Happy 2020 and WELCOME to...

Ranchero on Record

An intimate look behind the scenes and into the brains of the Rancheros at GhostRanch.

Portrait by Denver Ranchero Breece Justice. Her talents are just as cool as her name.

Ranchero on Record: Allie Ro Wilson (Creative Director)

Our very own A-Ro(d)

Allie's artistic journey is a classic story of kids' greeting card illustrator to Creative Director of The Ranch. (Relatable, right?)

From discussing freelance work and delivering client "asks" to managing multiple projects (and people!) at once, our convo was chock-full of career-guiding advice nuggets (the Wendy's kind, not McD's). 

I've made a few highlights below but the biggest "ah-ha" in developing client communication, as well explaining "Presentation Thinking", deserved a page of its own on the blog. 

We examined the pillars that guide her day-to-day "design management" (seriously, the gal knows how to turn a phrase).

We talked building trust with clients and understanding their language.

We laughed about her dog (Cooks!) who kept coming into the Zoom screen, ready for dinnertime.

But you'll have to read for yourself Allie's biggest learning points since becoming a Ranchero. 

If you're on this newsletter list, we already know you're interested. Have a look and LISTEN UP. 

Quotables:

"The more that you listen, you start to listen well enough that you can read between the lines—where it’s not necessarily about deeply understanding the content, but understanding what parts of that content are the most important things for people to walk away with."

Noodle Doodles

“Just sketch.” - Keeping up creative fuel

When the task-queue seems long and the spontaneity starts to feel sporadic, how does Allie keep the creative juices a-flowin?

While her husband Zach, a music-type-creative, sits at the table creating a 10-20 second music clip, she’ll illustrate an accompanying scene on a loop. 

The "Stuff Worth Pinning to the Fridge" section

These are a few of her favorite things...

• Allie's Daily Doodle Project (featuring various styles of self-portraits) has got to be the best "selfie" content I've seen. 

• In her first "directorial" role, Todd Henry's Herding Tigers: Be the Leader that Creative People Need, was go-to reading. 
• "To challenge your team, you need to help people see those aspects of their abilities to which they are blind." -Todd Henry

• Last year, Allie was invited to her Savannah College of Art & Design alma mater to speak at SCAD Embrace, a diversity and inclusion conference to inspire young creative minds. We’re still very proud and you can see her cute headshot HERE.

• Allie mentions that even picking up on buzzwords like "marketecture" from B2B client calls has been enormously useful in understanding the industry and creating content.
• (If you're still thinking "marketecture" is some new kind of charcuterie, read up).  

• Visual storyteller Christoph Niemann and his "Abstract Sunday" series.
• "Such an inspiration, he uses legit ANYTHING to create a sketch and tell a story...The beauty of it is that it isn't anything time consuming, it's about finding a story in places where you would least expect them." -Allie