Titan Digital Communications encourages 'creative class' of employees

Daily Record, The (Baltimore), May 28, 2004 by Andrea Cecil

In an inconspicuous alley near Baltimore's Inner Harbor is a little company called Titan Digital Communications.

The firm, which develops high-end Web sites, commercial graphics, kiosk interfaces and CD-ROMs, not only can boast of such high- profile clients as Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Nike, but also of its employees.

There's Casey, who makes electronic music; Chris, who is training to become a yoga instructor; Greg, who makes PC video games; Kasey, who sells all-natural soaps; and John, who scouts for Dewey Beach, Del., real estate to buy and develop.

All are considered to fit into the much-discussed and sought- after creative class, a group comprising well-paid, well-educated urbanites, including artists, engineers, scientists, writers, students and empty nesters.

Carnegie Mellon University economics professor Richard Florida christened the group in his 2002 book, The Rise of the Creative Class. In it, he claims cities can stimulate economic development by attracting the creative class.

The term creative class refers not to just artists, but workers in a range of knowledge-based industries, explains David Costello, director of the Mayor's Office of Community Investment in Baltimore.

In February the office launched its Creative Baltimore initiative to attract members of the creative class to the city.

It's not to say it's our only economic development strategy, Costello says. It's an overlay. From our perspective, it makes a lot of sense. Why not coalesce and build on what the city is already doing to attract residents?

These are people who aren't put off by crime and blight, or the perception of crime and blight, or the school system, he says. The basic premise is about attracting and keeping people who are not put off by challenges of urban life.

The city's goal is to grow by 100,000 during the next 10 years with a good percentage of these people being from what you could define as a creative class member, Costello says.

But the five at Titan Digital see themselves as lucky more than anything else.

Their jobs foster creativity and their office looks more like a cozy bar than a place of business.

With a pool table, a giant sculpture of an orange cow, few walls and leaded-glass windows hanging around the boss' desk, the Titan office is informal and inviting.

I purposely wanted the atmosphere to be really relaxed, very open, very laid back just because that's where I would be comfortable and I knew most of the personalities in my business - would like that, too, says Titan owner and founder John Snow.

As for Titan's multi-faceted employees, Snow included, he says he wouldn't have it any other way.

Everybody's got a real full life outside of work, which is great, he says. What we do is not really brain surgery. I don't mean it's easy. [But] a Web site or a CD isn't the be-all, end-all of life. I'd be worried about them if it was.

Electronic buzz

Twenty-seven-year-old Casey Collier is a self-described media whore, though not in the vain of a politician. He loves media itself: the Web, music, motion graphics, etc.

College-bound Collier left his home near Salisbury on Maryland's Eastern Shore to seek his bachelor of fine arts at the Maryland Institute College of Art. There, he strictly worked with computers.

I had to use the general fine arts route to do what I wanted to do, he explains. I couldn't say, 'Well, I'm going to go be a farmer.' So I had to come to Baltimore.

After he clocks out as Titan multimedia producer, Collier goes to creating electronic music; two years ago he was featured on 2000's American Breakbeat with his track kaylek 3.

His obsession with creating robotic, break-dance stuff led his father to convert the space above his home's garage into a music studio for Collier.

Every night, he spends a solid two hours working on his music, his Web log or a 3-D piece. Work consumes at least 40 hours - if not, 48, he says. Sleep only takes up four hours. Too much sleep, Collier says, and he feels like I'm wasting time.

Ideas are always happening, so you have to grab them while they're there because they quickly go away, he adds.

Collier says he considers himself lucky to be in a creative field and in a job that is so laid back.

I have friends back on the Shore that are digging ditches and filling holes and busting their asses and working hard, he says. I'm aware of the other jobs out there where people do that nine-to-five thing and just get out. I consider myself lucky to actually enjoy my job. It's nice not to feel like I'm another cog in a big gear.

Lotus position

With all the break-neck deadlines, Titan Art Director Chris Leicht can get cranky.

Yoga helps, she says. When I can't go to yoga, I can feel it.

The 29-year-old has been practicing yoga for 12 years - ever since her modern-dance teacher recommended it to her when she was 17 as a good way to maintain flexibility. Leicht got her degree in modern dance and creative writing from East Carolina University in North Carolina and went on to graduate school at University of Baltimore, where she studied communications design.