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Topic: How do I break into the New York fishbowl?
| Author | Message |
| DudeDrops | Posted – 1/18/2008 9:45:39 PM | show profile | email poster This is an open question to all of my New York friends who are swimming comfortably in the New York Media Fishbowl: Can a landlubber from the Midwest (Toledo, to be exact) get a good position in New York WITHOUT living there? I'm currently editor of Adams St. Publishing, a mom-n-pop cottage industry that produces four publications: Toledo City Paper (an alt-weekly), Toledo Area Parent News (monthly parenting tabloid), Ann Arbor Family Press (ditto) and Current (monthly entertainment mag in Ann Arbor, Mich.). I've been here for four years, won two industry writing awards and have mastered just about every medium there is ? press releases, copywriting for radio and print, ad design, and even event-planning. Hell, I even wrote and starred in a series of TV commercials. I'm now thoroughly sick of the Midwest and I long to become a part of the New York zeitgeist. But several people have told me the only way to get a good media job in New York is if you LIVE there, because companies won't wait a measly two weeks for you to move there. True or false? If any of you out there in Media Bistroland can give me any advice, I'll buy you a drink (top shelf booze only!) when I get my first NYC job. |
| Upward Bound | Posted – 1/19/2008 12:37:27 PM | show profile Just move here I say true. In my case, employers didn't really give a shit about my midwestern work experience and thought I was grossly underqualified for the jobs I was applying to. I caught a break filling in for someone on a last-minute basis. I wouldn't have gotten the job if the pub hadn't been in a pinch, but I did the job well and another opportunity at that company fell from the sky in to my lap. For me, it was all about in-person first impressions and had a lot to do with networking. My resume, which is all you'll have to go on until you move here and start networking, was more or less worthless without nationally-recognized names on it. When you think about it, it makes no sense for companies to take a risk on someone from far away when they have so many qualified candidates within spitting distance. Now, you have a lot of skills, which will probably help you a lot since shrinking staffs and layoffs tend to make people with varied skills more in demand. You probably won't shoot straight to the top since the publications you've worked for aren't household names on a national basis, but I imagine your skills will adapt and you'll rise fairly quickly even if you have to start lower than you think is fair. Good luck! |
| DixieDunbar | Posted – 1/19/2008 1:32:49 PM | show profile Doubtful... I was in a similar situation years ago... A Wisconsinite w/ dreams of moving to NYC. I sent out tons of resumes from the midwest and got no responses. Eventually I went to NYC for a week and pounded the pavement. Took a low-paying job, moved immediately and worked my way up. My best break came when a temp agency, Career Blazers, got me an assistant gig at Vogue. I was a little old and overqualified to be an assistant, but it served as my launching pad to better jobs at Conde Nast and Hearst. Save up and move. Take the best thing you can find and look for something better. Although you'll hear jokes about the midwest, I got a lot of mileage out of pimping my corn-fed qualities and famous midwest work ethic. Employers loved it. But, truth is, nobody works harder than New Yorkers. You can do it. Good luck! |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 1/19/2008 2:54:52 PM | show profile It's much more than waiting two weeks to move after they've decided to offer you the job. The real trouble is when an applicant lives 1500 miles away, it's too much trouble to even go through the process of deciding if he's a good candidate. Honestly, no one's going to look at your resume and go, "This is the guy we need." At best, they'll say, "OK, let's make him one of the 5 or 6 guys we call in for a preliminary interview." And calling someone in for a preliminary interview who lives 1500 miles away is too much bother, even if you are willing to pay for the travel costs. And that's your handicap. By living 1500 miles away, you have to look exponentially better on paper than applicants who are nearby, and that's hard to do unless you've done something like won a major, major award. In a way, the way you present your experience might work against you -- someone who says they've mastered everything from copywriting to ad design to event planning in four years is going to cause eyeballs to roll skyward. Very few people master any of those areas in just four years. So, rather than look at you as a master of all those areas, most potential employers will see you as a jack of all trades, which makes you less desireable from a distant -- typically employers will only consider a long-distant applicant if he has a highly specialized skill that is difficult to find close by. So by calling yourself a copywriter/event planner/ad designer you may look less desirable than someone who stresses just one of those capabilities. Bottom line: You probably won't get a job in NY until you move to NY. Good luck. |
