Leading up to my graduation from the University of Georgia in May of 2017, I was experiencing a combination of  immeasurable confidence, fear, poise and doubt. I knew I loved my major in public relations, but I also knew I would be landing on my parent’s couch if I couldn’t figure out the direction of my next step. Do I go to grad school and get a degree I might not even use? Do I get stuck in an entry-level job I might hate just for the sake of full-time employment? I finally decided to apply to the Omnicom-Grady Fellowship, a six month program allowing me to intern at an advertising and public relations agency in the Omnicom family to explore my options and see where my strengths and passions fell.

Fast forward to today and I’ve spent three months working at BBDO, an advertising agency, and a month at Porter Novelli (PN) Atlanta in the Technology practice. In just a short amount of time I have already learned and experienced much more than I did in my four years at college (sorry UGA, I love you). So for anyone exploring the marketing communications industry, you’ll want to tune into what I’ve learned so far from my experience.

Let’s Talk Apples and Oranges

Apart from being fruit, apples and oranges cannot be compared. Similarly, advertising and public relations cannot be weighed against each other. Yes, they both deal with communication and clients, but anyone in the industry will tell you the two could not be more different.

One of the major differences between working at BBDO and PN, was that at BBDO I worked on one major client and took ownership of a few ongoing projects, but at PN I am currently working with six clients that each have different needs, projects and operations.

At BBDO I was responsible for managing the social media trafficking for a branch of our client. This ongoing project involved working with four different departments on a daily basis -account management, creative and studio, the media agency and last but also most important the client. Who knew so much went into the creation of a Facebook ad? Getting a glimpse into how an advertising agency operates gave me great appreciation for the urgency of the advertising world, and how to apply what I learned to my final leg of the fellowship at PN.

Advertising is a highly visual environment. You spend hours looking and discussing images, layouts, videos, etc. So after three months of working in advertising, it was time for me to flex my public relations muscles and rejuvenate my skills I had gained in college. In short, it was time to write. After about two weeks I felt truly at home diving into drafting pitches and various documents. That is the great thing about public relations, your writing becomes so adaptable because you are constantly writing for a variety of clients and situations.

If I had to pinpoint a similarity between advertising and public relations, it would have to be that you are communicating for a client to place them in the best light. The tactics and strategies are as different as night and day, but the end goal is helping your client be successful.

Tick, Tock

One of the most important skills you can develop, no matter your profession, is time management. In a given work day at PN, I can work on a total of five different clients or projects. Those eight hours at your desk can go by in the blink of an eye, and the worst feeling is when you sit down to do your timesheet and you don’t remember what you did that day. It is imperative that you keep track of your tasks and responsibilities for the sake of the business. I personally recommend keeping track of time by keeping an ongoing log of your time throughout the day. Having a written record of your daily tasks makes it fast and easy to enter your time at the end of every day.

Seeing Your Work Come To Life

I think one of the best things about working in the communications industry is seeing your hard work coming to life. Even if you played a small role, seeing an ad on TV you helped traffic, having a social media post you created come across your feed or receiving a media hit is a wonderful feeling. It always makes me feel that my work matters because I can see the positive outcomes.

So if you’re like me and find yourself experiencing some uncertainty about your next steps after college, I encourage you to dip your toes in each facet of the industry to find where you will truly thrive. No career, industry, or company is perfect. However, my four short months in the “real world” have taught me to choose the route where the pros outweigh the cons. So grab a life vest, do a cannonball, test out the waters and enjoy the ride! I can’t wait to see what the next two months have in store for me at PN.

If you’re a student at a college or university, you’ll more than likely come across the opportunity to attend a career fair or two. At Porter Novelli (PN), we love going to career fairs because it lets us meet and connect with potential talent. We’re constantly looking for chances to be on campuses (and most of us jump at the chance to go back and visit our respective alma matersJ).

Whether it’s a general job fair, a major-focused fair or a general networking event with a career fair portion, we highly recommend that students attend them – it’s one of many recruitment methods for our summer intern programs and a great way for job seekers to make a personal connection with us outside of submitting a resume online.

However, career fairs can be overwhelming if you’re not adequately prepared. Below, we’ve curated some helpful advice on how you can make the most out of a career fair visit.

