June 2010
1 post
May 2010
1 post
4 tags
an affordable salon haircut: saving money, but not...
while i need to save money, my hair had started getting a little annoying. pony tails galore. and this look was not helping me feel fresh and ready to take on the corporate world again. my last haircut, while i was employed, was about $75 (including taxes/tip). it was a really nice haircut and i felt great afterwards. the hard part is that i don’t want to send $75 on a haircut when i...
April 2010
3 posts
1 tag
que sera sera.
so, i had a telephone interview yesterday. i felt very neutral about how it went. the interviewer seemed engaged, but not overly interested. i wasn’t nervous, but not entirely comfortable either. she’s very new to the company, so i didn’t expect her to have a lot of information about the company yet, so when she asked me “canned” interview questions, it didn’t...
4 tags
nurturing and preserving your ego
let’s face it. this job economy sucks all kinds of things and there’s very little that anyone can do about it.
in the past, determination and ego were all i needed to get my foot in the door and get an offer later in the week. i would network with employees i knew at the companies i wanted to work for, and i’d send out resumes to multiple people in the agency. then, i would...
2 tags
positive thinking will get me...somewhere tbd
it’s getting harder to stay positive. i’ve found myself competing with folks that were recently laid off for jobs at the very companies that laid them off. this was not good news when one of the companies that i’ve been interviewing with made me aware of this last week.
as much as it stings, it makes sense. if i was forced to downsize my department, it would be tough. there...
March 2010
4 posts
3 tags
making conversation and connections at work
this was initially part of the previous post, but decided it was long enough to be on its own. i’ve been noticing more and more that some of my friends are not good at or don’t know how to make friends/connections at work. this is just an initial jumping board of ideas to get the ball rolling.
now, keep in mind, this doesn’t mean you have to schmooze. i really hate schmoozing....
4 tags
why every connection counts.
i’ve been at a good number of advertising agencies, and the one thing that i’ve found to be invaluable is meeting/getting to know people. let’s be clear on what this means. i hate politics. i hate ass kissing. i hate schmoozing (i don’t even really socialize at work functions). but, actually getting to know people does a couple of things for you:
being on a large scale...
at least i have the ncaa tournament to keep me company.
7 tags
humble pie. come get some.
the job hunting environment is a grim, unforgiving, humbling place to be right now. on the somewhat bright side of things, i’ve been having potential job related discussions with a couple of very promising ad agencies with national, prominent clients. did i say discussions? right now, it feels a little more like a kick in the nuts (if i had nuts).
what i’ve come to learn is that if i...
February 2010
3 posts
5 tags
breaking point on the horizon?
i’ll be honest. i currently enjoy having the time to cook a variety of delectables that i see on america’s test kitchen, make sure all the laundry is done, clean the bathroom, practice the viola, and get caught up on battlestar gallactica. these are definitely things i didn’t have the time to do only a few weeks ago. but, in the long run, i don’t know if that’s going...
2 tags
now what?
now comes the hard part. do i want to stay in advertising and/or media? do i want anything that comes along? i don’t want anything that comes along. so far, i think i reviewed about 150 jobs on monster.com this morning, which was a completely mixed bag: marketing, advertising, administrative, food service…
casting a very wide net to see what i might stumble across. nothing terribly...
5 tags
no contest: my work to live manifesto
i have a lot more time to write on my blog. thank goodness! for the record, that “goodness” comes with a hint of sarcasm.
let’s talk about what it means to “work to live” and it’s counter “live to work”. to me, an authority on living and breathing, working to live means that you wake up everyday at an unnatural hour, shower, put on clothes that say,...
June 2009
1 post
at what point is behavioral targeting sexist?
i’m searching for a client’s ad, one which, as a consumer, i would certainly be interested in. i need a screenshot to create an “ooh & aah” client deck. one of my staff has had it served to him a handful of times. once he sent me the link to the page where he’s seen the ad, i sit. i refresh. i refresh. i refresh. i have received ads for: crate & barrel,...
May 2009
1 post
social media consumer perception recon
i am one of the number one poo-poo’ers of concept of “focus group of one”. if you’re in advertising, you know the what i’ll refer to as the “fg1” people. the walk into a meeting and say, “my sister-in-law really loves posting links to websites on facebook. that’s what we should be doing,” while not really considering that their...
