Since my last blog (way back in October) I’ve worked with three fantastic teams who have all taught me various things about the world of PR and media relations that I had never considered in my pre-Edelman days. Since working with Digital, Healthcare and Consumer, I can honestly say that a Twitter feed is not just a Twitter feed, a drug announcement is not just a drug announcement and magazine coverage is not just magazine coverage.

In my time with Digital, I learnt how to write web copy for different clients with dramatically varying audiences (a Puma After Hours Athlete travel guide one day to a girlie music fan the next), gathered and presented social media insights for leading law firm Allen and Overy, online listened (yep, that’s a thing) for Shell and Covent Garden, helped out with community management tasks for the Dove Global Facebook pages and compiled a weekly newsletter for a global blue chip communications company. I also learnt the (very basics) of data and engagement insights and what they mean for a social media platform. Similarly, using Sysomos, Buddy Media and CoTweet on a daily basis opened my eyes to just how much work goes into maintaining a brand identity (and therefore a consistent brand voice) whilst increasing online engagement. My time with the lovely Digital team saw a visit from the guys at Facebook, many Knowledge Shares, a pub golf session, a karaoke-off, Krispy Kremes in abundance and a great event with a former Digital/Consumer client Best Buy where we, er, met Chipmunk. (Amazing!) 

Moving onto my time with Healthcare, I spent a great deal of time composing coverage reports for many different and dramatically varying Healthcare accounts such as Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, HIV drug Edurant, anti-depressant Seroquel, smoking cessation drug Champix, cystic fibrosis drug Vertex and coronary drug Brilinta. I also spent my time compiling case study research, completed a daily reports on Research and Development pharmaceutical news, learnt the importance of grammatical accuracy with daily CHAMPIX (the ever necessary capitals) reports alongside establishing a solid grounding of what consitutes ’client relevant’ news for the Global Vertex cystic fibrosis report. As the other grads have said, the not so healthy (but very, very lovely) Healthcare provided lots and lots of cake, a ‘classy pod’ Christmas decorating competition and lots of patient and friendly faces who made my Healthcare PR experience a thoroughly enjoyable one.

As for now, I’m currently in JCPR, Edelman’s consumer team who look after a range of accounts such as Puma, Xbox, Unilever and Shell amongst many, many others. To date, I’ve had lots of great varied tasks including sending out press samples, calling magazines to pull together research for speculative reader events, new business research for things as varied as researching historians one day to fruit baskets and Turkish food the next. I’ve also completed PureVia Media Relations, Xbox mounting, travel research, Unilever daily newsletters alongside many, many other things. From the music (last week we had a lot of Etta James, today drum and bass…) to the tasks, no two days in JC are ever, ever the same, something that most definitely works to their advantage.

However, the fun as an Edelman grad doesn’t just fall between the (non-existent) departmental walls, in the last three months we had an AMAZING Christmas party at Circus, numerous Gorkana breakfasts, an eye-opening training session in Crisis Management, a great one on one writing session with a former tabloid editor, a fantastic creative brainstorming session where we learnt to really get to the heart of a brand and a really great (I’m running out of superlatives…) training session with a Healthcare AD regarding best practice and managing client relations. I even brushed up my skills with an IT Power Hour (you should see my inbox now, I’m all over those rules!) and had a ton of online training to work through from My Edelman University (as of yesterday, I’m a black belt in social media….oh yes!)

I’ve also helped out at the Edelman Crystal Ball and Trust events and even got to meet some fellow Edel’s from Denmark and Germany who flew over to complete our worldwide TalentEd project (in which our campaign came second, yay!).

So, that’s the last three months. If you’re still reading and aren’t bound to me by birth, I’d take a pretty solid guess that you’re reading because you’re thinking of applying for the Edelman Scheme this year. Like I know Rosie said before, so much of what we experience as Edelman Grads really does make you feel incredibly lucky. You work alongside the best brains, on the best clients and get to see your awareness of PR and communications grow on a day by day basis. If you’re as lucky as us, you’ll also get a pretty great network in terms of your fellow grads who remain your constant lunch buddies in the whirlwind of being a perpetual newbie.

I’ve absolutely loved my time at Edelman so far and would encourage anyone to apply this year.

