3 Years On: Where is The Perpetual Intern now?

Wow, it's been a while!

There I was updating my Linked In profile on a Saturday afternoon, and I suddenly remembered my old blog, The Perpetual Intern, which I kept religiously at the beginning of my life in London. I decided to see if I could still log-in, and Lo and behold, I actually managed to remember my details, and was super-surprised to see that I've had almost 5,000 views over the past few years. Not much in the grand scheme of things, but still a bit of a shock! As a result and in order to provide some closure, I thought I'd put together an update on the past few years, and where The Perpetual Intern is today...

Since my internship at French Connection, I have continued to bounce around when it comes to my working life (it must be the Sagittarius in me). First of all, I spent 18 months at a consumer PR agency working with brands like John Lewis and Avon Cosmetics - in fact, you will have seen my post about the bloggers networking event with Karren Brady which was part of my work there. Although working at that agency was really, really hard (long hours, terrible management, very high pressure), it allowed me to really cut my teeth in PR, and I'm glad I stuck it out as long as I did.

Next on the list was a job in Events Management - a role which allowed me to travel to Washington DC and New York for training camps, which was bloody amazing! It was a 'daily deals' company that I worked for, and as part of a two-person team I put together consumer events which were sold online. My job in particular was to flesh out the logistics and execute these events flawlessly with a team of 12 part time staff. In this role, I worked fairly autonomously which was a huge change from being micromanaged in my last agency! It was a fab experience, which sadly came to an end after 8 months when the company closed my division and I was made redundant.

After a difficult couple of months job hunting (and a move saaarf of the river to Wimbledon) I landed a job in another consumer PR agency, this time representing a portfolio of technology clients. This was another big change for me, as I am not the most technologically literate person in the world! Still, it was good to be challenged and again, I learned a lot more about the world of PR and the complexities and challenges involved in working agency side, with big, international brands. However, after 18 months in this role I had fallen out of enthusiasm for my clients and didn't feel like I had been given the recognition I deserved. And, I had caught the travel bug.

After handing in my notice at my second agency, I packed up 5 years of stuff that I had accumulated in London and headed back to my home city of Cardiff. But I didn't stick around for long; I spent the months of September and October backpacking around Thailand and Vietnam with my boyfriend and a Lonely Planet guidebook, generally avoiding real life completely (in fact I kept a blog about it all which you can read here). This is my opportunity for a gratuitous holiday pic!

In an incredible and completely unplanned twist of fate, my time travelling actually ended up influencing my next career move. During my last week in Thailand, a temporary contract for a Media and Communications Executive at the one and only Lonely Planet appeared on my Linked In feed. Still flushed with enthusiasm from my travels, I applied, and ended up interviewing for the role over Skype just 24 hours after I landed back on UK soil. 

Well, it looks like I will be heading back to London for a little while, as I start at the end of November :) Perhaps I should change the name of this blog to The Perpetual New-Girl!

KARREN BRADY'S GOLDEN RULES OF NETWORKING IN BUSINESS

I was lucky enough to attend a blogger event with Karren Brady at the beautiful Soho Hotel. Read on for some inspiring tips and hints from this one-woman business machine!

Karren Brady has shared some of the secrets to her success in a collaborative new campaign with cosmetics company Avon, to help guide women to achieve in business. Avon mentor, Karren has worked together with Avon’s most experienced and successful independent Representatives to draw up Avon’s Golden Rules of Networking in Business, capturing and sharing ‘must-dos’ when it comes to networking in business today.

The campaign, launched in Avon’s 125th year, sees the global beauty giant and original social network reinforce its commitment to improving the lives of women across the globe. With 6.5 million active Avon Representatives around the world, the beauty giant now facilitates one of the largest global networks of entrepreneurial women, all with a wealth of insight to share on how to tap into networking opportunities.

Karren, along with some of the UK’s most dynamic independent Avon Representatives, has taken the time to share their hard-earned insights in a short video version of the Golden Rules to be posted on YouTube, making them accessible to women worldwide.

Extending its help to women even further, Avon has shared the Golden Rules with bloggers and industry bodies such as the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) and the Direct Selling Association (DSA).

Karren Brady comments: “I’ve been an Avon mentor for over a year now and have truly been inspired by the talented Avon Representatives I’ve had the pleasure of meeting. I realised there was a huge wealth of knowledge within these business women that could be tapped into and shared. Networking and contact building have been crucial to my career and with increased competition in the job market it’s never been more relevant for women to identify and leverage relationships that may help them succeed in business.”

Avon Representative Baljinder Kaur Kanwal also explained how she works: “As well as running my own Avon business I work full time in financial services, which gives me a great opportunity to build my network of Avon customers. I find I’m always networking, whether chatting to colleagues about Avon in my lunch break or leaving samples in the ladies’ room with my card attached. There are now so many ways to network, both online and face-to-face – it feels like the potential to grow my customer base is almost unlimited.”

