After standing at Waterloo station for 45 minutes on a Tuesday morning and being inundated with various job offers from around the world and one of the biggest football clubs in the world – Manchester United – graduates still ask me why did I choose to work at my company?
So what attracted me to the job?
I wanted to work somewhere where everyone knows my name, I don’t want to be on the fifth floor and other employees are staring at me like who is this new guy even though I’d have been there for about 9 months. I wanted the chance to manage my own projects in various industries simultaneously rather than working for a big sexy company like Nike, Adidas or Coca-Cola, where I would probably just handle one of their social media accounts – #Boring.
How did it happen?
So about 2 hours after leaving Waterloo station I received a LinkedIn InMail from company Director Matt Churchward, stating that he had walked passed me at Waterloo station, saw how busy I was and asked me to come into their head office. I sat with all three company directors who congratulated me on my out of the box efforts in attempt of landing a marketing role. I was just what they were looking for to help the business move forward. They told me what I wanted to hear, I would join as a Marketing and PR Project manager and create my own marketing campaigns, as well as being a part of the internal recruitment process hiring more graduates.
The deal sealer…
What sealed the deal for me was when I walked into the office for my second interview. The atmosphere was just what I was looking for. It was a young group that I knew I could get on with and achieve some great things with and we have already been nominated for a few awards this year. In comparison to everywhere else I interviewed with, I didn’t feel the same connection between current employees and I just couldn’t work somewhere where people just turn up and are glued to their computers for 9 hours and leave.
We play football together, have team nights out, as well as going on company holidays to Barcelona, Berlin and Budapest. What sets us apart from the rest and why it is such a great place to work in comparison to other organisations is the great company culture that has been built.
There is no magic to solve the issue of graduate unemployment, but we will be playing its part to provide opportunities in the green, digital and property sector as I’d hate to be the reason commuters are bombarded by hundreds of graduates at station in the morning asking for a job!
Author: I am Alfred Ajani the Coventry University graduate from South London also known as ‘The CV Man’. I am Marketing and PR Projects Manager at The Asoria Group, responsible for driving the Marketing and PR function.