The prospect of beginning the scheme in the Healthcare department was a little daunting. My previous PR experience was in a corporate department, and I was worried that I would feel out of my depth in the world of Health PR. I don’t have a science background (literature and languages are more my thing) and hoped this wouldn’t hinder my understanding of the sector. However, the team was extremely welcoming and put me at ease from the off. They are all very knowledgeable of the intricacies of the industry and were able to answer my numerous questions. Like doctors, the Healthcare team-members focus on their own specialist areas; for example, you might go to one person for nuanced in-depth review of the oncology sector, while someone else might know everything there is to know about international regulations around HIV vaccine distribution. In this way, like a microcosm of a general hospital, Edelman’s Healthcare team can deliver PR to clients in all different areas of the Healthcare industry.

The work I was given plunged me straight into several different projects; I was particularly keen to be able to help draft internal emails and newsletters in my first week. I also jumped at the opportunity to help with preparations for a new business pitch which provided me with a real insight into how a pitch snowballs from the prospective client’s first brief to the delivery of a well-crafted pitch deck. I helped provide research into the relevant market and competitors, and this served also to educate me in this often complex industry populated with rules, regulations and difficult-to-pronounce brand names. As well as this research, subscriptions to trade newsletters and journals were extremely useful in keeping me up-to-date with the latest developments – I found The Lancet and Scrip both particularly informative outlets.

I realised two important things by the end of my rotation. Firstly, that for the sake of my own health I really would have to start refusing the constant flow of ‘treats’ that passed through the department and secondly, that I had only brushed the tip of the pharmaceutical iceberg. There is a whole lot going on in the world of medicine socially, politically and economically. It hums away quietly without most of us noticing it. The amount of work involved in bringing new treatments to market is colossal, and Edelman’s work is a key part of this lengthy process.

So far my limited number of blog posts have all been quite “work” focused– but life at Edelman is so much more than that. Take last Thursday night for example. The ‘Edel-Spook X Factor Karaoke Competition’. My current department, Healthcare took on Spook, my old department in the karaoke competition to end all singing contests. Forget X-Factor, Edelman is where the talent is (well maybe/probably /absolutely not).  In a private room in a Chinese restaurant near our office, the finger food and white wine was flowing. All the classics came out from Spice Girls to Stevie Wonder to MC Hammer, and even I, who despises karaoke joined in on as many songs as I could and belted Bonnie Tyler until my voice had disappeared. Fortunately, no photographic evidence of the night has surfaced…yet, but watch this space in case it does!

It was an amazingly fun night and just another reason why I am loving life as an Edelman Grad so much; having worked with both departments I knew pretty much everyone there and had just as much fun chatting with my favourite intern as I did the MD. In and out of work the people and atmosphere at Edelman are second to none.

No one has the same opportunity us grads do to try so much and meet so many people. We’re pretty lucky I guess.

Some other quick examples:

Pedalo racing in Hyde Park with Spook:

Halloween Decorating Competition with Healthcare:

Now back to planning the next big night out working hard.

I have definitely discovered a passion for social media and digital marketing that I never knew existed. When I see Facebook, I now see beyond status updates and photos of my friends. I see engagement analytics and insights. I have not only become a regular Tweeter but I actually enjoy it, those 14o characters a more powerful than I ever thought, those few words could make or break a brand or campaign in an instant. My LinkedIn profile is now up-to-date and I may even venture onto FourSquare and Flickr in the near future! I am truly a digital convert and I credit this to a number of things I experienced n this department that I just don’t have space to get in to but two in particular.

1. The wonderfully friendly, fun and helpful characters who grace Spook Media, First42nd and Edelman Digital from Account Execs, to my lovely line manager all the way up to the amazing team of Directors. They were all always there to talk me though tasks, answer my questions, get a drink with and in the case of TFI Fridays engage in a pedalo race. Digital creates a unique atmosphere that makes working hard all day never really feel like work.
2. The lengthy list of clients I had the pleasure of working on.  My experiences alone are enviable let alone the entire client list! This is a brief (well I tried at least) run down of who I worked for and a taster of the sort of tasks I was lucky enough to undertake.

