A Glimpse Of The Future

Last Tuesday, I had the amazing opportunity to take a day trip downtown to Pound & Grain; digital marketing agency, for my Career Life 10 Job Shadow Project. This opportunity was brought fourth to me by Ms. Willemse who suggested me and Emily visited as she thought both of us were a good fit for the agency, and she had connections with them. As soon as I heard the words “digital marketing agency” I was super excited. At first I wasn’t quite sure who/what I was going to do as my job shadow, as I knew my passions and talents but didn’t exactly know which careers they fit in to. So I was on board right away and me and Emily got to crafting an email. Throughout the scheduling process, Emily was nice enough to handle most of the emailing and consulted to me whenever there was a decision we needed to make. Eventually we settled on a date and all that was left was to wait.

Heading in to the office on Tuesday morning I was slightly nervous as I didn’t know what the day had in store for me. That all went away however when we were greeted by Tara and welcomed in to their cozy office. Straight away I got friendly vibes and this didn’t seem like a corporate office. My first thoughts were that it seemed like a great work environment and nobody looked bored out of their mind staring at their computer. Once we were settled in, Tara ran us through what the day was going to look like. The schedule was set up so we had a half hour meeting with members from every team in the office. She wanted to give us a taste of every position and to see how different roles are split up within a company. 

The conversations we had throughout the day were so incredibly beneficial. They not only gave me an idea of what it’s like to work at a digital marketing agency, but what it’s like to work…at all! Before this I didn’t fully understand the moving parts within an office, and this experience really opened my eyes. Getting to chat to people in various positions was amazing, from planners, to analysts, to coders, we got to see how a project is split up within a large group of people. 

The entire time we were there, I couldn’t stop thinking about how all the beliefs and values of the company are almost identical to those of PLP. It was almost like I hadn’t left the classroom, I didn’t even have to switch my mindset from how I normally operate in a school environment because everything everyone said resonated with me. This made me feel really comfortable and made me feel confident that I will be able to work just fine out in the real world. Ever since I joined, I’ve always been a big believer that PLP teaches the “right” things. Getting to see how these values translate to the workplace was an amazing opportunity and one I will always look back on and be happy I took.

Thank you to Tara, Ms. Willemse, and all the lovely people at Pound&Grain!