My Career Goal – Achieved

I can proudly say I have achieved a new milestone in my career.

On Wednesday, April 17th I ended my career in advertising – media planning to be exact. I know I don’t often talk about what I do and how I spend the majority of my day. I’d like to show you a small snapshot into my work world. Sometimes it seems like just yesterday (even though it was almost 8 years ago) when I announced that I wanted to become a media planner and I started my career at OMD. After University I thought I’d try my hand at selling out of home advertising. I remember meeting with media planners and saying they have all the power! I need to become one of them. Oh how naive I was! I still quit my job selling advertising, sent in my resume to OMD, had an interview two days later and was hired a week later.

From OMD, I moved to MediaVest then Taxi then Doner (which closed it’s doors in Toronto) then MPG (which has now become Havas Media) then rounded out at UM Canada. I’ve worked on everything from consumer packaged goods, tourism, retail, automotive, luxury goods, financial, pro bono accounts and closed my agency life working on one of the biggest brands in the world! I have learned how to swim when thrown into “sink or swim” situations. I’ve learned great business writing skills. I’ve learned advertising strategy, consumer insights, how to research, how to ask probing questions to get the answers I need for great work, great presentation skills and how to play nice in the sandbox with internal teams, working with large teams from different agencies and with clients.

If you’re curious about what accounts I’ve work on over the years here is my LinkedIn profile 🙂

As one of my 2013 goals for the year I announced in January that I wanted to work towards a promotion within the year at my current agency UM Canada. Then I went away on the BCBD Transformation Retreat with 11 amazing women and I actually promised myself that I would find my dream job. I never announced this in public so was a bit scared to start thinking about it. While on the trip I actually told the girls that I love what I do and am completely happy about my role at UM and the clients I worked on. I however have been thinking about how to align my working world with my passions and my personal brand. I had originally started brainstorming health & fitness companies and hadn’t even thought about my passion for reading. Suddenly LinkedIn collided me on a crash course towards working for an amazing tech company founded on one of my passions books and reading. I started work at Kobo today as the newest integrated marketing manager and I couldn’t be more excited!

Here’s to dreams, goals achieved and to new adventures.

What I have learned over the years and what I wish to take with me:

I also promised myself that I would dedicate time once a month to educating myself in terms of management techniques by reading or going to a course of seeing a speaker. So far I have read Blink, It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want To Be, Freakonomics and I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This.

As I move onto the next challenge in my career I will remember the following things from my reading so far:

1. First impressions are everything

2. The power of positive thinking will help you achieve the unachievable

3. Take time to drain the swamp – you must read I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This to understand

Do you have a dream job? What’s stopping you from getting it?