• Leading Tech Brand: With a social media presence of over 20 million fans, it was a great learning experience to help manage, monitor and write content for this brand’s platforms and assist with pulling data to analyse and create insights about engagement rates, fan profiles, commerce drivers and so on for reports and conducting research into new strategies and general social media insights every week.
• Best Buy: A huge social media presence in the US, the UK are hoping to follow suit and I got involved with writing content for all their platforms and the admin for their ‘Thumb’s Up Price Down’ deals tab on Facebook.
• Allen&Overy: I would never have put social media and leading law firm together but as I’m quickly discovering digital marketing applies to anything and everything. For Allen&Overy I was responsible for running and reporting on a whole Twitter campaign for the launch of their 50 Degrees East survey. I wrote some Tweets, posted them daily, monitored and reacted to responses and pulled and analysed data which I used to report on the success of the campaign.
• Anglo American: This mining giant was another very unexpected client but they are in the process of launching themselves across several social media platforms and I helped in drafting ‘About Us’ sections for them and starting to build albums for Flickr.
• Ballymore: Yet again, a corporate client in Digital surprises me. For this property development company I helped conduct a landscape analysis which in (very) short involved looking at social media activity and conversation that could relate to this client and their purpose and drawing practical insights from what I found.
• Dove: As one of my all time favourite brands it was a pleasure to work on Dove. I assisted with building sections of the Dove Development Deck including a profile of ‘The Dove Woman’ based on fan data from Facebook and ‘truths’ about how the Dove Women (from their top 5 markets) engage on Facebook, and how they respond to different content. This was a really interesting task for a truly iconic brand that’s made me love Dove even more.

So, that wasn’t as concise as I hoped it would be, but I wanted to make sure I did my time in Digital justice. All that’s left to say is a huge thank you to the whole team, I loved every second. And here’s to my next rotation in Healthcare!

When it came to crunch time a couple of weeks ago, I was swinging in roundabouts. One day thinking ‘yes definitely x department’, the next day ‘no that department’, the following day ‘but what about this department’ – you can imagine how this continued. I’m normally a pretty decisive person, but this was ridiculous! The factors I considered were a) client accounts b) future progression and c) the people. The thing with Edelman is that each department has exciting, big name clients. The other thing with Edelman is that each department considers your future and will help you in career decisions. The third thing with Edelman is that each department has amazing people…you can see my problem here! The people I must say are talented, dedicated, intelligent and truly welcoming. As a grad you are lucky enough to learn from some of the crème de la crème in the industry.

So what were the highlights of my eight months?

• Working with some Digital pioneers in Spook. The world of communication is changing with the advancements in technology, and what better place to learn about the importance of social media than in our very own award winning Digital team. Try exciting campaigns such as Levi’s® Shape What’s To Come and Puma’s After Hours Athlete
• Meeting Boris Johnson at an event I helped organise on behalf of Douglas&Gordon whilst working in Corp&Fin. Actually hilarious! A point to note about Corp&Fin is the variety in work – a dream for any graduate. From issues and crisis management, to CSR platforms, award ceremonies  and of course the all important media liaison
• My first ever red carpet event at the Xbox Halo: Reach launch, working with some consumer PR gurus to organise a celeb-tastic event and then watching the fantastic pieces of coverage appear
• Pitching for new business whilst in the Public Affairs team. Understanding the insights which are essential in forming strategy, context and desired outcomes
• Working in a global hub at Tech was priceless. I was lucky enough to be involved in brainstorming and then implementing campaign ideas both on a central and local level
• Improving a weakness in Healthcare. I’ve never been a perfectionist and sometimes attention to detail can suffer. To work well in Healthcare you have to study the small print and this was the ideal opportunity to put my weakness to the test and sort it

Any conclusions? Yes….the graduate scheme is truly invaluable. The tools it equips you with, the friends you make and the interests you pick up can only but increase your employment prospects and that’s the whole point, right?

Sure I returned to the glorious duties of media monitoring and collating some biggie reports, but I also got round to assisting with a client event in a major way and doing meatier work like selling in stories, referencing expert sound bites from doctors, sorting out suppliers and fulfilling research requests from affiliate offices.

It always amazes me how global the work I do at Edelman is – and nowhere is that more evident that in the Healthcare team. Working on the Healthcare team is a real eye-opener for realizing how universal healthcare issues are and how central companies are to the process of improving people’s health around the world.