1. Do your research and prepare. Find out which employers will be there and research them. Prioritize the companies that you’re most interested in, since you likely won’t have enough time to meet with all employers.  If possible, it would be helpful to obtain a floor map of the career fair so you can map out your route.

2. Come up with insightful questions to ask. Don’t ask questions that you can easily find the answers to online. Ask questions that only employees would have insight into, such as “what’s the culture like?” or “what’s one thing about the office that you really enjoy?”

3. Craft your elevator pitch. Recruiters will most often just ask you to tell them a bit about yourself. Have a concise and interesting pitch ready that tells them what they need to know about your experience and career interests, in under two minutes.

4. Bring your materials. Resumes (and even business cards) are a must! At PN, we review all the resumes we gather from career fairs to see if candidates would be a good fit for our internship. Before you print your resumes off on nice paper, make sure it has been proofread for any errors! If you’re interested in a company and the employee doesn’t ask for your resume, be proactive and offer it to them.

5. Dress appropriately. Dress for the job you want! First impressions matter and bad first impressions matter more.

6. Attend pre-career fair events. Usually career fairs are only a small component of a much larger networking or professional development event. If possible, attend those sessions before or after the career fair. You’ll get some valuable learning in, and will have more opportunities to network with professionals while you’re there.

7. Take notes. It shows that you’re genuinely interested in what employers have to say.

8. Ask recruiters for their info. Make sure you grab a business card and thank them for their time.

9. Follow up. Reach out within a day or two while the event is still fresh in recruiters’ minds and personalize your outreach with something that was discussed in the initial meeting. Bonus points if you add a next step or action like setting up an informational interview or coffee meeting.

There you have it! Do you have any career fair tips that you’d like to share with us? Leave us a comment, and make sure to follow your local Porter Novelli social media accounts to see when we’ll be at a career fair near you!

When you’re in a public relations (PR) role, you read. A lot. Whether it’s general news, industry-specific developments or PR-focused publications, we read it all to get a pulse for what’s going on in the world. It’s crucial to read every day, regardless of where your news comes from (i.e. email newsletters, actual newspapers or even social media accounts). It helps us stay up-to-date on the happenings and ultimately, helps us prepare for anything that will affect our clients. Not to mention, reading in general is great for mental stimulation, stress reduction, stronger analytical skills and more – according to lifehack.org. 

So we thought it’d be a great idea to share the knowledge and ask our Atlanta office, “What are your must-read outlets every day?”

Find answers below that will get you started!

General News:

·TheSkimm

“If you’ve never used it, it gets sent to your inbox every weekday morning between 7-7:30am. It’s a high-level recap of the day before that’s written in a punchy, catchy way. I love it because even if I know it’s going to be a crazy day, and I don’t have time to look at all my usual outlets, I will still be up to date with the top news. I always begin the first couple minutes of my work day with a cup of coffee and looking theSkimm over.”

·CNN

·USA Today

·MSNBC

·ABC

·The New York Times

·The Wall Street Journal

· Mashable

·The Economist

·…and local newspaper news (like the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in Atlanta)

 PR Industry:

·PR Week

“For industry news, comings & goings, etc.”

·AdAge

·AdWeek

·SmartBrief

·PR In Your Pajamas

“It’s a blog run by Elena Verlee that covers everything from effective social media marketing to perfecting practical PR skills. My favorite aspect of it is the coverage on the latest trends and how your brand can tap into them. She’s been covered in Forbes, PR Web, Cision and AdWeek. Coolest part: This blog even has a section that breaks down “What is PR and How Do You Get It?” for news.”

Career Development/Industry-Specific:

·Levo League

·Career Contessa

·Harvard Business Review

“It’s interesting, usually pretty short reads and your boss will be impressed if you reference it.”

·Fast Company

“For creative inspiration and some leadership info.”

·LinkedIn

“I love perusing articles people post on business, leadership, etc. as well as reading published posts from influencers/leaders.”

·Inc.

·WIRED

Overall, we advise you to make sure you’re reading a variety of sources to widen your horizons and switch up your point of view on a topic. The more diverse it is, the better.

