:: COMM :: School of Communication

The alumni our group had interviewed was Carmen, who is a graduate from Comm-PRA in the year 2003.

Carmen is now working in a media agency – MindShare Hong Kong Ltd, which is in the same group of O&M. She works as a buyer in the company. Everyday, she negotiates with the sales for a better price and placement on behalf of the clients. She also needs to deal with the advertiser’s needs.

During the time of interview, Carmen has just started her job for about a week. She commented the work as interesting, challenging and multitasking. Despite the long working hour, from 9: 30 in the morning to late night, she enjoys the working environment in the media agency a lot. Carmen also said the working environment is relatively free and with less restrictions, as long as you can finish your work on time.

When we asked about funny stories she had encountered in the office, Carmen said there are plenty of them everyday. But the most memorable is being rebuked for some minor mistakes, or even with no reason. Clients sometimes are stupid and non-sense.

Carman has worked for seven companies since her graduation including promotion assistant for an associated degree courses, account executive in an advertising agency, ground personnel , buyer in media agency and Guidance Service Officer in Counseling & Development Centre. Carman said the reason of changing jobs so frequently is to gain different kinds of experiences before she wants to settle down . Now, though she has worked only for a week in Mindshare, she hopes that this will be her career.

Carmen had been a member of three committees throughout her school life in the Baptist University, the Communication Society, the IABC and the Girls’ Football Society. She believes these experiences enhanced her communication skills, thoroughness and courage, that enable her to cope better with the society today.

Carmen spent her leisure time just as every young adult in Hong Kong does. She loves karaoke, movies as well as ball games.

When we were up to the topic about maintenance of balance between work and leisure activities, Carmen said it’s really hard for her to strive balance. But she always has one belief, that is to ‘play hard, work hard’. She also rose up a very funny point here, that is for most ladies who devote them into media industry couldn’t get marry finally, as they are always too busy to develop a st eedy relationship with their lovers.

When we asked what suggestions can Carmen gives us for the upcoming 3 years of University life, she told us that besides studying hard, we have to play hard as well. Carmen said that the 3 years duration will not be as long as we imagine, therefore we should grasp our time, not wasting every minute. On the other hand, she reminds us to be a sensible and responsible person. Carmen told us that the most important thing we have to learn in the society is to maintain good relationship with each other. As the world is small, a good reputation and good relationships can help a lot. Last but not least, Carmen said we must improve our language skills in these 3 years, especially English, as it is really important to our work in the future.

For any funny stories we requested Carmen to share with us and other alumnis, she said that she couldn’t recall one especially funny thing, as the working environment was filled with fun and colleagues are all nice and funny.

For the promotion in her company, Carmen said it really depends on luck, as big companies like Mindshare always offer good fringe benefit and have low turnover rate that is hard to be promoted. But Carmen said she will work hard and hopefully she can get promoted one day.

Interviewed by CHAN Kit Wing, HUI Ka Kit andLAU Shu Man
PRA first year students
Nov 2005