"New Agency": anyone and everyone

Community, social networking, travel and opportunity were the words which described my personal interests and lifestyle until March 2020.
Then, the outbreak of COVID-19 happened affecting not only my own lifestyle but causing a global change. Considering the term "critical incident" describing "[…] an event which made you stop and think or one that raised questions for you. […] It is an incident which in some way has had a significant impact on your personal and professional learning” portrays the outbreak of this pandemic completely.
Thinking back, in the beginning of this year I saw DPS as the perfect opportunity to gather experiences worldwide, to develop my skills and grow personally. I felt excited and curious to get out in the world learning from professionals, experiencing different cultures and building a social and professional network. The fear of failing, of rejection and the stress were only a small part alongside my curiosity and excitement. I felt lucky to have one of the most interesting years of my life right ahead of me. However, I experienced a "critical incident" known as coronavirus which changed my point of view completely. My thoughts were turned around and instead of feeling lucky and excited I felt scared and stressed. As everyone else I didn't know what would happen, if I still would continue with my DPS year or if I would go straight into third year. I didn't see the variety of opportunities any longer. Yet, I started applying for internships, attended competitions and found my luck within the crisis. I got an internship at Mercato Metropolitano. From that moment on, I started looking at the world differently again. I got my excitement and curiosity back and started looking forward to this year. I started looking around me and realised that this difficult situation had the effect on people to find new solutions to everyday's lives tasks.

Looking at the question "What New Agency comes from a complete global reset?" I am the opinion that the term "new agency" can stand for anyone and everyone. It could stand for all the businesses which changed their structures from employees coming to the offices to sending them into home office. It could stand for all online meetings to keep communicating with each other. But most importantly, I think that, "new agency" is targeting us individuals as everyone had to change and adjust their lifestyles. I realised that my main interests, which I mentioned in the beginning, namely socialising, travelling and community, don't exist in the way they did before the crisis anymore. Even though I miss my "old lifestyle", being able to enjoy my personal freedom, seeing friends and going out, experiencing life in the pandemic shows me how flexible our society is and that with each negative comes a positive. For example, due to the lockdown, less emissions were caused helping the environment. Additionally, after the first wave hit Europe and events were cancelled, people realised that their lives have actually been stressful before the crisis, as there was always something happening. Because of lockdown, I started making time for myself by reading books which I hadn't in a while as I was constantly busy with seeing people and being on the run.​

(Detail of Celebration, 1997 by Sarkasi Said)

Interning at Mercato Metropolitano I got insights into their business strategies and how they adjusted to the constantly changing situation. Thinking about it now, I believe that by working for them in the time period from September to December 2020, I was able to learn more than I could have expected. I experienced the reopening after the first lockdown, their responses to constantly changing restrictions as well as the second lockdown. I am impressed and fascinated by their fast past work and feel lucky to be a part of such a forward thinking and hard working team of problem solver. They managed to turn their whole sustainable food market into a huge restaurant, offering table service, so that the community would still be able to enjoy their drinks and food. This happened within a day.
Whilst the Market sites were still open I was researching app developer thinking about how to expand community culture and convey Mercato's beliefs in the future. As soon as the announcement of the second lockdown happened, MM opened an online grocery, offering people the change to get food delivered home. All those changes do usually happen within years but I feel lucky that I experienced them within a couple months.
Mercato Metropolitano is just one example but a lot of businesses became in my opinion "new agencies" changing their services and adjusting them to new situations.

Another internship I am currently attending is requiring work remotely. I was looking for some part time internships which I could do alongside Mercato Metropolitano as it started of as only a part time internship. I think that the fact, that home office became more common and has a lot of positive sides to it, was the reason why my boss offered remote work. This happened to be a great solution for me, not only as it is possible to plan my own hours, but also as it introduced me to home office. In the beginning I was quite concerned about staying home and working eight hours on my desk only communicating over Zoom, email and calls with my boss as I didn't know the what she expected me to do. I realised that in the start, logging into social media accounts and their website and starting to post and promote activities, was a challenge for me because I had to figure everything out by myself. I think it would have been easier to come to the office and being able to learn the different softwares by her showing me. I also didn't know if I would meet her expectations. Nevertheless, by working alone, I understood how independent I am and by working for a longer period of time for her, I realised that communicating exclusively over the internet works very well.

(Isolation Communication, 2011 by Charles Luna)

Anne Nestler
BA (Hons) Graphic and Media Design
@annes_graphics