It’s a beautiful March day, and you know it’s coming, but suddenly your phone “bings” with a new email and the dread hits. It’s HR with your timed writing assessment and it starts now! Take a seat and a deep breath – you’ve got this! The writing assessment is simply our way of making sure that you have the basic writing skills necessary for your success at Porter Novelli as an intern.

To make you feel more prepared, here are four key lessons you should learn before taking a writing assessment:

Lesson 1 – If you can choose, write about something you know well.

Some writing assessments give you a few topics to choose from, or even let you pick one of your own. While writing about something relevant to the company you’re applying for is always a plus, it’s really smart to write about something you already know! It’s better to write well about a topic you are familiar with than to try to research and pick a new topic that you might not write as eloquently about. And keep in mind – the people reviewing your writing assessment are likely reviewing a number of them, so being original and making it interesting will make their job more enjoyable.

Lesson 2 – Set goals for yourself.

You’re given two hours to take the writing assessment, so set goals for what you want to have complete by what time, taking into consideration how long each assignment will take.

Figure out what piece of the assessment will take you the longest and be sure you give yourself adequate time without cutting it too close anywhere else. Two hours may sound like a long time, but it can go quickly, and planning will help ensure you have time to get to everything.

Lesson 3 – Proof it!

You know your writing skills are strong and your computer is equipped with spell check, but there is no substitute for proofreading once you are done. Be sure to build in time to make sure that everything is correct and flows well. I always recommend reading your writing out loud to yourself – that is a surefire way to catch a lot of errors that might be lurking.

Lesson 4 – We aren’t trying to trick you!

One time when I took a writing assessment I found a typo on a media list I was supposed to use as a basis for some of the assignment. I remember staring at it and wondering if this was a trick: am I supposed to correct it and show my editing prowess? Or am I supposed to ignore it so I don’t look like I’m correcting the people I’m interviewing with? I may never know if that typo was there on purpose or not and if my correcting it helped or didn’t impact my chances at all. The moral of this story is that we aren’t trying to trick you. Simply do your best, double check your work at the end and feel confident in the abilities you bring to the table.

If you’ve made it to the writing assessment phase of the PN intern process, you’ve already shown some serious talent. You can go into the writing assessment with confidence and know that you are well equipped to do your best as long as you make the time count, working quickly and carefully. And remember, as an intern you aren’t expected to be 100% perfect. When we review your writing assessment, we’ll look for the basic skills as well as your attention to detail, and be prepared to help teach you the rest once you (fingers crossed!) join our team.  

Ask any PNer what they like about working at Porter Novelli (PN) and they’ll give you a few answers – either the people, the impactful work or most of all, the culture.

Workplace culture is important to us and it shows! Our culture focuses on the employees because we believe that happy employees à better work à happy clients! In addition to all our awesome company-wide benefits, a staple of workplace culture in the PN Atlanta office includes circles.

A circle is similar to a committee or club based on interests. Anyone can create a circle and anyone can join one. A few of the circles we’ve had at PN: wellness, social impact and sustainability, diversity, mischief, foodie and FUN.

The fun circle is responsible all things fun and casual in the office, such as:

Woo Week.

Woo Week is arguably the best week of the year. Every year around Valentine’s Day (we just finished it two weeks ago!), we have people opt in to Woo Week and assign everyone a “wooee” that they’ll spend the entire week showering with gifts, treats and thoughtful notes. It’s all done in secret and it’s exciting to watch people try to guess who their wooer is. At the end of the week, we host an event where all wooers reveal themselves over Valentine-themed snacks and drinks.

The Turn-Up Trolley.

#ThirstyThursday is real! Every Thursday we have a cart filled with snacks and beverages that goes around from cube to cube. Each week we designate an employee in the office to go around and ask a get-to-know-you question for a treat. This gives us a break from work and allows us to get to know everyone better!

Summer kickball.

Every summer, we grab all our athletes (lol) and join a kickball league in Atlanta. This allows us all to get out of the office and hang out with our coworkers in a non-work environment.

Other monthly (and sometimes spontaneous) events.

In addition to celebrating the typical holidays (St. Patty’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, Fourth of July, Halloween, etc.) we also make sure to showcase the quirkier holidays, such as National Grilled Cheese Day, Pi Day, Picnic Day and National Ice Cream Sundae Day. Our office is competitive in sports, so every year we host a college football kickoff tailgate in our office as well.

