepped outside the “graphic designer” box and tried my hand at motion, 3D, video, and roles I hadn’t touched before. These moments expand my skillset and show me new directions my career could take. That said, boundaries matter. Clear communication around workload, timelines, and quality expectations will mean the difference between healthy growth and burnout. To me, saying “I don’t do that, I’m just a graphic designer” misses the nuance. I like to frame it as: “I’d love to explore that, but here’s what I need to make it successful.” Creativity thrives at the edges of our comfort zones, and being trusted with tasks outside of the job description can be a great opportunity. 👈 💞 😎

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With so many rebrand ‘fails’ happening lately, it had me thinking about what the problem might be… Seems all too often the over-simplification, which I’m typically all for, tends to remove too much of the soul that existed in these brands. Clean and modern or minimal and accessible find their way into the creative brief all too often and hold far too much weight in the design execution. The updated direction should feel fresh and new, but at the same time it can’t alienate those who have held that brand close to their heart for years.

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How do you make your design work harder to support your strategy? It's easy to jump right into colors and images when you think about brand personality, but it should really be the personality that drives the visual choices. Defining a good brand personality means defining emotional and human qualities that balance appealing to your audience and separating you from your competition, while still feeling authentic to your company. It draws a direct line between your strategic goals and your visual system. It establishes metrics to measure ideas against. It gives you a rubric for making creative choices. - - - - - Let's figure out your brand's personality. https://lnkd.in/e4Prph-k

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An important read for design managers, mentors, team leads, designers and anyone responsible for creative energy. This book quietly messes with your head. In a good way. “Creative Confidence” by Tom Kelley & David Kelley founders IDEO and Published by William Collins Books isn’t heavy. No big words. No fancy theories. It’s one of the books I picked up very early in my design career. Not as a designer, but as a design manager and that context matters. Because as a manager, you don’t just manage timelines and outputs. - You protect curiosity. - You create safety to try. - You make space for bad ideas to slowly become good ones. This book shaped how I worked with designers. How I gave feedback. How I learned to judge ideas less and people more gently. At its core, the book carries a simple reminder: Creativity is not for “talented people”. It’s for anyone willing to try. An important read for design managers, mentors, team leads, and anyone responsible for creative energy. Sometimes the real work is not designing. It’s protecting confidence. Save & Share #CreativeConfidence #DesignManagement #DesignLeadership #CreativeMentorship #DesignThinking #BooksForDesigners

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Will AI take our design jobs? Maybe? Someday? But it also makes us so much more versatile as designers to work with less obstacles. Much like the invention of GPS gave me more confidence to drive somewhere I'd never been (shout out to the Mapquest generation), chat GPT has helped me tackle design tasks I never would have even attempted before. In the past, when asked to do something we didn't know how to do, we could just say "we don't do that". Now we really have no excuse to say “we don’t do that” anymore, because we literally have a one on one teacher right in our pockets. I’ve spent countless hours of my design career troubleshooting issues, or trying to figure out how to do something in Adobe/design programs by watching long winded YouTube videos and reading articles/forums that never seem to get to the point, nor fix the issue. Now I just take a screen shot of Figma or After Effects or Premier or whatever program is giving me an issue. I put the photo it into chat GPT and ask my question. It’s helped me figure out in minutes how to fix something that would have taken me hours in the past. It's even helped me write expression code in After Effects in just a few minutes (something I was always too intimidated to even attempt before). Yes, AI is scary to us designers, and yes I know it's far from perfect. But for me personally, this aspect of chat GPT has had a big benefit on my work flow. We hear a lot about the negatives of AI, and I often echo that sentiment, but I'm curious to hear some of the other positives the rest of you are seeing as designers.

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Why is two designers better than one? At Alkemis Design, you’re not getting one perspective...you’re getting two. Two designers making decisions. Two sets of experience. Two creative minds solving problems. That means double the knowledge, double the attention to detail, and double the intention behind every choice. And the truth is… we genuinely enjoy working through these projects together. That collaboration shows up in the final result. Because when you have a team that means business and loves what they do, the space reflects it! Do you think creative work is stronger solo or as a team?

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Every designer has seen this message. A long list of services. Big expectations. Tight timeline. And then… $200 budget. This isn’t an opportunity. It’s a red flag. Why you should say no to this kind of offer It devalues your time and thinking. It turns strategy work into rushed execution. It sets you up for endless revisions. It teaches clients that design is cheap labor. Good branding isn’t a checklist. It’s research, decisions, systems, and responsibility. When the scope is huge and the budget is tiny, one of two things happens: You burn out. Or the work suffers. Both hurt you. Protect your process. Price your thinking. Say no to projects that don’t respect the work. The right clients don’t ask for everything. They ask what matters most. #logodesign #designerlife #dailydesign

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I just saw three posts in a row that started with the words "Most [insert profession] do [this thing]." Is LinkedIn just bots talking to each other at this stage? Humans are much more interesting.

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STOP treating designers like tools instead of partners. If you bring a designer in after all decisions are made, you’re already too late. Designers should be part of the conversation, not the execution only. We ask questions you didn’t think of. We see gaps before they cost you money. Collaboration creates stronger brands. Commands create average ones. Choose partnership over micromanagement. #qk #graphicdesigners #creativedirection #branding #businessgrowth

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Terminal Fluency: As AI becomes more central to Designer workflows, I’ve been seeing more questions about whether the terminal is still worth learning. I think it is, terminal is core skill that compounds and unlocks next-level control over agents. Make terminal your second brain with this tmux + vim cheatsheet (or just get started) and keep your hands on the keyboard. https://lnkd.in/eV5bAFhF

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One thing I’ve noticed in design: Many companies think they’re paying for senior expertise, but the actual work gets delegated internally. That’s just how agency structures work. The alternative is simple—work directly with the person doing the thinking and the designing. Both models have value. But transparency about who does the work matters What’s been your experience?

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