Within the first week of being on the team again, I had the responsibility of lending a hand to a US-based Edelman team that was coming over to work with a client on a 2-day communication seminar, including a crisis training exercise which I had the pleasure of assisting. Sure there was loads of printing and logistics to sort, but it was great being a key player on the team and ensuring the smooth running of the crisis training session. Smooth running of a crisis training session  – sounds like a bit of an oxymoron? J). Seeing people who probably don’t get much face time pull together in a mock crisis was very rewarding. During the session, a whirlwind of stories were escalating while bells were dinging and calls were coming in left right and center from the media and the public demanding responses. The training was a real case in point that knowing how to consult one another is just as important as knowing what to do. Not only that, but I got to meet some great people and witness some exceptional expertise at play from both our client and Edelman!

Oddly enough, each rotation I do feels a bit shorter, but my oh my, do I seem to get more done! This included having a little spare time – I rolled up my sleeves (not to mention donated a few) and did what I could for Edelman Boutique, our annual in house boutique jumble sale which this year benefited Leonard Cheshire Disability. I even got in a few productive lunches – including a lunch and learn session about billing management and a general contact lunch with the graphic head of the healthcare media company Anything After 9 (AA9). I’ve since signed up for three training sessions – (courtesy of Edelman University!), we’ll see how these go soon enough I am sure. . . .

That’s progress for you, I really enjoyed working with people I didn’t get a chance to work with before and can’t wait to enter the realms of Corporate and Finance! xC

Well it could be due to the all-round personality of the team. They are the most supportive I’ve come across so far – you even have two line managers, and workload has never been a problem. They are an incredibly friendly, intelligent bunch and are always present at the bar on Thursday – now that’s my kind of team! Happy to help with any questions, but what is most striking is that they are always on call to help each other. Teamwork to a Tee.

Maybe it could be due to their clients. Healthcare is the ‘big bucks’! With leading pharmaceutical companies as clients, the revenue this department brings in is phenomenal, especially being run on a global scale. I guess this makes one more diligent and cautious in any task, however routine or new. It heightens the importance of your work. I certainly felt it!

Or it could be down to what this work actually encompasses. How many people can say they make a difference to peoples’ lives through the work they do? Not many. Seeing and understanding the effects of medical treatments created by the Edelman pharma clients makes your work all the more worthwhile. From helping to raise awareness of pneumococcal disease, to the ever-growing concerns of mental health diseases, these are just two examples of the many treatments which Edelman has seen grow successfully.

Or finally it could be due to their Gleedelman performance! For some, maybe this is the case, but personally, work which is challenging, stimulating and potentially life changing – who wouldn’t want to be a part of that!

Find out more at http://www.edelman.co.uk/what-we-do/health-and-medical-education and http://maryfizzy.blogspot.com/

So what now?!

Heather and Clare have both been offered positions in two of the departments at the company which is fantastic news. Unfortunately my two chosen departments do not have a position for a grad and so no job for me. However, PA (one of my two choices) have offered me an internship with them for three months.

Therefore I will be doing a similar role as I did through out the grad scheme but for three months. The most exciting part is that I will be going back to them two weeks before the general election. Things will be extremely exciting and it will be fantastic experience! As there wasn’t any possibility of a permanent position with them this is definitely the next best thing, I wouldn’t want to be in a department where I was suited to the work.

Even if I leave Edelman at the end of the internship I will have gotten a year’s fantastic experience with the company to take me into another position, hopefully. I have begun to think about what I would like to do after the internship.

At 24 (yes ok nearly 25 *shudder*)  it’s time to begin to seriously think about where I want to focus my career and I think it will either be in Public Affairs or Sport. I am also doing a course in PR and Events which will give me further experience and skills in the industry. This together with a part time job and working at Edelman keep me extremely busy.

I’m with the Healthcare department for my final rotation and the team are really lovely – especially my pod and the two pods next to me but like Clare said the treats are vast and it is difficult to resist.

I have started cycling to and from work each day (two weeks in) and getting here for 8 and leaving a bit earlier (5 or a bit after) so that I have still worked 9 hours but the extra was at the beginning of the day. The routine is possible in the this department and due to the way my body works it is great because it gives me a break before going home to do uni work.I work better in the morning and the fresh air and lack of people on my commute puts me in a good, awake mood.

I have to say that the work at Healthcare has been extremely interesting but I prefer the type of work in PA as I am not the most scientifically minded. However it has been fantastic experience.

