When you get a place you are encouraged to join Hiive this network for creative professionals. I have joined Hiive but not sure what I think about it yet. I joined the Channel 4 swarm which is a group for those who attended the C4 day, so I knew a few people who were going beforehand.
When I got there I found that I was put into the Digital Marketing group, we were put into a hall where the head of 4Talent spoke to us and showed us a Channel 4 showreel. Afterwards, the Executive Producer of Maverick TV, Kirsty Lord, showed us Maverick's showreel and spoke to us about her career journey through media and how she got there. Maverick was there because one of their centres is based in the Midlands (Birmingham) and they are always on the lookout for local talent. It also shows us that you don't need to move to London to have a career in media.
Her words were work as hard as possible and take every opportunity you can. Very wise indeed! Afterwards, we were split into our groups for our respective talks.
Cheeky image inside the Digital Marketing workshop
In the Digital Marketing workshop, we got a talk about digital marketing from My Kinda Future which is an agency that works with young people to help students explore their career options post education. As I already work in Marketing (and the age range was so vast) it was pitched a little low for me but it was great for those that wanted to see what it was all about or doesn't have any experience. We were then told that for our afternoon task in the groups we were going to create a digital campaign for the Rio 2016 Paralympics based on the word pride and that we would present our idea to Aaron and Mark who worked at Maverick and a Continuity Presenter for Channel 4. The two winning groups would get an experience day at Channel 4 and the overall winning group would present their idea in London and battle it out for a career development prize.
Bit of brainstorming in the workshop
After lunch, we created our digital campaign and presented it to the judges, although my team didn't win it gave me some ideas and also I didn't realise until after that pitching that I actually pitched to industry specialists, which I had never done before and is a really big thing!
Two other industry talks followed, one from the Continuity Presenter at Channel 4 who grew up in Wolverhampton (where the Talent Day was held) and one from Erin Jane who worked in the Marketing Department at Channel 4.
Erin's talk was really good because she hammered home how important it is to look outside the box and take every opportunity you can get. She worked in International Relations in America rather than going to an American university to study in her year abroad and she got herself a mentor in her final year at Birmingham University. Both of which helped her see what she wanted to do. In addition when she applied for the role at Channel 4 she wanted it so badly she travelled down to London and asked to meet a member of staff who worked in HR to talk about the job, the Receptionist was so shocked that she actually let Erin speak to a member of HR and she managed to set up a meeting for that day. It goes to show if you want an opportunity that badly and you demonstrate how and why you want it, it will help you in the long run.
Erin offering her advice
So that was it! It was a really good day even just for the networking. I met some brilliant people and I really felt invested in Channel 4, what I mean by that is I felt that they offer lots of career pathways for anyone to take up and they really want young people to get involved.
Interested in Channel 4 pop up. Look at their site here.
I have done some work with the BBC too! Look at my BBC Generation2015 profile here.
I also write for Metro.co.uk in my spare time and a few other sites. Look at my article list here.
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