And, sometimes, we do spontaneous lunches for the office for no reason! Just as a nice surprise.

Offsite and holiday party.

In addition to the weekly and monthly events, the fun circle is also responsible for planning our yearly company offsite and holiday party. The offsite usually takes place in late summer/early fall, while the holiday party is held in December.

The offsite is another way for the office to get together and hang out in some capacity – whether that’s doing a scavenger hunt at the Atlanta Zoo, chilling at Monday Night Brewing or volunteering our time doing service work.

The holiday party is a time for us to gather and reflect on the great year we’ve had, and we go all out – DJ, food, drinks, photo booth, and more!

The fun circle is just one way to boost workplace culture and office morale. The fun circle – and other circles—help people to become more engaged in the company and make it an enjoyable place to work.

We’d love to hear from you! What is important to you when it comes to workplace culture? Hit up our comment box and let us know!

My journey started almost two years ago with an internship at CARE, an Atlanta-based global humanitarian agency that has strong ties with Porter Novelli (PN). The role, unbeknownst to me, would end up being a crucial stepping stone that would lead me to an entry-level role at my dream agency. During my six-month-long run at CARE, I was introduced to media monitoring and measurement. I was pulling together monthly monitoring reports, analyzing topics covered in the media and learning more and more every day the value coding, monitoring and analytics brings to a brand. Shortly after I graduated, I began working at Porter Novelli on the Radar team, which allowed me to jump in head-first into a crisis monitoring role. You’re probably thinking, what in the world are you talking about and how does this apply to PR? Let me explain.

Here at Porter Novelli, Radar provides clients with a host of capabilities, including real-time social, traditional and broadcast monitoring. Let me give you a few examples of the work we do on Radar. A client, or PN account member, might tap Radar for a request to monitor a client-specific or industry-related issue. We’re then able to assess whether the deliverable should be quick email updates covering conversation and trends discussed among traditional media outlets and social networks, or whether we should take a deeper dive into the issue and deliver a comprehensive report. Since we are on a crisis team, we have to always be prepared to take on any project thrown our way. However, aside from one-off crisis requests, Radar also has ongoing daily, weekly and monthly work that revolves around tracking and coding data. We’re able to show clients results that reflect their media outreach efforts – something that will always be invaluable for any of our accounts.

My favorite part about my job is having the opportunity to work with such an incredibly smart, efficient and hard-working team, who I quickly considered my family. In addition to my talented team members, this role lets me work across all practices and across offices, which has made me a better-rounded employee. Being on a smaller team has forced me to grow rather quickly, which has in turn given me executive visibility and allowed me to add great value for not only our clients but PN’s global network. My hope for each eager intern hopeful is that you push yourself. Challenge yourself. Take risks. If you have an opportunity to join the Radar team as an intern, something a bit off track from your traditional account role, take it! I mentioned my time at CARE to say my passion for what I get to do every day here at PN was uncovered after I took an opportunity a bit out of my comfort zone. It has led me to an incredible opportunity and awesome start to my career.

#DataOrItDidntHappen.

Did you know that public relations (PR) agencies aren’t totally comprised of traditional account teams anymore? At least, Porter Novelli (PN) isn’t, and it never was. We started as an agency driven by data, research and insights and have continued to grow and develop these areas in the business so that we can provide sound recommendations for our clients.

One of the fastest-growing areas in the PR  industry is analytics. As more clients want evidence and data to justify their spending on PR programs, we’ve been able to build out a robust analytics network at PN to back up our recommendations. At PN, analytics falls under the broader umbrella of SPAR (Strategic Planning, Analytics and Research), and in the U.S. specifically, we have analytics teams in New York City, Atlanta, San Francisco and D.C.

                                            ATL analytics team

What does analytics work entail? A lot of things. We help clients develop measurable goals and figure out what metrics align with those goals. We conduct social media listening analyses to figure out how clients are being discussed in every day conversation. We do landscape analyses to show clients where they stand in their industry with competitors. Everything we do is based on measurement and evaluation.

The cool thing about working in analytics (along with other “specialty” practices) is that we have the opportunity to work across all practices at PN: technology, consumer, healthcare, etc. We are able to learn about a variety of topics, and because there are only a few offices with analytics teams, we also get to work with teams in offices across the network.

