You can work on an award winning marketing team....literally
Funny how people throw around the term "award winning". Sometimes it even denotes that an award was won...
Like the Stevie Award for "Best Marketing Team" won by our Corporate Marketing & Research Insight Group here at Microsoft. Back in the day, I supported this team and really appreciated how closely they were willing to work with staffing to get good people on board. They are one of the reasons I get marketing.
It's cool to see them win an award. And I guess I wouldn't be a good recruiter if I didn't mention that they currently have positions open and anyone interested in applying can send their resume to me at Heather.Hamilton@microsoft.com.
Corporate Initiatives Research Manager
Research Manager, Global Customer and Satisfaction Measurement
Research Manager - Worldwide Public Sector and Worldwide Licensing and Pricing
Corporate Initiatives Partner Manager
I'll update with a link to any media coverage that comes out. I wouldn't want to be all PR and break the news first! ; )
Comments
- Anonymous
June 22, 2006
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June 22, 2006
Humility Joe, humility. You say "My communication and interpersonal skills are developed far beyond those of many corporate executives." Is that based on a wide sample of interactions with corporate executives? Or are you comparing yourself to one knucklehead you happened to encounter during your "highly impressive and unique corporate marketing internship experience".
Look, I don't mean to come off snarky. Actually, I probably do...but your confidence comes off as arrogance (and if it does in writing, I'm guessing it does in interviews). No one wants to hire someone they feel will be unmanageable.
Absent that, you can start your own company, i.e. Zuckerberg (Facebook) or what's his name. Oh yeah, Bill Gates. - Anonymous
June 22, 2006
I have an addendum to my last comment...if that was satire, good one. You got me. - Anonymous
June 22, 2006
Hi Michael. I did not mean to sound cocky or arrogant at all. I just want some advice from expert recruiters about how I can overcome the obstacles that I spoke of in my original comment. I mention my accomplishments not as a way to brag or sound cocky, but in hopes that advice can be given to me that will help me use those accomplishments to my advantage in my attempts to get a job with a reputable company.
Any advice?...and I do mean that in a sincere (and non-antagonistic) way. - Anonymous
June 22, 2006
haha...not satire buddy. I'm sorry if the tone of my original comment sounded a bit harsh. Frustration arises from not having a job fresh out of college when you're on your own for the first time, ya know? I guess that frustration translated into text. I'd think that with an NYU degree, it would be a bit easier for me. But I guess not. - Anonymous
June 22, 2006
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June 23, 2006
Hi Joe,
Your second response is much better than the first one...
"I mention my accomplishments not as a way to brag or sound cocky, but in hopes that advice can be given to me that will help me use those accomplishments to my advantage in my attempts to get a job with a reputable company."
Getting a job with a reputable company that offers good training opportunities, strong management, and, yes, the old cliche, "room for growth" should be your top goal -- not the salary, not the corner office. If money is an issue, you may want to reconsider your field -- marketing/advertising just doesn't pay all that well starting out, great internship experience or not. Investment banking does, but then you have to be an investment banker...
Lastly, I would drop your sense of entitlement about the NYU degree. I've found that the only degrees that really, truly, honestly open doors are Ivy League degrees, degrees from schools like MIT, or degrees from programs that are well respected within a certain field (like an Agriculture degree from a place like UMASS). It may come in handy in a place like New York if your resume happens to land on the desk of someone who went to NYU, but the cold hard reality is that other than that, it's not going to be the difference maker.
I work for a small company that for entry level positions, can't/won't/finds it not worth it to pay for "fancy" degrees for entry level positions (and I went to Michigan where a lot of my friends were able to command top dollar at investment banks). We can often find similar talent in people without grossly inflated salary expectations. And maybe Heather can chime in here, but I don't know how much true entry-level hiring the Fortune 100 does for marketing positions, outside of companies with general management/operations training programs like a GE. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
gotcha. i guess right now i should just focus on building my resume to match what top companies want over the next few years.
btw michael, i read your blog...how was the tom petty concert? i wanted to see U2 at madison square, but couldn't due to schedule conflicts. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Joe,
Wine-Oh and Michael are giving you some good advice here and good for you for being bold enough to ask and strong enough to take it.
So Wine-Oh is right. You should expect to take an entry level job. I also went to a good university, graduated from a top entrepreneur program and if I told you about some of the mind numbing work I had to do when I graduated, I guess you would be surprised (but I did master the art of addressing envelopes...whee!). At the time, because I didn't have parental financing, my biggest concern was paying rent. In my case, there was no room for arrogance. Confidence was sometime even hard to muster. So Michael is right, humble yourself and focus on entry level jobs where you can learn from others. Your "break" is likely to come after someone sees your good work, but probably not before.
