Claire N.
About me
| Claire N. | |
| Social and Political Science | |
| Politics and Economics and Social History | |
| Undergraduate | |
| 2000 | |
| United Kingdom |
My employment
| Director of Marketing & Business Development | |
| Business Development Matters Ltd | |
| United Kingdom | |
| Advertising, marketing and PR | |
| 2007 |
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A day in the life of a Director of Marketing & Business Development in the United Kingdom
Courses taken since graduation
Chartered Institute of Marketing Postgraduate Diploma
Where I hope to be in 5 years
This year I hope to develop a small portfolio of clients and work in a way that allows me to spend a significant amount of time with my young children.
My advice to students considering work
Being able to apply what you learn in a way that is valuable to an organisation is the key to differentiating yourself from the competition. Being able to explain at interview how you have used your learning and experiences to achieve your goals or fix a problem really stands out. Enthusiasm and willingness to role your sleeves up and get involved also makes a great first impression when you start a job.
About this sector: Professional services is a great starting point for a new graduate - a firm will typically have a large number of clients (different business types) in different industry sectors. You can gain a lot of experience and insights quickly. These firms are always changing, so there is lots of opportunity to develop and grow your career and the demand for professional services remains high in the UK and is growing fast in a number of emerging international markets.
My advice about working in my industry
Professional services is a great starting point - a firm will typically have a large number of clients (different business types) in different industry sectors. You can gain a lot of experience and insights quickly. These firms are always changing, so there is lots of opportunity to develop and grow your career and the demand for professional services remains high in the UK and is growing fast in a number of emerging international markets.
What I do
I now work for myself providing consulting and interim services to a wide range of professional services firms. I help with:
Interim business development and marketing support - providing senior experienced short term resource in the event of unexpected absence or periods of exceptional workload
Getting started - advice on creating and help implementing a business development and marketing programme for your business as a whole or specifically for newly formed or under performing areas
Improving results - advice and implementation support on how you can get better results from the time and cash you have to invest
Overcoming barriers to success - analysis, advice and support on how to overcome key issues identified as barriers to successfully delivering your business development, marketing or profile raising strategies
Client relationship management - advice and support for professionals on how to improve their performance and develop sustainable, defendable and profitable relationships
Delivering strategic projects - providing leadership and management for key strategic initiatives that are facing implementation challenges, possibly caused by a lack of focused resourcing or not having the right expertise in the business
Skills I use and how I developed them
Extracurricular skills:
Strategy, Sales, Marketing, Communication, Planning and Budgeting, Management (People, Financial, Resources).
A combination of formal training and experience gained on the job. I was also fortunate to work for a wide range of people I could learn from.
What I like most
Professional services firms are complex environments. To get results I have to both be an expert professional, but also be able to effectively work with a huge range of stakeholders and personality types. It challenges me.
What I like least
Professional services firms are often very political organisations - this can prevent the right things been done quickly.
Next steps...
If you like the look of Claire’s profile, the next steps are down to you! You can send Claire a message to find out more about their career journey.