The lovely Erin joined Medialab for a week whilst she completed her work experience during the first year of her GCSEs. We ran her through all aspects of the business, while she also worked on a mini project to present back to the team. Read on to hear what she got up to!

MONDAY

I arrive at the office around 10 am to meet Daisy, Medialab’s HR Coordinator and Tatum, the Office Manager, who ran me through the company’s values, benefits and wellbeing, the culture and IT support, if I need it. Everyone was really friendly, even just walking around the office, people were stopping to say hi.

Then, I was introduced to the team that I’d be shadowing for the week, the in-house marketing team. After this, I shadowed one of the team members, Kim, who’s the Senior Business Development Manager. She ran me through what her role looks like, which includes researching potential clients, what’s involved in a pitch process and then the onboarding process.

Toward the end of my first day, I was shown the overall company structure and how the teams all work. Each team is doing something different, but it’s an open-plan office, so it feels as though everyone is working as one, which is nice.

TUESDAY

I start my introductions across the company today to understand what everyone does in more detail, starting with the Apollo team. I met with Hayden, who is a Data Scientist here and he took me through Apollo, which is their marketing intelligence platform. He demonstrated what different dashboards might look like before and during a campaign. It was quite cool seeing how all the raw data is made into clear data visualisations for what is most relevant to the campaign.  Then I met with Nick, Medialab’s Integration Director. He talked me through the importance of having the right strategy and planning in place which not only makes the work better, but more cohesive.

I then got to go out with the marketing team for lunch, we went to a really nice Thai restaurant near the office, it felt like I was part of the team. After lunch, Cerys, who’s the Marketing Executive, ran me through a project I’ll be working on. This involved coming up with ideas for their internal initiative, Together We Stand, and proposing what we could do for one of the sessions. She ran me through what they’ve done in the past to give me some context; the aim of Together We Stand is to create an open and inclusive space at Medialab, through sharing resources and educating one another on subjects that mean a lot to the people who work here. From this, I thought it would be nice to focus my project on organising a session plan to mark Mental Health Awareness Week which is happening in May, so I started researching some initial ideas.

WEDNESDAY

This morning I spoke with Beth, she’s an Account Executive who’s just finished Medialab’s Bootcamp scheme. It was really reassuring to hear that there are alternative routes into the industry than doing a specific degree. She ran me through what the six weeks of training looked like, covering digital, TV, press and planning, and what her role looks like now as a full-time executive.

After this, I had my introduction to TV with Olly, an AV Executive, which I really enjoyed. He shared what his day-to-day looks like, as well as this, he also ran me through a typical conversation you’d have with sales houses, like ITV, and the process of booking TV advertising spots, which I found really interesting.

Before lunch, we had a Together We Stand session celebrating International Women’s Day. They held a panel made up of different women at Medialab, across all levels, to discuss mentorship and building workplace equity. Everyone was so open with their experiences, and it was great to hear everyone’s opinion on how we can better support each other.

THURSDAY & FRIDAY

I had my final introduction session with offline. Offline, are responsible for anything print – like inserts, door drops and ads in newspapers and magazines, which can support campaigns running across TV and social media.

During the final two days, I focused mostly on getting my project together. I wanted to create a session that was interactive, as well as informative. I looked into what the theme for Mental Health Awareness Week was for this year, anxiety, and provided definitions, as well as outlined what types of anxiety there are. I then assembled my content into a mock session plan and worked everything into a PowerPoint. Finally, I presented my ideas – I was a bit nervous, but everyone was so encouraging, and the feedback was really positive. I was told that they’d use some of my ideas for the session in May, so that was really nice to hear!

WHAT’S BEEN YOUR HIGHLIGHT OVER THE PAST WEEK?

I really enjoyed the International Women’s Day Together We Stand panel, I thought it was so nice that everyone was really involved, especially the CEO and other members of the Board. Then, just generally learning about the business and what everyone does, I didn’t really know anything about the industry before and it’s definitely opened my eyes to various roles within media!