April 2009
2 posts
let me tell you about an exciting interview...
so, after the partner at job1 essentially told us that no one else would hire us, we all started looking for jobs. i personally, decided to look for a new job anywhere and everywhere related to advertising. my boyfriend at the time worked on a high profile account and one of his vendors, a famous pop culture and music magazine, was hiring. they were looking for an assistant account executive, who...
waiting...and more waiting...
i haven’t been great about creating a regular schedule around posts, but i’m going to pretend to apologize and then i’ll pretend you forgave me.
right now, i’m sitting in the living room, wearing my gym clothes, waiting for the phone to ring. a lot has happened since the last time i posted, so let me catch you up.
i’ve been in multiple telephone and in-person...
March 2009
15 posts
in a time for envy and dwindling self-esteem, a...
right now, we are surrounded by very few people that are seeing success and good fortune. we are mostly in the same boat: jobless or potentially jobless, late on bills or worried about next month’s bills…but right now, the biggest issue we probably all have in common is that we’re clinging to our last shreds of self esteem. a year ago, we all probably felt pretty good. then, not...
ah, interviewing. good times.
so, i didn’t get to writing on monday because i actually had my first interview in over a month. don’t expect i’ll tell you what organization i interviewed with, but i can say it’s well-known.
i approached this interview as an opportunity to fine tune my interviewee style, and i’d like to share it with you, in case it helps you in any way.
The Day Before The...
gone fishing...for the day
well, fishing for a job. i’ll tell you more about it after it’s all said and done, but fingers crossed!
from adage.com, "P&G Gives Its Marketers a Crash...
here’s the LINK . now go read it. i’ll wait….i’m not going to summarize this one for you, so you’re going to have to read it your own damn self.
now that you’ve read it, here i go: i love this campaign. i love it because it’s able to demonstrate a lot to digital media and brand managers that there are more than one way to skin a cat. since the myspace and...
at this moment, my favorite jobless activities:
playing mario kart with my fellow unemployed or mini-strangers from foreign lands
listening and downloading songs from rcrdlbl.com
writing blogs
going to the gym
cooking for the in-laws, as rent payment
seeing who’s viewed me on linkedin.com
responding to various people’s twitter feeds or facebook status’
spooning with the dogs and cat
reading the first three twilight...
gym day 2: i'm a fucking idiot
did all the same machines as i did yesterday and decided the pain meant it was working. the only thing not a’painin is my va-jay-jay.
first day at the Y
we’ll see how i feel tomorrow, but i spent about 1.5 hours lifting weights and riding the stationary recumbant bicycle. the hubs and i just joined the local YMCA so that i would have something to do other than job searching, writing blog entries and getting fatter. this could be the start of something painful…but hopefully successful. i’m not sure how successful, though, since i...
On "Cable, Satellite Providers to Push...
if you hadn’t read the actual article, it discusses the shifts in how major cable providers are approaching offering and promoting PPV adult films. previously, adult films were unpromoted and the man with the need to get his rocks off had to look and browse around the PPV channels until he found his jackpot. cable providers wouldn’t think of promoting adult films and considered...
“Being a champion opens lots of doors—I’d like to get a real estate...”
– source: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mike_Tyson
From Adage, "Cable, Satellite Providers to Push... →
of the few industries that thrive in recession, the porn industry is certainly the most scandalous. with new technologies and lotion in hand, i’d like to share my thoughts on this tomorrow.
““People might not get all they work for in this world, but they must...”
the first agency: "where else are they gonna go?"
A BAD TIME TO LOOK FOR A JOB
i graduated from DePaul University in chicago in June 2001 with a bachelor’s degree in marketing. i was dating one of the many men i thought i would spend the rest of my life with. my friends and i went to thailand as our last big hurrah before we had no more summer and winter breaks. when we came back to chicago, i procrastinated job hunting, using “i...
why am i doing this?
this is where i give you the background of this blog and what you can expect from me in the future. well, i’m an out of work media supervisor who just moved to the detroit area from minneapolis (and chicago before that). i’ve worked for one of the biggest and exciting retailers in the country and on some of the sexiest and buzzworthy campaigns (as well as some real duds). things have...