Students, alumni and parents were treated to a stellar line-up of panellists for ACS Cobham's 'Get Ready for Careers in Media and Communications' event in January, featuring leading lights in PR, digital advertising, print and broadcast media, all with a connection to ACS.
Jennifer (Jo) Ogunleye - B2B Communications Lead, Google (ACS Hillingdon alumna, Class of 2009)
Claire Valoti - VP EMEA at Snapchat (Friend of ACS)
David Weigel - Washington Post Political Correspondent (ACS Cobham alumnus, Class of 2000)
Tina Kraus - Senior Producer, CBS News (Current ACS Cobham Parent)
The importance of stories, finding your passion and stepping outside of your comfort zone were all themes to emerge when a stellar line-up of media and communications professionals shared their experience and tips for success to the next generation.
Each with a link to ACS, the distinguished panel feature two alumni - Jennifer (Jo) Ogunleye, B2B Communications Lead, Google (ACS Hillingdon, Class of 2009), and David Weigel, Washington Post Political Correspondent (ACS Cobham alumnus, Class of 2000).
Jo and David were joined by Claire Valoti, VP EMEA, Snapchat, and friend of ACS, and Tina Kraus, Senior Producer, CBS News, and current ACS Cobham parent.
The virtual event attracted students, alumni and parents with an interest in the field of media and communications.
First to speak, Jo reflected on her early experiential marketing jobs through her time studying biomedical science (sport and exercise) at the University of Aberdeen, working for a range of brands including P&G, Lindt, Shell, Guinness, Call of Duty, and Hobbycraft.
Then followed roles within a healthcare PR agency, Gatwick Airport, the City of London, and KPMG, via a scoop on the front page of the Financial Times. And then came Google, and her dream role.
I’m proud that my journey has not been a linear one. It’s not been that you study one thing and that means you’re going to be doing one thing alone. The beauty of a career like communications is that your skills can be applied to anything which you’re passionate about.
“If you start out thinking, like I did, that I wanted to work in psychology or law, I now work with lawyers every day. In order to understand our audiences, I have to do research and think about the psychology of an audience and the mood of a whole nation, perhaps. So, a lot of the skills and passions you may have, I think, are applicable to a career like communications, because it’s really about people.”
Friend of ACS, Claire Valoti, spoke about her experience being at the forefront an industry in its infancy and becoming an expert in everything to do with digital advertising and later mobile advertising.
Going on to become Managing Director at O2 Media, then running partnerships at Facebook, Claire is now VP at Snapchat, where she realised a “once in a lifetime opportunity to get to build a business”, when the multimedia app wanted to launch in Europe, initially in the UK. She has since gone on to be responsible for additional territories around the world.
One of my biggest tips as you go throughout your career is find your cheerleaders. Find the people around you who are going to champion you. Find those people and hold onto them. And do what you love, what you’re passionate about, because you’ll do better.
For David Weigel, now Washington Post Political Correspondent (ACS Cobham alumnus, Class of 2000), his participation at this career event came full circle, after attending a similar career day while a High School student here.
Unsure what he wanted to do career-wise, he was inspired by one of his friend’s parents, an international correspondent for a Danish newspaper , who spoke at the event about being a journalist. This was the first thought he had had about a career in journalism, and David went on to study the subject at US university Northwestern, during which time he undertook internships.
After graduation, he based himself in Washington DC, where he worked for various media outlets, including Bloomberg, before becoming political correspondent for the Washington Post, where he has worked for the last seven years. Outside of political journalism, he has also written a book about progressive rock music.
He reflected on journalism as being "a rewarding job", which can be "exhausting" but can also "have a lot of slack".
He experienced this in 2020, when he covered the US presidential primary elections, "writing 2,000 - 3,000 words a day under deadline pressure, talking to people, checking facts, trying to break news," but acknowledges slower periods where he could focus on a profile piece or something that interested him.
"I find that exciting. It's a very changeable job. You’re still going to have things that surprise you every day."
He had the following advice for would-be journalists:
Be willing to go outside of your comfort zone constantly. Be willing to go to things you might not naturally go to, be willing to ask people for their time, even if they have no real reason to give it to you, but you want to tell their story. I think it requires a kind of empathy and constantly seeing when you’re talking to people, where are they coming from, what is their motivation, why are they doing this?
Tina Kraus, Senior Producer, and current ACS Cobham parent, had perhaps the most impressive backdrop, speaking live from her CBS Newsroom in London.
Growing up in Idaho, US, an internship while at college led to her on-screen break. Her thesis on her communications course was to find the most common characteristic in TV journalists. Integrity and courage were the most common, but top of the list was curiosity, Tina noted.
An opportunity for a small broadcast news channel in New York followed, before the CBS News opportunity came. Initially a TV journalist, she also worked behind-the-scenes as a producer. Her work has taken her around the work and has included three months covering war in the Middle East for for CBS.
After becoming hooked on international news, she moved to London with CBS, where she has been ever since.
Tina advised future media professionals to “look beyond the lens”, referring to how she did every job in the newsroom, and how "learning to do everything, is going to make you that much better. Don’t be afraid to ask for help from people who are doing the job you would like to do one day.
Do you like to read, do you like to talk to people, do you watch the news, do you like to be the first to know when something happens? That’s all part of being a journalist.
