We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Katherine Hill. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Katherine below.
Alright, Katherine thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?
I have been working as a full-time creative for over 10 years. I left my role as a management consultant for Accenture to pursue my work as a choreographer for elite figure skaters.
Day one of my journey is difficult to pinpoint, honestly. It took quite some time to feel like a true Creative, worthy of charging money for my ideas. You could call the first day I put on ice skates (age 2), as Day 1. Or, maybe it was the first time I was hired, and paid, to choreograph (age 15). An obvious answer could be the day I quit my stable job to choreograph full-time. But, none of those and so many other milestones, were not Day 1. “The big leap” from my stable job came years and years after I showed interest in pursuing choreography professionally.
Could I have sped up the process? Definitely not. From my experience, there were, and are no, short cuts. I had to try, fail, experiment, learn, land the gig, lose the gig, collaborate, go solo, feel like I didn’t have a legitimate job, feel like I had the best job in the world, feel like nothing could stop me, feel like everything was stopping me, and so on and so on and so on. The thrills and the disappointments were, and forever will be, married.
Katherine, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am a choreographer, consultant, and entrepreneur. I choreograph for elite figure skaters out of the US Olympic Training Site in Colorado Springs, CO and around the world. When not working with competitive athletes, my husband and I choreograph for international stage, television, and film productions (Cirque du Soleil, Canadian Broadcast Company, etc) And! When not choreographing, I teach creative collaboration to corporate teams.
All in all, my clients range from Olympic competitors and international entertainment companies to advertising agencies and everyone in between.
I work to combine my time in theater, sport, academia, and business to facilitating inspiring experiences for others- audiences, performers, students, or teams- and absolutely love the feeling of creating something from scratch. I think everyone deserves a creative outlet and count myself lucky to be a part of someone else’s creative discovery.
Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?
After taking the “road less traveled” I always enjoy offering a few humble nuggets of advice. On the topic of growing clientele in a creative business, my best advice is to keep creating and to be there.
I have choreographed for 5 year-olds, 65 year-olds, charity shows, student productions, great gigs, stressful gigs, elite clients, difficult clients, high-paying projects, low-paying projects and everyone and everything in between. I took every “at bat” possible and learned from it all. Keep creating and, eventually, people will notice your work.
Also, “be there”. If there is an industry event, be there. If there is a conference with like-minded people, be there. If there is an online forum of potential clients, be there. Many creatives want their work to speak for itself. While admirable, I find that mindset impractical. To grow your clientele, you have to show up and meet people like everyone else.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
I think resilience can arise in many forms and that mine has often shown its face as adaptability. Collaboration in a creative sphere can easily become contentious if the collaborators lack adaptability. At the end of the day, most creative decisions boil down to taste and everyone’s tastes are different. Neither perspective is necessarily “right”. In order to really make things work, I listen to my team’s views and incorporate their feedback. I am immensely proud of many projects that changed form after taking feedback from directors, producers, and fellow choreographers. There is always a way to incorporate other stake holders’ perspectives.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.khill.co/
- Instagram: @khill_co
- Facebook: NA
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katherine-hill-ab60b415/
- Twitter: @khill_co
- Yelp: NA
Image Credits
Angelina Huang Justin Barbin