Creating a Career I Love: Learning About the Industry and Myself

Hello everyone! My name is Briana Schneekloth. I am a Senior Advertising Major in the Account Management Concentration, and I am currently wrapping up my internship at Pierce Coté: A Regan Communications Company. As I move rapidly towards the start of my senior year, I have been considering what my future will look like, and what sort of role I see myself in as I step into my career. For the past eight weeks, I have been exposed to all aspects of working in an advertising agency, from account management to art direction. As I explored the agency world, I was also able to explore my own goals.

With this being my first internship, I really didn’t know what to expect. I had heard horror stories about internships where interns are barely given the time of day, spending hours on busy work and learning next to nothing. As I got started, I realized this would not be that kind of experience. Within my first week, I was already doing research, participating in meetings, and being introduced to clients that I would work with over the course of my internship. 

One of the things that I found so interesting in my internship experience was the industrial diversity among the agency’s clients. The accounts held by Pierce Coté fall into many different industries, and each requires a different point of view. The kind of marketing an entertainment company needs is extremely different from the marketing a financial institution requires. As an advertiser, knowing about the clients you work with and their needs is more important than anything else. You can always learn the skills, but you need to first know the topics. It is impossible to market for a company without any background knowledge. When you work at an advertising agency, you need to know a great deal about all of your clients. Learning about all of the different industries keeps the job interesting. There is always something new to learn, a different campaign to work on, and another opportunity to grow.

I have always been passionate about so many things. I am much more than a one trick pony, and I need creativity like I need air to breathe. Being able to flex creative muscles that I don’t always get to work out is such a treat, and its so much easier to be creative when you are always learning something new. For someone who loves to learn, an agency like Pierce Coté was the perfect place to be.