                                               U.S. SPAR team

And my favorite thing about working in analytics is that it never gets boring. Projects span across a variety of clients, industries and project types, and the field is constantly evolving as traditional and social media platforms change too. The team operates on a “work hard, play hard” mentality. We have fun, play pranks and we get nominated for awards.

                                                     #Winning

So what background does an analyst need? As there is an increased demand for analytics and measurement across the PR industry, what skills are being sought out?

Fortunately, I didn’t have to come in as an intern with analytics knowledge – just an eagerness to learn. I actually majored in PR and communications studies at the University of Georgia and started at PN as a digital intern. As I continued working at PN, I realized that I had an interest in analytics, and I was lucky enough to have some great mentors who taught me what I needed to know.

Analytics will certainly continue to grow in the PR industry, which means that there will be a need for talent and people interested in that career tract. If interested, I highly recommend that students at the very least take courses to become familiar with Excel, or if your school is with the times, there might already be a class focused on measurement in PR. Familiarity with social media and other digital platforms desired. In summary: it’s a growing field with a bright future!

Every August, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) hosts the National Conference for Healthcare Communication, Marketing and Media. This event is affectionately referred to by the Porter Novelli (PN) Atlanta office as “NCHCMM” (pronounced “nich-um”).

Because several branches and divisions of CDC account for such a large portion of PN Atlanta’s Health + Social Impact client base, our team takes the opportunity to sponsor, exhibit and present at NCHCMM very seriously. For PN Atlanta, NCHCMM offers a fantastic opportunity for us to showcase our range of capabilities to current and potential clients.

To attendees, PN is a social impact powerhouse, represented by the many of the passionate PN Health + Social Impact team members that work directly on projects that impact the well-being of others every day – that’s true. However, what attendees don’t realize is the amount of collaboration that takes place leading up to the conference, and the level of ownership that new and junior staff is trusted with to make the event a success. For NCHCMM 2016, we (Katie Cartwright and Kristen Ellis) were honored to be selected to play a large role in the planning process as interns.

As an intern, the idea of playing such a crucial part in preparing for a large visibility opportunity on behalf of PN was, at first glance, intimidating. Instead of cowering away from the opportunity and opting out, we embraced the challenge alongside our colleagues of every level. No task was too big or too small. Together, we decided that our focus would be on helping attendees understand the importance of telling a compelling story through the most relevant channels to their audience. To help highlight this, our booth was dedicated to learnings about Generation Z, the next emerging healthcare audience, and how to reach them through Snapchat.

Everyone on the Health + Social Impact team had an important role in making the event a success – from planning the Snapchat filter to be used throughout the conference, to securing the speaker for our spotlight session, to drafting and designing the one-pagers that would be discussed at our booth – and our team was not shy to share the responsibility with two new, but passionate and excited, team members. We were trusted to lead various pieces of PN’s NCHCMM presence, not out of laziness or disinterest of our team members, but as an opportunity to prove ourselves as dedicated team members.

The three days of the conference were some of the busiest and most rewarding days of our budding careers. While working the booth, we really marveled at the incredible feeling we got from sharing the impact PN has in working with such dedicated clients. The CDC’s efforts promote the importance of healthcare and well-being to countless audiences, and we were struck by talking about the magnitude of influence health promotion efforts have and how far-reaching their influences are. On the flip side, we were blown away as people approached the booth proclaiming, “Porter Novelli? I know you guys! You were behind that incredible campaign that our team adores!” It was a special reminder to appreciate the value of our hard work each day, and seeing the smiling faces sharing insights from the field with us at our booth produced some incredible memories we won’t soon forget.

In addition, bonding with our senior coworkers on a new level brought us a “warm fuzzy feeling” of camaraderie and teamwork. We feel that twinge of joy every day at PN, but as we stood by those we look up to at NCHCMM, it was a little something extra. We were so inspired to be part of a team who has a real purpose driving our work each day – to make the lives of those we impact a little bit better, brighter and more meaningful. NCHCMM really brought all we’d learned about PN’s commitment to social impact during our internship to the forefront and made us even prouder to be part of the incredibly inspirational office that we call home.

Katie Cartwright, Account Coordinator, Health + Social Impact Practice