Access has grown rapidly this year and we’ve had a surge of interest from graduates to match. A few months ago we set our sights on finding the best possible internship candidates whom we could take under our wing and give the best possible chance at a career in the creative industries – that’s when we came up with the #Access Interns campaign. Here’s how we did it.
For graduates leaving university it can be tough to gain entry into the creative industries. They’ve got a qualification, have a desire to work, but also have to be able to stand out from an ever increasing crowd. With so many graduates vying for the next Account Executive or Junior Designer position, internships are a great way to get some experience and help land that all important first job.
Inception
With any graduate enquiry form you’re always going to get a fair amount of interest from students looking for a route in the industry. Ours here at Access was no exception. We wanted to give everyone a fair shot and allow them the chance to shine beyond their CV. This is where the concept of our #AccessInterns campaign came from. We wanted to create a flexible brief that would allow applicants to demonstrate their strengths in their chosen field, while reproducing the pressure and excitement of pitching for a client.
Reproducing a client pitch for our candidates
Agencies are constantly pitted against one another to produce the right pitch to win the client. Using this logic we asked candidates to produce a presentation which sold Access to a potential client. This ‘pitch’ would form the basis of our opinion prior to interview. Candidates needed to gain some knowledge about Access and then convey it to us whilst showing us their personality. Ideally we were looking for a candidate to give us information we know a lot about but in a way in which it seemed new and interesting.
Social media application
We sent all of the interested parties from our data capture an email giving them details of how they could apply to be an intern. Rather than handing out the brief straight away we wanted to identify which of our initial applicants were fully prepared to immerse themselves in the application process.
In order to make our campaign a little different we incorporated a social media element. We set up a ‘Pay with a Tweet’ system in which each candidate tweeted their interest in the campaign in order to download the brief. This not only gave us the opportunity to see who our entrants were, but helped to spread our campaign to others who may not have signed up on our graduate list.
The brief itself helped to further reduce the number of entrants. We asked candidates to produce a quality presentation, one that would require some hard work and research, all within a short time frame echoing agency turnaround times. Each entrant would be assessed depending on their skillset; Creative applicants being judged mainly on their presentation and AMs/Project managers on their understanding of the market/strategy. We received plenty of finished presentations and were then able to select a long list for telephone interview.
Face to face pressure
Our conversations with candidates proved to be a really insightful part of the process. Many of the applicants impressed us beyond their presentations with their verbal communication skills and professional approach. Those shortlisted following the phone conversations were then invited into the agency for a formal interview.
Over the course of two days we interviewed our selected eight candidates. Each had shown the required amount of application and enthusiasm to get them to this final stage. As with any face to face interview it ultimately becomes a choice of who is right for the agency.
Welcome Jack and Sophie
Following this process, we are super happy to announce that Sophie Hall has joined us as an Account Executive and Jack Warman has joined our creative team. Sophie impressed us initially during her phone interview and then continued to display a real passion for digital marketing, specifically analytics. Her impressive university results (one Degree and TWO Masters) and her dedication to further her own learning, made us eager to see what she could bring to the agency.
Jack made us belly laugh with his pixelated recreations of some of the access team. It was a brave move to make up our very own Mark Hope as a fairy, but thats the kind of brash humour we appreciate here at Access. He did apologise to Mark on his first day but there was no need. Especially as you can see it for yourself now at the top of our social media feeds.
Both Jack and Sophie are settling in really well and are proving a real asset to the Access team – expect to hear more from them in the coming weeks!
