“The biggest hurdle to getting a job or work experience placement is how you sell yourself. From when you start your application and submit a covering letter and CV, it should tell your potential employer how you will help them; the same is true of the interview where you should show an active interest and understanding of the company, as well as a desire to work specifically for them. So often, we receive work experience or job applications which don’t meet any of these briefs; they don’t have any understanding of us or what we might want and therefore they don’t succeed.
The same cannot be said of Rob (Age 15), who wanted a placement with us, or so we thought. His (unedited) post below shows how selling yourself is so important; do it well and you can even gain a job you don’t actually want! Testament to him, he is one of the best interviewees we have ever had in his age group and we found the start of his post a little surprising; he applied and interviewed almost perfectly and is streets ahead of many who do actually make us first choice :) Credit where it’s due and all that!” Victoria Petkovic-Short, Account Manager.
If I’m honest APT was not the first place I applied to do work experience. In fact it wasn’t even in the top five, and I came here on Monday with no real inclination to enter the marketing industry, an industry I picked based on a mild curiosity and vague hope it might be interesting. 5 days later and I can confirm that marketing, at least here at APT, is an interesting and varied career, one I would definitely consider re-visiting in the future, quite possibly as a permanent career. More than anything I’m glad I came to APT rather than whatever stuffy bank or office I applied to first; it’s definitely been a worthwhile experience, the small tightly knit group of staff have been lovely and I feel I have learnt valuable and transferrable workplace skills through doing real work- I haven’t been making the coffee as expected, and have come away with a portfolio of work I’ve written on APT’s behalf, and which should be useful in any future applications I make, particularly in this field. I have been surprised and delighted with the level of responsibility I’ve been given and the drop-you-in-the-deep-end approach the staff here have taken, as it has ensured that I have been able to gain a lot of knowledge in just a week. I was warned not to be too gushing in this but can’t not comment once again on the team of friendly and welcoming staff, and their ability to keep a fun and casual atmosphere in the workplace, yet conduct their work with such a high degree of professionalism and genuine interest. I am extremely grateful to everyone here for the experience they’ve given me. Rob Webster