The other thing I wanted to mention was the importance of interviewing well for new grads. Now I don't recruit new grads myself but I do have an opinion (on everything). With new grads, a bunch of them enter the market at once, they all are fresh with limited experience. The resume can get you the interview (again, though, probably for more entry level roles), but they are interviewing other people too. So you have to interview well to get the job. Based on the comment string above, I wonder if you do come off as a little over-confident, even though you don't mean to. I'd definitely recommend toning things down a bit. Instead of saying "My communication and interpersonal skills are developed far beyond those of many corporate executives" (a statement that I believe could easily cost you the job), say "I have excellent communication skills; let me give you some examples". Or better yet, don't tell them you have excellent communication skills, show them.
Do you have someone in your life that can do a mock interview with you? A mentor, professor, parents friend? Someone who has a bunch of experience? Someone that is willing to give constructive feedback? That is what I would definitely recommend. If something is going wrong in the interview, you need to figure out what it is.
So refine your interviewing skills and apply for entry level jobs and try not to get discouraged when you don't get some of these either. There are plenty of jobs that I have interviewed for but didn't get. But if I did get them, I wouldn't have ended up here, so I am OK with it....it's a journey. Isn't that zen of me?
You know this really reminds me of what life was like when I was newly graduated and life hadn't slapped me around yet. Luckily for me, the slapping commenced pretty much immediately upon graduation and lasted for about 3 years. Looking back, I'd wished that I had taken advantage of on-campus interviews, but at the same time, I learned a ton from the hard times. I learned that I was going to have to work really hard. Fifteen years later (holy cow!), that hasn't changed at all. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Joe-
I re-read some of your posts and you remind me alot of me 10 years ago, fresh out of college. I hope these posts are helpful to you. Your timing is rather interesting because I am faced with my own situation here. being an eager, willing to learn, well educated (graduated from the same school both undergrad and grad), artuclate person I am, there is no science or formula to interviewing.
Like Heather, I experienced that life slapping. Still get it now and then. I just graduated with my MBA 5 weeks ago, and interviewing. In fact just this morning I was given an offer that I considered to be quite low (I made the same amount 5 years ago), and was told the MBA didnt matter to them. To me that was a proverbial slap in the face. I worked 2 years on that degree and felt that in one fowl swoop they erased it. While I havent said no, I am thinking of declining the offer. However the other part of me says "they are giving you a huge opportunity to prove yourself and in 6 months it will be irrelavent." Luckily I have the weekend to ponder this.
My dream job is out there and I am 3 interviews into it. Its held up in some HR red tape thats out of anyones control. So I am wondering if I hold out and say no to the offer (well knowing it will be weeks before another offer), take the offer and set a start date, in the hopes the other comes through, take the offer and forget about the dream job, or say no and keep looking. Not sure what to do here. Heather/Heather's Blog readers, any suggestions or thoughts? - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Don't take the job if you still intend to look. If you accept, that company is going to decline other people, they are going to shut down the recruiting process for that position and those few weeks will really put them behind.
Accepting a job and then having another come out of the blue is one thing, but if you are still interviewing and there's any kind of known possibility that you can get another offer, you sholdn't take the first one. I think you would be burning a bridge, there's no guarantee you'll get another offer in a timely manner and there' a chance you'll want that job offer again.
You have to say yes or no and mean it. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Thats what I thought and feel too. But I wanted to be sure I was right in my thinking. Good to have the sounding board to throw things like this up there.
As always I appreciate the quick feedback Heather. Im not about to burn bridges and cause a train wreck. Not the type of person to do that. I have a couple of days to accept it. So I have a lot of thinking to do this weekend. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
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June 23, 2006
More good advice from Dudley. Joe, take it to heart but also in stride. I don't think anyone here wants to make you feel bad about yourself. It's more about the packaging of your skills than anything else. There's nothing uniquely bad about youthful over-confidence but you do need to get past it. You can turn this around. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
I appreciate all of the feedback and wonderful advice that is being given. I will certain use this advice to better myself and my strategy for building my career. Thank you very much! - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Hey Joe, check in with us and let us know when you land a position. I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for you! - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Joe-
Out of curiosity, what is it that you are looking to do? What city are you in? If you are in NYC, I can give you a list of local tech/media job postings. Alot of them are for recent college grads, like yourself.
Another suggestion, is get involved with networking events. Meet as many people as you can. At the risk of sounding like my mother (hi mom!) its very helpful. I wish I did this years ago. I am a newcomer to these types of events. You never know who you are going to meet.
Good Luck! - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Can you feel the love tonight? I can.
Wine-Oh, you are a nice guy - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
Aww. Shucks. Thanks. I beleive in paying it forward (not such a good movie). But alot of people have helped me. Others havent, and I dont beleive in that. - Anonymous
June 23, 2006
haha, you are all very wonderful people. Wine-Oh, I want to do corporate marketing (on the brand image side). I am not limiting myself to a particular city. I have a preference to be in Washington DC (family is there), but I am willing to relocate to any city for a position that can jumpstart my career.