I have made some great friends here – especially the other interns and grads and I’m lucky enough to live near some of them. Hopefully we will keep in touch even if I do leave after the internship.

So at the moment the future is not certain – I will be looking around for positions whilst doing the internship and hopefully the next role I’m offered will be the perfect one!

The next blog I will be writing is one when I eventually manage to do a bit of travelling – but that wont be for a few years – but maybe I’ll be working on a few others in the meantime.

Overall the Graduate Scheme at Edelman has been fantastic. To have worked in each of the four departments for two months has enabled us to be immersed into teams and really get a taste of the type of work the company does. Since September Edelman have won wuite a few awards and also celebrated many pitch wins. This company if a fantastic place to be and I have received extremely positive feedback from its presence on my CV. I recommend this scheme to every potential PR!

I want to wish Maggie, Livi, Francesca, Erin, Charlotte, Louise, Natalie, Clare and Heather lots of luck with the rest of their time at the company (however long it will be), and thank everyone from all four departments and everyone whom I’ve worked with for all their support and help.

Signing off now..

I was very apprehensive going into this hardworking area of the office. I have very little political background – I only studied political history until GSCE level and a bit of political philosophy during my degree. I had become interested in UK politics during recent years as I got older and changes in government/bills began to affect my day to day life. As a country girl I was one of the many to march in Hyde Park about the hunting ban, and David Cameron is my home MP for Witney, so I was looking forward to learning more about this world.

I didn’t know what to expect in terms of work when I started three weeks ago. Clare was here before me and she told me about some of it and the clients’ accounts she worked on, but nothing prepared me. In my first week (first week of January) the buzz word was new business so I was doing lots of research into new ideas. I was also shown how to do some monitoring for press mentions about one of the clients and research for clients in the news.

PA deals with so many different aspects of client work that every day is different.

In the second week everything began to get very busy as I was asked to help with work for a new and really exciting client. I also asked if it would be possible to help on one of the new pitches and was able to do some research, so at least I can feel I helped, a bit!

With the General Election coming up there is work related to Parliament, with some work for Reed in Partnership where I was liasing with MP offices and writing biographies. David (the new intern) and I have also been asked to put together biographies to help the team in their preparation for the Election period. This is helping me to learn more and more about current UK politics and also about how the team works.

The team have been fantastic, when I came in Paul (my line manager) was on holiday and Lyndsey, Peter and Mark took care of me. When Paul came back he has helped me to get to work on some great clients and asked me who I would like to work on and if there is anything I feel I haven’t done yet.

Last night Spook challenged the office to a pub quiz – It was great fun as the  PA team are competitive and we did manage to win! No hard feelings ‘eh Marcus – but we did beat you by a little bit. Plus anyone who says there were too many PA related questions – our best rounds were Literature and Food and Drink!! It was a really good opportunity to get to know more of the team who have made me feel very welcome.

I’ve got four and a half weeks left with this team during the grad scheme and then it will be on to Healthcare (my last rotation). The new grads have started now – there are three more girls to make up a pretty good group of us, together with the interns David and Olivia (who I have met). I was very pleased that Francesca joined the grad scheme after being an intern at Corporate with me, and I wish Francesca, Erin and Maggie loads of luck.

Work wise I have been given new things to work on, as well as still carrying out daily reports and monitoring. Anna, my line manager even asked if there was anything I thought I wasn’t getting to work on.

The build up to the Christmas party is beginning to get into flow. I have volunteered to be part of the stage management team – this is the chance for me to be involved as much as possible without being on stage (get a bit of stage fright!). On Friday we had a sort of rehearsal party. This was in the theme of Pirates (a not so secret love of one of the Spook team). We got dressed up and took part in a treasure hunt. This I am pleased to say we won – after an extremely loud rendition of ‘What shall we do with the drunken sailor?” I suspect that the image of people racing through the office dressed as pirates searching for items was extremely amusing, as well as a little bit weird!

I am now getting to do more challenging things, using many tools that I will use in the future for research and reports in other practices. I’m getting to dip into the big consumer clients as well as tech and healthcare ones on a daily basis.

Heather, Clare and I have announced that we will be wanting everyone to think pink on 30th October, with more details to follow as we get closer. This is our first separate project so fingers crossed it all goes well.

Last week we got some great feedback out our work in the teams, which has really boosted my confidence, just hope I can keep it up!