Web Graphic Designer (Remote)

Yes, we are reaching out to the community of dharma brothers, sisters and any supporters of dharma activities! We apologize for the job description for being longer than originally intended, but since it’s our first job posting for the site and we wanted to be further transparent of our intentions, this will be the only first and last, long job description as we  go into details down below.

This is for a part-time volunteer, remote (work from home) and not paid position.  We are all a team of volunteers, so you’re in good company. This is really a position where you have the opportunity to generate merit (This is a perfect position if you been looking for a way to create merit using your creative skills) and with the added benefit to add as one of your portfolio pieces.

As this is a volunteer position, work at your own pace without any stressful deadlines and as with all volunteer team members,  collaborate amongst one another for general feedback, positive inspiration, mentorship and or guidance. One of the team members on our site has experience as an HR Corporate Recruiting Manager (It’s mentioned here now in this job description instead of their bio in our about section, as their past experience spans across such industries with some perhaps well known Internet, media and entertainment companies and they didn’t want to mix dharma with everyday jobs), thus why they implemented this Dharma Careers – Job portal section as it utilizes some of the more useful, common, modern backend/front-end web technologies.

Because of this exposure they had in helping and building software engineering departments utilizing such similar tools first hand and from the ground up working for these previous companies and after talking to another team member about one of the temples they attend and their temple’s website, a suggestion was mentioned to help find a qualified graphic designer. This other team member suddenly had a heartfelt intention of allowing all Buddhist temples, monasteries and lay disciples from anywhere in the world to be able to have access to the same internet tools that other large organizations use to source for qualified talent, so temples now have the same ability to post jobs related with dharma but for free and to be able to connect directly with our site visitors as a source to find qualified talent; through means of leveraging the growing number of unique visitors that our site attracts from the effort of our compiled articles and pages. We don’t think a job portal like this exists anywhere in the dharma world and the relevant need is a cause of justification as with big well known job boards such as linkedin jobs, monster and all the other big players; charge expensive licenses to companies just so they can be able to post jobs on the internet and have access to a database of candidates, or this team member is just trying to implement the best recruiting practices and to apply some of the humble skills they learned, finally for the benefit of dharma, as per their wish and intention a long time ago.

For further clarification and to answer how exactly does this benefit temples? Well temples are always an opportunity for lay disciples to practice dāna or make symbolic offerings to the triple gem, along with developing bodhicitta and generating merit, to support all their dharma activities such as building meditation halls, printing sutras, etc. and the irony sometimes is that they have a beautiful, supportive spiritual temple but their website doesn’t reflect this at times as it’s sometimes an afterthought and part of the temple budget was was either overlooked to hire an experienced web designer and or a motivated lay disciple with less experience offered to create one and unfortunately a website nowadays is usually the first thing other potential disciples take a look at first before even stepping into the temple. As such, with this team member’s opinion, they saw an opportunity for temples to also have a convenient method to have access to local, experienced professionals, that still have a good heart, that are willing to contribute their skills as a form of dāna, to help reflect the temples’ values in our modern times. The younger generation nowadays generally utilize the internet to search for inspiration, motivation, answers to questions they may have about practicing and developing their spirituality and a website is usually the first thing they would go to.

Referencing back to our job post, we can’t say or promise being a volunteer is rewarding, but know your work will be showcased and viewed on an average of 3000+ daily site visitors a month (google analytics data noted as of 3 months ago) give or take from all around the world and an additional – approximately 2000+ from our facebook fan page, considering these numbers aren’t that much as compared to other niche sites, but for us with humble roots, this accounts for the data within the past 2 years of  previous visitors looking for their old favorite pages and posts as we were inactive on retreat during this period of time. As you can tell, now that we are back from retreat and after reviewing all the data, it motivated us to do a whole total site rebuild, so that we can provide a better overall UX (User Experience) for everyone and keep growing together at the same time. _()_

Now that we done with formalities back to the job description below.

Suggested requirements:

• 3+ years Photoshop skills.
• Experience creating logos and headers for websites (WordPress is a plus and or any other CMS (Content Management System) web site builder such as Wix is acceptable)
• Has experience working in a web development environment and or has some html understanding and knowledge.

Pluses:

• Experience creating Internet branding and marketing materials is a plus.
• Have some photography experience is also a plus.

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As needed and suggested tasks:

• Create static images such as headers and logos for the home page.
• Customized simple images for blog posts, usually referencing in some form or another what the actual post is about.
• Create customized, identifiable branding materials such as profile avatars and cover images that will be used on social media accounts.
• Create standardized cover art or posters to be used in some of the menu sections that have listings of curated dharma books, sutras, texts, etc. Standardized meaning re-used to emphasis a consistent familiar look with a quick, simple change of titles when adding new listings.
• Take high quality photos of Buddhist art such as statues, paintings, calligraphy etc.; where you create written title subject matter overlays on these photos.
• Be able to work well within a team environment and take constructive feedback.
• Love dharma and or have the respect for it.