March 2018
Written by: Natalie Knickle, BPR Co-op Student
Motivating, creative and fun. These are the words that Public Relations co-op student, Karly Piercy used to describe her work term at NATIONAL Public Relations firm located in Halifax. Karly shares the same feeling I had when I walked into the firm. You walk in and feel like you can do anything.
An empowering atmosphere
There is no dream too big and no goal is unattainable. The office is trendy and the walls have the words “Strong women work here”. There is something empowering about walking into an organization who has a strong focus on women. In fact, women occupy many of the senior level positions.
Laurel Taylor, Emily Seaman, and Karly Piercy are the three women I visited with to learn more about their roles. Laurel Taylor, graduated from the Mount’s Public Relations program and is now a Senior Consultant. Emily is the most recent Mount PR student to become an employee at NATIONAL and acted as a mentor for Karly.
Diversity in the work
Not knowing what to expect, Karly went into her last work term with NATIONAL with a sense of curiosity and the desire to learn more about working in a fast-paced PR firm. The work term exposed her to a variety of different projects and clients. When asked what skills would make a person successful in a role at NATIONAL, Laurel stated that it would be important to be “curious, tapped into community, humble, eager to learn, and have the desire to do impactful work to shape the world around you.”
Going into her last work term Karly knew she wanted agency experience. “I think I was drawn to agency work because I love the idea of working with more than one organization.” Karly found motivation in knowing each of her days was going to be different than the last.
“The best part about working in an agency is that you don’t really have an average day. Every day is so different. My favorite days were the ones spent working on request for proposals with tight deadlines and being able to work alongside the creative team.”
Mount alumni leading the way
Karly also enjoyed working closely with Mount alumnae who encouraged her to think boldly and to get involved with various members of the team to broaden her knowledge. Overall, it’s clear that NATIONAL values new perspectives, teamwork and giving students an opportunity to develop their knowledge.
NATIONAL Public Relations is the largest public relations consultancy firm in Canada with offices in Canada, US and the UK. The firm works with many clients across a variety of sectors. Some of their clients include Nova Scotia Power, the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation, Gildan, Samsung and the Nova Centre. To learn more about NATIONAL PR and services offered visit http://www.national.ca.