Avon’s Golden Rules to Business Networking – Compiled with Karren Brady

1. Live by the “three feet” rule
Talk to anyone that comes within three feet of you – whether you’re at the school gates, the bank, out shopping. There are thousands of potential customers or recruits out there that don’t know what they are missing

2. Use your fingers
Twitter is a great way to communicate with customers and potential customers about e.g. sale items and exciting new products as more and more people now use Smartphones and want to receive information at the touch of a button. Don’t forget to invite your customers to sign up

3. Spread the word
Giving away simple tips and sharing knowledge is the key to successful networking. Supply a great training schedule or a fantastic service and people will be inspired to talk about you and recommend your business services – the term networking is just another word for sharing

4. Embrace new ideas
Lots of people are afraid of the internet and new technology because they have little or no knowledge of it but the best thing is to jump in, get online and start learning. Be ready to give your ideas to anyone that is willing to listen – from basics to uploading and downloading of videos to blogging, creating newsletter, websites and other innovative ideas that reflect you as a business woman

5. If at first you don’t succeed…
Success in business is often a numbers game – a lot of people won’t listen to your ideas and you will be rejected, but the more people you speak to the more potential clients you find

6. Fortune is in the follow up
Never neglect a lead and never be shy about calling on a contact who can help you.

7. Approach digital as you would anything else
When networking through social media, maintain the same approach and apply what you have already learnt from face-to-face networking into this new environment. The same skills apply online as offline.

8. Apply the three minute speed dating maxim
At a social or business gathering, try and speak to each person for at least three minutes before politely moving on to talk to someone else. That way you make sure you won’t miss out on any potential new contacts that could help boost your business.

9. Follow the crowd
Facebook can be a really useful tool; the networking potential is unlimited and offers the opportunity to reach new clients. Start a group, set up a business page, post reviews, videos, photos and written collateral and engage more people with less legwork.

10. Be a networkee
The old adage of “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” still holds strong. If you are active in facilitating relationships between people you’ll soon reap the benefits when it comes to calling in a favour like a request for an introduction to a useful contact.

On holiday...

The Perpetual Intern is taking a holiday right now, but will be back at the end of July! x

The Visual Team at French Connection HQ

Situated alongside the Marketing team at French Connection, the Graphics and Visual teams work their magic. It is thanks to them that sitting at my desk feels as though I have been plonked in the middle of an art studio, which I love!

At the moment, the team are putting together all of the graphics for AW10, which is exciting - but also a glum reminder that the longest day has been and gone and that summer will be over in no time! With this in mind, French Connection is taking inspiration from the typical windy days of British autumn in the plans for the AW10 window displays. Here is the mock-up that has just been erected behind my desk:

Pretty cool, huh?

Marie Claire - Inspire and Mentor Event

HOW TO GET IN TO FASHION

Today I attended the Marie Claire 'how to get in to fashion' event - a networking opportunity for aspiring fashionista's, graduates, school leavers, and basically anyone with the shared goal of making a career for themselves in the world of fashion. It was a fantastic opportunity to get some real insight from real professionals, and I though it would be nice for me to pop along so I could tell you a bit about it.

The panel included;

Boutique Buyer for Matches - Georgina Gaiza

Up and coming Fashion Designer - William Tempest

Head of Communications at River Island - Sarah Walter

It was Sarah in particular, who really inspired me. Her CV is very impressive - she has worked at Harpers, at New Look (responsible for their brilliant collaborations with Lily Allen, Kelly Brook etc), and now River Island to name but a few, and yet, at the start of Sarah's career, she took 4 years out of Fashion to run Safaris in Africa! How brilliant is that! It just made me realise that there is no cardboard cut-out model for success, and that in this industry, it really does take all-sorts.

In case you missed this event, here are the panel's top tips:

1. Internships, internships, internships - they could not stress how beneficial these are. William Tempest did his internship with Giles Deacon, and the others all mentioned that a really great intern will always leave an impression, and that can lead to so much more.

2. Nothing is beneath you when you start at the bottom, and in Fashion, everybody does. A positive attitude goes a long way.

3. Fashion should be intuitive and personal, be confident in who you are.

4. Don't be afraid to take risks and chances - almost all of the people on the panel got where they were partly by being open-minded opportunists.

Hope this helps!

Bargain Hunt: The joy of the Sample Sale

As a lowly intern, there are a few things that you know you're going to have to do. One of those things, is contributing your blood, sweat and tears to putting together the Sample Sale. I can honestly say that I didn't think all of the rails of clothes would even fit in the showroom at Centro One, but they did. And thanks to all of my hard work, I knew exactly where to look for the really great bargains, because I put them there!

Here are my top Sample Sale steals...

Dress RRP £55

Sample Sale steal £10

Dress RRP £135

Sample Sale steal £15

I am planning on wearing this to a summer BBQ this weekend with a pair of nude gladiator flats - perfect!

Bag RRP £60

Sample Sale steal £10

The Great Plains Spa Day at French Connection HQ

It was another eventful day at French Connection, and this time the press office was turned into a Day Spa for the staff - all in the name of charity, of course...!

Great Plains, who are part of the same company as French Connection, have announced a collaboration with Plan, one of the largest child-centered community development organisations in the world. You can find out more about what they do here.

In order to raise staff awareness, Plan sent a representative in to talk to everyone about the great work that they do - whilst Benefit, Dermologica and HOB helped to raise some more money by offering facials, hair styling and makeovers. It was such a great way to get all of the staff to interact with the charity and find out more about why Great Plains were working with them, and really helped the staff feel involved in making a difference. It was also amazing to spend your coffee break enjoying a relaxing facial!