December 2021

The World of B2B

We asked 2 of our work experience students from the University for the Creative Arts Farnham, who are studying Graphic Design, to tell us about their time at Ogilvy.

My experience at Ogilvy

Reece

The pandemic meant that I could only spend three days physically in the studio during my two week placement at Ogilvy’s satellite studios in Shere but this wasn’t detrimental to the experience in any way. I successfully applied for one of two spaces on the placement and for the two weeks we were there James Austin, who was our main mentor, and the rest of the staff made a huge effort to help us get the most from the experience. As I mentioned, the circumstances meant that we were only on-site for a few days but whether we were in or not, we had regular contact with James and talks were arranged daily with different practitioners to give us as much insight and experience as possible.  

For the placement, myself and the other intern worked consistently on a live-brief, from the initial logo design through to creating a presentation of our work and demonstrating it to the design department. It was a great insight into the way a project like this would take place in a real life company. The biggest difference I found from the kind of work I’d done at university was the pace of it; a branding project like this at university could easily take the better part of a term but here every concept was conceived, developed, finalised and presented within the space of two weeks. This may be less time some real briefs are allocated but working in this much quicker manner gave me a real insight into how work in a studio like Ogilvy’s is created.  

Marcelina

I was thrilled when Ogilvy offered me an internship at their studio in Shere. As a freshly out of uni graduate I learned a lot about the creative industry and gained valuable experience on a daily basis at an agency like Ogilvy.  

I myself had the opportunity to work in a team on an exciting project with the other intern. It was quite a challenging brand identity brief. With guidance from the Ogilvy team, we were able to achieve together an outcome that I’m very proud of. After two weeks, we presented the design work at the end of the internship. This assignment gave me a holistic understanding of how the agency tackles client briefs and manages work on a tight schedule.  

Is Ogilvy a good company to work for? 

Reece

From two weeks experience my answer to this question is undoubtedly ‘yes’. Everything from the introductory briefing for all new employees to the way we were treated during our time there by everyone in the studio really demonstrated the level of care Ogilvy has for its employees. Our introductory briefing with all new employees went into a lot of detail about the large amount of care the company has for its workers and the range of resources, benefits and support they offer.    

On the work side of things, the answer to the question is the same. Not only did I enjoy what I was doing but I also had the opportunity to talk to many different people, all of whom showed a real passion for the work they did – something you’d only get at a good company to work for.  

Going into the placement, knowing that I’d be working in the B2B branch of the company, I did wonder if I’d find the experience to feel almost too ‘corporate’, designing for internal matters rather than a client-facing branch. However through the work I did and the people I spoke to I quickly learnt this isn’t the case. If anything there’s more creative freedom when something isn’t client facing which makes the work really enjoyable.  

Marcelina

I had a chance to meet and talk to a lot of creatives. Everyone was helpful and enthusiastic to share their experience and through light upon their position and work process at the agency. It was interesting to hear about how different everyone’s tasks are and how they come together to carry out projects. 

What type of agency is Ogilvy? 

Reece

A huge one. Virtually by the hour my knowledge of the the scale of the company increased. With each person I spoke to I learnt of different departments and areas of work or other ways in which the company as a whole operates globally. I learnt of jobs that I never even knew existed which opened my eyes to a massive range of careers that my design education could take me.  

On a more literal sense, Ogilvy is an advertising and marketing agency but my time at the studio made me realise this definition goes much further than I originally thought. I’d been aware of the kind of B2C work that Ogilvy has created over the years for it’s long list of clients but the B2B side was something I knew little about nor had considered it as a sub-factor of advertising and marketing. Learning about this side of the company doubled my knowledge of the industry and made me appreciate the scale of the studio even more.  

Marcelina

Ogilvy is an agency that puts emphasis on creative collaboration and communication. Even though I joined Ogilvy for only two weeks I was met with a very warm and welcoming atmosphere. Thanks to the support from people around me, I not even once felt lost or stressed during the internship. All in all, I enjoyed the studio culture, meeting people, learning from them and basically all my time at Ogilvy. 

See what our lockdown new starters also had to say about starting at Ogilvy during the pandemic