“Good At” is a recruiting & freelance platform specializing in advertising, marketing and design. A “one-stop store” for personnel consulting and headhunting, freelance (contract) placement and inspiration in the form of a magazine. Patrik Sünwoldt is the founder and head of the company and pursues the goal of helping people and companies to develop their potential. We had the pleasure of talking to him about “Crossroads”.
1. Patrik, with Good At (good.at) you have created a platform that acts as a connecting element between clients and contractors, between need and demand. How did the idea for this project come about and what motivated you to start your own business?
I've always been very freedom-loving and have had the desire to have my own company in the back of my mind my whole life. I got into the whole recruiting thing by chance - I'm actually an art/creative director and worked in advertising for a long time. At some point, I wanted to freelance again and found myself at a recruitment consultancy for creative professionals. The managing director at the time asked me if I would like to support her in the recruitment consultancy on the side - she thought I could do it quite well. And she was right 😉
I really enjoyed it right from the start, and then I simply did things step by step that I would have wished for myself as a young creative. These conversations at eye level with someone who has been doing the job for a long time. Or from the client's point of view: every agency has its ten favorite freelancers on the Excel list, and if no one is there or doesn't have the time, then the big ask around starts. This gave rise to the idea for the freelance platform, for example: we simply merged all the Excel lists of all the agencies, and now you can draw from a pool of over 500 specialists - spread all over Austria. At the same time, I wanted to connect the “bubbles” of Graz, Vienna, Linz and Salzburg more closely, because there are great people and demand everywhere - but relatively few cross-connections.
2. You're a bit of a “truffle hog” when it comes to discovering potential in people and then bringing them together with the right people or putting them in the right positions. What puts you on the right track when “searching for potential”?
To be honest, it's mainly intuition - a mixture of feeling and experience. We creatives in particular often don't need much - simply hearing that something is good, sharpening it up a bit here, putting more focus on it there - and that's usually enough. However, this type of conversation is rare for all of us: In our private lives, we usually lack the expertise, and in a professional context, unfortunately, we often lack the time or sometimes the goodwill.
Above a certain professional level in particular, this neutral and sympathetic exchange is very rare. And that's exactly what we offer on a department-specific basis. Ulrich does the same thing I do, in his own way, with the consultants and project managers, Julia with the marketing department and Renée with the designers. The feedback we get is really nice, and I'm personally very grateful to have found something that I enjoy almost as much as working creatively. Although there's no lack of constantly developing this brand and the products...I can let off steam endlessly and I put my heart and soul into it. There's a lot more to come! 😉
3. One of your theses is that in a world in which the outside is constantly changing, stability must come from within. That sounds logical, but challenging. Do you have any experience of how to get to this point?
Yes, I first really realized this during the first lockdown, when everything changed from one day to the next. The world was turned upside down, I found myself very much thrown back on myself. Since then, we've all been forced more and more into reflection. What is it all about? What are our values? What do I actually want personally? However, the question “What am I passionate about?” is often rather paralyzing for many people. The question “What am I good at?” (which is why the company is also called “Good At”. The fact that the URL www.good.at was still free is of course the cherry on the cake 🙂 So the question of what you're good at is a bit more low-threshold - and that's the first step towards looking inwards again and again. A good start to such a process.
Viktor Frankl says: "There is a space between stimulus and reaction. In this space lies our power to choose our reaction. Our development and our freedom lie in our reaction." It's about slowly learning that the trigger is not necessarily connected to what is triggered. All this makes you less dependent on what is happening around you. Two good book tips on this are New Work Needs Inner Work by Joana Breidenbach (from a systemic corporate perspective) and the book The Creative Act - A Way Of Being by Rick Rubin.
I then embarked on this path of reflection at some point, and the more I trusted myself and my inner images, the easier Good At came about. In the beginning, it was really a struggle with a lot of learning (also in the literal sense) because I didn't trust myself and my inner images enough.
4. AI - the spectre and at the same time the beacon of hope for the creative industries. What potential do you see in technological development for creative professionals
Basically, you should never forget that there is an incredible amount of money involved (which has already been invested and will continue to be invested) - and that AI is insanely hyped as a result. The name is also misleading - it is neither artificial nor intelligent. Nevertheless, it is very powerful software that is developing by leaps and bounds and can make people who know what they are doing much more efficient and faster. Or is already doing so to some extent. Our job landscape will change a lot (highly recommended: The Future of Jobs Report 2025 from the World Economic Forum: https://www.weforum.org/publications/the-future-of-jobs-report-2025/)
If AI “frees” us creatives from the annoying, small-scale work (e.g. form adaptation for social media etc.) and gives us time again for ideas, concepts and real brand work: I'd love it! Over the next 2 years, we'll probably be pretty inundated with AI-generated content...and everything will look more or less the same at some point. Then maybe there will be a reminiscence of branding, unique imagery, individual and really coming from the brand...but who knows, we'll see. But what is even more important in this process is that creatives must finally start to recognize the value of their talent. This is immense and is one of the four most important skills for the future: creativity, communication, collaboration and critical thinking. Not many people have the creative ability to approach a problem in a new and different way, to condense statements and put them into words or visual language. Also applied to other areas, outside of marketing.
But “we” often think: “Anyone can do that.” But that's not true. Normal for you is special for others! Here again: awareness of your own strengths - very important for what's to come, to build on your previous question 😉
5. In your mentoring sessions, you meet many people who are at crossroads in their careers. Do you have any tips for making decisions at these crossroads?
I find and have always found the question good: “How do I want to live?” - not “What do I want to do?” This leads to completely different approaches and opens up completely new spaces.
A nice method is a personal variation of the Ikigai principle (google it if you don't know it). This involves drawing up 3 “potential bubbles” and looking at the intersections of “What am I good at?”, “What do I love thematically?” and “What interests me?”
An example: A friend of mine is a doctor and was in burnout. He didn't want to and couldn't go back to the clinic. Then we did this exercise. His skills? Medicine. His passions? Soccer. And he wanted to work with children. Today, he is on the rehabilitation team of a soccer club and also coaches the F-youth team there - and is very happy! You might not have seen such combinations before. But that's exactly what I find so inspiring.