Dear Kate,

One year and four months has passed since you embarked on your career in the field of agency public relations, and boy, have you learned a lot! Congratulations.

Just for fun, here a few pointers and tips I wish I could have told you back when you first started:

• Do not take anything personally. Do your job 110%. If anyone attacks you, questions your character or scolds you (and they will – just the “nature of the biz”), don’t take it to heart. It will just wear on you. If you know you do a good job daily and your firm stands behind you, be assured you will be A-OK.
• Get a crystal ball. People will ask you to predict the future and ask why you didn’t know something that happened would happen. You have no other choice but to get a clear sphere of magic.
• Get on Twitter! You will meet some highly respected thought-leaders in the field of communications, explore and benefit from many of their ideas and grow as a professional. Something called the PR Breakfast Club might even come out of it! More on this will come…
• Ask questions!  Better to get something right the first time than to mess it up and re-do wasting clients’ time and money.
• Do it all. While you are young with no husband or children to feed at home, go out to those networking events, meet new people. You will even land a client or two of your own out of it. Oh, you’re tired? Too bad. Remember, you love coffee.
• Don’t ever get excited (well maybe that’s an exaggeration). Journalists might sound like they can definitely run an article on your client, but because of spacing issues, different schedules and other reasons, it won’t run. I’m not saying be a perpetual pessimist. Just be realistic with your own expectations so you in turn can do the same for clients.

Well, this really is a short list from all of the things you have learned over the last year. And you will learn so much more. Keep at it, kid!

Best,
Kate

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