Jose Andrade

The short story timeline starts at age 5 and an early passion for crayons or anything that would make a mark. That only evolved as I grew older, into pastels, pen and ink, even spray paint on the uptown #2 line. During my stint in the United States Army, I even managed to escape any of the crappy details simply because of my creative abilities (those non-commissioned officers sure do love their shields and tattoos). During what they called a “split-option” program, I was able to attend Pratt Institute in Brooklyn New York while still serving my soldierly duty. Oddly enough, the discipline of the Army adequately prepared me for the discipline of commercial art. I was lucky enough to have seasoned and passionate professors that valued the strength of a deadline as much as they valued the strength of the projects themselves.

After graduating and completing my Army stint in 1986, I was able to land a pre-press job in the then land of pre-press, Carlstadt New Jersey. It was there where I would get my hands one of the first Macintosh IIFX off the line. Yes I was awed by the whopping 40 MHz, 128 MB of RAM, 160 MB hard drive and lets’ not forget the $9,000 price ticket at the time. It’s no wonder the company I worked for at the time literally had a velvet rope around it. I managed to get pretty schooled at Aldus Freehand and ReadySetGo 2.0 which were pretty sophisticated programs at the time. It would be the start of new path to channel my passion for the creative, and my schooling with what I knew, was clearly the future.

The year was 1996 and by then I had Photoshop, Quark, and Illustrator solidly under my belt. Add to that early inceptions into Filemaker Pro, server systems, networking, and business management classes and I was ready for the big agency. I would land a six-year tenure at the prestigious Foote, Cone & Belding capping a role as Studio Manager. I was lucky enough to work among a slew of some of the greatest professionals in the industry. Their vision and passion mirrored and fueled my own. I followed their pioneering/entrepreneurial spirit and immersed myself into the new and growing media of the time. Although yes I do mean the web, let’s not forget that there were nearline technologies following suit such as CD authoring, multimedia. photography, collaborative network environments to name a few.

So when the dot coms bombed, and many thought we were seeing the end of the web, what we were really seeing was a new beginning that would combine all this new media as well as traditional media into the force it’s shaping up to be today.

Sorry, I realize I peppered the history of new media as I see it, but frankly it follows my own evolution in the landscape of advertising and design communication. It is this organic, evolutionary process, that mirrors my approach in managing divisions or agencies to be as flexible in all directions and ensure the right mix of people, processes, capabilities, and technologies.