Saturday Morning

I am officially on a mini vacation and have stopped my job hunt. It feels great. I came back to Minnesota for Thanksgiving and a wedding. It is so nice to be home and to see people that I have missed so much. Yesterday I had my first egg nog coffee of the year. The Fa La Latte at Caribou. I haven't seen these egg nog drinks in London, so I was very happy to have one. It feels like Christmas here. The houses have Christmas lights up and it just has that holiday feeling. I can't wait to put up a tree when I get back with Matthew.

I got a rejection letter the other day from M&C Saatchi. That was pretty disappointing, but what can you do. No use getting all worked up about it. I felt like I gave a great interview, so I am curious about why I wasn't invited back for the second round. There could be a hundred different reasons that have nothing to do with me so I am going to let it go. Nick, who I met before the interview at Starbucks, made it through. I am happy for him, he is a nice guy. I wish him the best. There is something for me out there. I just have to keep looking. 

It's nice to take a break from it all. I am going to start back up again on Monday, but for the time being I am just going to enjoy some time off. 

Monday Morning

I am hoping to hear some good news this week. Hopefully sooner than later. I am going to Minneapolis for a visit on Wednesday and if I have made it through to the second MC Saatchi interview than I am going to have to change my return ticket. That's not too big of a problem, it's just the waiting. There are a few places that I haven't heard back from. They claim that they will tell you a yes or a no, but I can understand where they are coming from. They've got tons of applications to go through and then they've got to contact people. I am going to chase up AMV today. Some people are posting that they are hearing back so I just want to make sure. You never know.

The advertising graduated scheme application frenzy has died down for me. I was really caught up in it a few weeks ago. Like everyone I suppose. Constantly checking the discussion boards to see if anyone else had heard anything. It can start to take over your life, if you let it. Especially when you are unemployed and have nothing but time on your hands to obsess about it. I feel like I definitely past the obsession point. It would be an amazing opportunity to take part in a graduate scheme, but it's not my only chance at getting in. It also doesn't mean that I am not a talented person. We all like to win and have someone think that we are amazing, but it's more important to believe in yourself.

I thought I gave a great interview. I have to remember that I don't know what they are looking for. They might want really young graduates who they can mold into their image or they could want people with a certain look. Who knows. It doesn't mean that I am not good enough. I was chatting with one person via Facebook emails and they were really gutted that they weren't getting any interviews. They thought it must have been because they were rubbish. It's simply not true. You just have to keep going and never give up. I think I am finally getting used to how competitive it is here.

I have been having a hard time adjusting to living in London. I got completely overwhelmed with my job search and started to feel really awful. While it's very competitive here there are also so many opportunities. I started to feel like I didn't know how to go about finding a job. Which of course if silly, because I knew how to get a job in Minneapolis, but here I started to loose my confidence. That in and of itself was a terrible feeling. I usually always feel confident. I was and am worried about my CV and how it comes across here. Is it strongly written? Those kind of things. Knowing where to even find jobs. A lot of time people use recruitment agencies. There are a lot of them here. All these things start to pile up.

Also not having any friends here makes it hard. At least in Minneapolis I could meet up with some friends at the Bryant Lake Bowl after a long day of job hunting. The loss of familiar surroundings during a transitional time, from college to work, is tough. Last week I spent all day working on applications and before I knew it it was 4 p.m. and I hadn't eaten lunch. I went for a walk to the store and I was so overwhelmed by a feeling of homesickness. I wished I was going down to the French Meadow for a bowl of tomato soup. That's what I was really craving. Instead I was walking down to the corner store. It was sad. We all have those favorite places or things that we do when we are working and need to take a break. 

 I like a change of location, to go some where and get a special coffee or a treat. I don't have those kind of places or treats here yet. I don't doubt that I will, but I miss that soup and all my friends. I miss seeing places that have special meaning for me. I miss driving by a park and being able to say to the other person in the car, hey I once hit a home run there when I was 13.

I was feeling bad enough to go and see a life coach this past Saturday. I was just starting to hate the way I was feeling and needed to go and talk to someone other than Matthew or Wayland. Don't get me wrong. They are both extremely supportive, but I needed to talk to someone who wasn't so close. It was extremely helpful. My coach told me that all the feelings I was having were extremely normal for people who come to London. It was good to hear that. At some level I felt bad for not being happy that I have the chance to live in such an amazing city. The coach told me that London is a very transient city and that at the end of the day to remember that it will be a numbers game. I am going to have keep trying until something sticks. With looking for jobs and with finding friends. I am hanging in there and I've got a few things up my sleeve.

Saatchi Interview

I had my interview yesterday and I was very happy with how it turned out. I felt more excited about it than nervous, which was nice. I found out by letter last Thursday that I was invited for a first round interview. I heard that there were around 1000 people who applied and that they did a first pass of around 100. They then do a second interview with 25 and narrow that down to a lucky 5. 

I enjoyed getting ready for the interview and doing the research online. I found out there is so much that I don't know about Advertising as a business. There is a lot to learn, which is exciting. I went down to the London College of Communication career center on Monday to have a look through all their industry magazines. I thought it would be a good idea to bring something to the interview to make something that might help me to stand out and be remembered. I decided to make a little set of interview flash cards to help me remember my stuff. It turned out to be useful to help me remember what accounts they are working on and campaigns that I liked. I am glad that I did, I found it to be useful and fun.

The interview was yesterday at 3 p.m. I decided to get down there early at about 1 p.m. I wanted to first make sure that I could find the place since I wasn't able to fit in a dry run. I did get a bit lost so I am glad I left when I did. My plan was to find the place and then head to a Starbucks for a nice gingerbread latte and prepare. Luckily there was one right on the corner and I could see people coming and going from the office. I felt a bit like a spy. It helped to a get a sense of the place. There were also other graduates coming into the Starbucks holding their acceptance letters. I struck up a conversation with a guy called Nick who was on at 2 p.m. It was nice to have a chat and get to know who else is applying for the schemes. Nick was a nice guy. 

