Work Experience: Trent Editions case study
Kathryn Langley is a marketing assistant at UBM, an international magazine and business media company. To get to this point in her career she started with work experience at Trent Editions, an academic publisher at Nottingham Trent University where she was studying for a degree in English Literature and Creative Writing.
After approaching Trent Editions herself, they took her on. Contacting companies yourself to arrange work experience will show initiative, something that impresses employers.
As it was a small organisation it meant that Kathryn gained experience in different areas of the business and was introduced to proofreading, indexing, marketing and editorial.
‘I got a chance to get a breadth of experience early on, this meant I could decide what I did and didn't like doing and I realised marketing was the area where I wanted to focus.'
Kathryn's initial assumptions of what a work experience placement would be were photocopying, photocopying and more photocopying! Though there is always an element of basic administrative duties in any placement, Kathryn's advice is:
‘Make the most of it and don't just focus on the actual duties but also concentrate on getting to know the business, the people and hopefully use it as a networking exercise.'
After the Trent Editions placement and then finishing university, Kathryn went on to work at Hot Courses, a database and directory publisher, this time as a marketing assistant and her work placement stood her in good stead.
Though these are testing times for the publishing industry, Kathryn thinks a ‘can do' attitude really helps in the midst of budget cuts:
‘You have to muck in and quickly learn things you might not know anything about, for example, subscriptions. This means I now have one more skill to add to my CV.'
The most important thing for Kathryn was experiencing different areas of the publishing process early on which helped her to focus on what she liked and did best.