There are tons of career paths, what is it that you want to do in marketing? Creative? Product Management? Publicity? There are many ways to go...

Hi Jim,
I saw an amazing job called "Business Designer" at Ideo... they work with clients to help them design new services and products. They do the feasibilty analyis, research, and provide mock ups of the creative, sometimes all the way through to final execution. I'd love to work at an innovation firm in that role (I have electrical engineering/design experience, brand strategy experience, and services entrepreneurship experience).

I want to apply to NYU and Columbia (my family situation forces me to stay in NYC), but they don't seem as innovation focused as Stanford or Haas. Long story short, I don't want my goal (if it is to work in an innovation firm) to seem out of line with what they can offer.

SO I'm wondering if there are other marketing roles that could be a good stepping stone to the "Business Designer" position. In essence, to find a realistic short term goal that would line up with a longer term goal in Business Design at an innovation firm.

What do you think?

What might be good for you is try and get a position at at startup. This will help you get experience in all of the skills this job promotes, but you will get to lead the initiative. Also, you should be able to find a role in either NY or northern California as both have solid entrepreneurial communities. Try visiting the General Assembly in NY.

Hi,

There are several product managers at the company I am currently interning at. It seems that product management is a good career path if you want to focus and develop expertise on developing marketing strategies for a particular product. You can also be involved in new business development, technology on making the product (introducing product additions/changes based on market demand), as well controlling the supply-chain for the product you are managing. Check out a product management career if there an industry you are particularly interested and would like to apply your marketing skills to learning about products in that industry.

To become a brand manager, candidates must possess MBA with specialization in marketing. They cannot become brand managers all of a sudden, rather they should begin their career as a member of the sales team and after two or three years of good performance in the sales team, they will be promoted as product manager or assistant brand manager on the basis of their performance and finally might be posted as brand managers. There might be heavy competition in posting a person as assistant brand manager or product manager from a team of sales personnel. Therefore, only a person showing good performance as a member of a sales team can climb in the ladder taking towards the position of brand manager.
brand management

albert001 wrote:To become a brand manager, candidates must possess MBA with specialization in marketing. They cannot become brand managers all of a sudden, rather they should begin their career as a member of the sales team and after two or three years of good performance in the sales team, they will be promoted as product manager or assistant brand manager on the basis of their performance and finally might be posted as brand managers. There might be heavy competition in posting a person as assistant brand manager or product manager from a team of sales personnel. Therefore, only a person showing good performance as a member of a sales team can climb in the ladder taking towards the position of brand manager.
brand management

Hi Albert thanks for your post. I know of people who have gone into Brand Management straight out of undergrad and also straight out of an MBA program. I'm sure sales is a great way to get a foot in the door, but I definitely don't think it's the only way. But thank you again for the post - Sales is another short term goal for me to consider.