...thank you all so much for your help! - Anonymous
June 24, 2006
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June 24, 2006
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June 25, 2006
Lol my brain switches off as soon as I hear that term. Usually the award is so specific that there are only 2 or 3 people competing. Such as the ISP awards - there are basically 3 ISP's in control of the group that hands out the award, and they just pass it around every year really..
sometimes companies just hand out these awards to themselves, just so they can be award winning..
so what's it like, working for the evil empire? has steve been throwing any chairs lately? - Anonymous
June 25, 2006
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June 25, 2006
Daniel-I provided a link to the award. Feel free to check it out.
Working here is great and keeps me busy enough that I resist the urge to troll the blogs of our competitors employees. But that's just me...yawn. - Anonymous
June 25, 2006
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June 26, 2006
Wine-Oh, good way to think about it. - Anonymous
June 27, 2006
Dire - no. Urgent - yes.
Heather, you are both talented and lucky, and therefore an exception. It is easy to look in retrospect and see that you took a couple of years out of school before you ended up on a serious career path, and it all worked out. I took some odd turns in my life as well, but I don't think you could learn anything by it, except that if you are strong-minded, you can make your own way, against the flow. That doesn't work for most people.
My advice to Joe is quite simple. Time is wasting. It is better to be doing anything than to be doing nothing, and honestly, as someone who has hired lots of people, if he doesn't have something in 3 months, he'd better have a really good story to tell about why (e.g. I was travelling in China for 3 months, and trying to learn Mandarin). Of course we can recover from missteps, but it's better not to take the misstep in the first place.
So, yes, that is the world according to me, with apologies to your other readers. I have to admit, I had no idea how long and strong that got until after I saw it posted -- stream of consciousness can be an scary thing -- but I stand by it. (I'd put my own smiley here, but you know how much I dislike them.)
Wine-Oh. There must be a story behind that moniker. Maybe Heather will allow you to tell us why you call yourself that?
Detecting bad vibes is good. Also good that you have the confidence to to say no when the fit is wrong. Carry on. - Anonymous
June 28, 2006
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June 28, 2006
Paul-
Im happy to actually. I like wine (for the record I dont drink it that much). Heather had a posting about her experience about wine.com. I was in a witty mood that day and the name stuck. Simple as that. - Anonymous
June 28, 2006
I didnt see Heather's posting about luck until now. As you know I turned down the position i was offered. One big red flag was talking to someone at this company who they fast tracked. He had no experience whatsoever for what this place was looking for. He said point blank to me he was lucky and people left and he asked to take on their roles. He kept saying luck this and luck that. That worked for him, great. But luck catches up. Its about hard work and determination too. - Anonymous
June 28, 2006
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June 28, 2006
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June 28, 2006
I'm not even sure I believe in fate. I do believe in coincidence, though. Being in the right place at the right time is even balanced out by all the times we are in the right place at the wrong time and don't event know it.
It's somewhat random. I think awareness of where you are, what is going on and the opportunities that are being presented is key (plus all the hard work, of course). I don't think you can be successful without that. - Anonymous
June 29, 2006
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June 29, 2006
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June 29, 2006
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June 29, 2006
yeah, see, I don't think all things happen for a reason. Most of those things you call being lucky are just "happensrance" (thanks to Paul for the word I was looking for). No force is conspiring for you to get the middle seat. Now the poop bags, that's totally about preparation. Always have extra poop bags!
I'm with you on the perserverance thing, buddy. Shame on those teachers and professors. Some people in life just aren't believers (I don't mean that in the religious sense, by the way). I guess I mean believers in the human spirit. Have you contacted them to tell them they stink. I'd have a hard time resisting if I were you. On the flip side, it'sa strong person that moves forward despite what others say. It's easier when people are cheering you on.
You aren't getting all Dr. Phil, don't worry. Sharing stuff that touches your life is what it's all about my friend! - Anonymous
June 29, 2006
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June 29, 2006
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June 29, 2006
I have not gotten back in touch with those professors. Some saw me at graduation back in the day. I am sure they read the updates in the alumni newsletter. If anything it motivated me to work harder. What goes around, comes around. - Anonymous
June 30, 2006
You are more mature than I am ; ) - Anonymous
June 30, 2006
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June 30, 2006
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June 30, 2006
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June 30, 2006
Agh Paul! I'm done! ; ) - Anonymous
July 10, 2006
I had just stumbled on this blog via a Google search tonight and, boy, what a wealth of information in relation to my current situation! This is fantastic!
I'm still another year or so out from graduating with a BA in Business Admin & Marketing and my part-time bank teller job is becoming very disenchanting. I appreciate it as a 'good' job while I'm going to school but it's definitely not where I want to be in the future. I've been investigating some marketing internships and I hope to land one in the coming months. I'll have to rely on my enthusiasm and sincere interest in marketing because I only have one marketing course under my belt so far (with more to come, of course), which might create a big challenge for me to be a competitive applicant. It never hurts to apply, though!
Bed time now, but I'm bookmarking this site so I can finish reading all of these great comments. Thanks so much for the excellent insight! - Anonymous
July 11, 2006
Sure, Saxy! Good luck applyiing for internships!