BlackWomenWork

Hi, Tiye! How would you describe what you’re currently doing?

I have spent seven and a half years working in advertising, specifically in media planning. In layman's terms, media planning is when a brand such as Coke comes to agencies like mine with a budget they’re prepared to spend on marketing efforts. We will then work with and advise the brand to figure out a target audience, potential places for innovation, which media platforms to use, and performance metrics. My team would then go into the media marketplace and seek out spaces for the brand -- spaces like Refinery29, Instagram, or Facebook -- to divvy up that budget across multiple forms of media including print, TV, social media. So we’re making recommendations on placement. That’s been the majority of my career. In the last couple of months I have made a slight shift to be involved on the strategy side, where the approach is more of a holistic, top-line framework. We’re looking at consumer insights, sociological research, media innovation. It’s not so in the weeds, or execution-focused, in comparison to what I was doing before.

How would you describe the path to get to where you’re at now?

In the summer before my junior year, I interned at a multicultural advertising agency in Atlanta, my hometown. It was called Images, though it’s no longer in operation. It was Black-owned, and Black-run, and there were so many disciplines represented in just that one agency. There were so many things to do and it didn’t feel routine. That’s when I thought, OK, I could do this. Later in college, I was in the journalism school and had the option to focus on advertising, and my next internship was a media company called Time Inc. (which was recently bought by Meredith Corp) in NYC which published top magazines such as People, Time, and Essence. My specific role was in the research and insights department. That was another, very different aspect of the work that I appreciated

By the time I graduated, I had figured out that New York City was the epicenter for the advertising and media industry, and I wanted to move there. I was open to a pretty wide range of opportunities. Like a lot of students fresh out of college, I was like, someone just give me a job! (laughs) I took just about 4 months off after graduation, and after that time some friends of mine were at Howard’s School of Communications. They invited me to this job fair at their school, which I now know is really popular and well-known. My friend and I decided to go crash it, and there were recruiters there from UM (Universal McCann) -- where I currently work -- which is how I made my connections.

Yes to crashing job fairs! That’s amazing. So what do you think makes you uniquely positioned to do what you do?

My identity plays a big role. Growing up I was exposed to so many different cultures, and now so much of my role is analyzing cultural trends. I’m a first generation American, with Jamaican parents. I grew up in the South as a person of color, and a woman. I have a diverse group of friends, and diverse interests. All of this allows me to think differently, to be able to step into tasks in different ways, from different perspectives.

You’re in a very corporate, commercial space. Do you feel that there is a greater good in the work that you do?

Yes, definitely. I have worked with clients focused on greater good. I used to work on the Johnson & Johnson account, and they are very much into corporate social responsibility. Another account I’ve worked on was CVS Health, a company striving to be more than retail pharmacy but also to be sector leaders -- they banned tobacco five years ago, for example. They also had a campaign called Beauty Unaltered which centered around the fact that they do not digitally retouch the images of models in their stores/campaigns. So I have been a part of those initiatives, which makes me feel like my moral compass is pointed in the right direction.

As you envision it at the moment, what excites you about the future of your career? Or, more broadly, the future of the space you are in?

The U.S. population is growing more and more diverse. In 2040, it’s predicted that the country’s population will be majority minority. In the field that I’m in and in so many other spaces and sectors being a person of color means that you have foresight into what’s coming. In that way we’re set up so well for the future. I’m interested to see what strategies and initiatives brands will use to appeal to minorities and other historically overlooked groups.

There’s also an exciting but more daunting trend, which is the huge role technology has in our society today. When I started my career, Snapchat didn’t exist! When you thought of social media, you really just thought of Facebook. Now it’s TikTok, tomorrow it will be something else. It is exciting but it also adds a bit of uncertainty in this field.

Is there a time you feel that your identity influenced how you were perceived at work or shaped how you experienced work?

I had a managing director who was a Trump supporter. They were the “But her emails!” type. That was a challenge, just to be around that kind of attitude. I’ve had a supervisor who just didn’t understand me and who I am, and so they were very aloof with me. I used to be more interested in proving myself, but you get to a point in your career where people know how capable you are and that you’re good at what you do. You feel more comfortable letting other parts of yourself come out. There are so many different facets of me, and that is how I’m able to bring my unique perspective to what I do. I feel lucky that I can now say that I feel that I can be myself at work.

When did you feel comfortable being yourself?

I think I can actually pinpoint it. A brand I worked on, a dairy-alternative, was looking to more explicitly target Black people because a lot of us are lactose intolerant. I was able to step in and through my identity, I had a lot of intuition and could share a lot of anecdotes. For example, in a brainstorm session, we started discussing a potential angle related to Black parenting practices -- specifically, exploring unique aspects of how Black mothers parent. And I immediately said, “Haircare!” Black mothers connect with their children through doing their hair. I was able to bring that into the discussion by tapping into my own life story and cultural understanding.

I think a lot of times white people don’t want to think of you as a color -- they say “I don’t see color” or “we’re all one race.” But I grew up as a Black woman in a Black household, and my experience is different than yours. And while our experiences are both valid, they aren’t equally valued in professional spaces. So being able to step in with my identity as this special insight that only I had felt good.

Is there anything else you considered as we’ve spoken that you want to get out?

One thing that has been very popular is diversity, equity, and inclusion, or “DEI”. Recently I attended a session facilitated by a white man and a Black woman who were in human resources. They were talking about mentorship, finding someone like yourself who can guide you. It reminded me of early in college and later when you start your career, and everyone talks about mentorship in this very specific way. As though there’s this Black angel in a gown who will emerge and guide you in your career, like a fairy godmother. But I have found a lot of great allies in white women, other people who aren’t “like me”. I think it’s so important for young Black women to keep that in mind as they seek out mentors. Don’t just seek out Black people, or other Black women. First, that’s unfortunately just hard to do. In many spaces, we aren’t represented in large numbers yet. But also there are other ways to find affinity with people. You can relate to people in so many different ways. The most important thing is to find someone who is in your corner.

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