So after waiting a few hours and do my last bits of preparation I decided it was time to go in and wait in the lobby. There were four of us in total waiting. We all introduced ourselves and a chat. Who applied for what and had anyone heard back from any of the other schemes. Then it was time to begin. I was interviewed with another girl called Michele. Anna and Alex came up to us in the lobby, they were going to be interviewing and then we were whisked away. The interview was split up into two parts. For the first part I talked with Anna and she just asked me about why I was in London and what I liked about it. She asked some questions about some of the experience that I put down on my CV. It was a nice friendly chat and I liked her a lot. Then Alex came in to talk to me more about the role of an account manager. He was a bit more serious than Anna and I am not sure how well I came across to him. He asked me about my favorite ads of all time and ads that I didn't like. He was harder to read, but was it was all right.

Then they interviewed us together. We looked at print ads and basically they just wanted to hear our opinions. It was a bit daunting because you wanted to have your view, but yet you couldn't help wonder what they were thinking. After looking at the adverts we were then given some ads and had to pitch them to the other person. We had two minutes to look over the ads and then we had one minute to pitch. It wasn't too bad. I tried to make it as lively as possible. I wasn't sure what they were expecting and I have never pitched before, so we shall see. Overall I had fun and it was a cool experience. I should be hearing back within the next few days. 

Account Management

Here is a great description of the job I am going to have!


Account Management, or Client Services, is the focal role in the development of an advertising campaign. You know your client. You know their objectives. You know how to harness your own and your agency's energy and resources in pursuit of those objectives. And you know the buck stops with you!

Account Management is complex, demanding, challenging. And very rewarding.

You are in overall charge of the relationship with your client. On their behalf, you manage the whole advertising process - ensuring, too, that your agency's objectives and values are faithfully represented and the account profitably safeguarded. In short, you are the spokesperson and mediator working for both sides - a sort of double agent.

In account management, there are normally several layers. You will start off as a graduate trainee and spend your first few months learning about the industry you have joined. After your induction period, the next stage is to become an account executive. You will be expected to acquire marketing skills (understanding the role of advertising, how to relate to marketing objectives, gathering brand information, analysing competitive activity) as well as advertising skills (the difference between marketing and advertising, how advertising is developed, what is involved in production, research techniques, the importance of the creative brief).

You will also start to learn organisational skills (day to day admin, team coordination, timing plans) and communication skills (contact reports recording the outcome of a client meeting, ensuring all of the team are kept informed, status reports). And, perhaps most importantly, you will begin to develop the vital people management skills that are the bedrock of our industry (how to gain commitment, how to generate respect, how to instil trust, how to negotiate effectively) — all these are essential to effective team work, both within the agency and with clients/suppliers.

Once you have established yourself, the next stage is to become an account manager. The marketing skills you will need to develop are, for example, strategic understanding of your client’s business needs and objectives, the ability to understand and develop marketing strategies to achieve those objectives and a broad knowledge of strategies used in other markets.

You will need to expand your advertising skills to include media/creative brief writing, ability to judge creative work in relation to your brief, job supervision and active participation in research presentations. You should also have an up to date understanding of new technologies and consequent opportunities. Your people management skills will develop to enable you to train and develop people who report to you, to manage upwards as well as downwards, to motivate members of the agency team, to absorb anxieties and resolve conflict.

Your presentation and communication skills will be developed through client presentations, selling creative and media ideas, learning to listen actively to read sensitive situations accurately, preparation of strategy papers etc. Negotiation Skills will be developed through budget presentation, liaison over creative issues between client and creative and motivating the team to keep to deadlines. And Financial Management Skills will become important as you take on responsibility of budgets, billing, profitability and financial forecasting on your account.

This career ladder will take you through Account Director, Board Account Director and possibly Client Services Director (ie the director with overall responsibility for the Account Management department). As you progress, as well as fine-tuning the core skills, Leadership Skills will become increasingly important as you take on the direction rather than just the management of accounts and as you accumulate direct reports within account management that will require your input in their career development through delegation, coaching, feedback and appraisals.

You will also be responsible for maintaining and developing the agency’s relationship with the client in such a way that effective advertising is produced which is profitable for both client and agency. You will acquire a good understanding of Business Issues to enable you to participate actively with senior client management debate, to be successful at the all important New Business pitch — the lifeblood of agencies, and to contribute to the management of the agency.

All of these skills will be developed through a mixture of training, coaching and practice throughout your career.

Key characteristics of an excellent account person are integrity, commitment, articulateness, numeracy, team motivator, charm — and a sense of fun!

Recruiters will be looking for a good degree (but not a particular subject — in fact, diversity is key to good agency teams) and demonstration of personality/team leadership.

Average starting salaries are c.£16,000 and can rise to £300,000, if you reach executive management level.

Account Management is the most usual route to the top.

*post curtesy of Musa Tariq (Facebook)
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Monday Night

Just a quick one, since I am preparing for an interview on Wednesday. I had a no back from Oglivy and JWT, but a yes from M&CSaatchi. I am looking forward to the interview, it should be interesting considering I have no idea what to expect. Will an interview in London be different than one in Minneapolis. I tell you one thing, I definitely wasn't prepared for how competitive it is out here. I have been really doing some soul searching about what it is I want to do for a career.

To think, if I had never come to study abroad I would never be here now and I would have never had any idea about these graduate schemes. I feel like there is lot that I am going to learn from being here, I've already learned a lot about advertising from just living in London. This is certainly a challenge, but that's a good thing.

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