Case studies: Editor: Alex

Alex studied English literature and after a frustrating job hunt he became an editor at a small publishing house.

After I graduated I took some temporary work to tide me over while I applied to various graduate schemes and searched through thousands of unappealing business-speak filled online job adverts. I also applied to do a PGCE to give myself another option.

While I was looking for work I was living in the Midlands, but travelling all over the country to attend interviews in London and Manchester. After six frustrating months an agency saw my CV online and put me forward for an editorial position with a business-facing magazine based in my local area.

I studied English literature and edited a student newspaper while I was at university so I had excellent writing and editing skills. I also spent a year in Austria on the Erasmus exchange programme and can speak German, which was important because the employer was a small German publishing house. I was offered the position and am still with the company two and a half years later. When I first took the job I thought it would be a stop-gap, but I have ended up staying because I find the role really rewarding and found that working for a small company suits me because I am given lots of responsibility.

Temping for cash never hurt anyone, but doing a sub-standard job is not good for you. Treat your temp position as you would a full-time post and this will make the transition easier when you do get something permanent.

I edit the features section of the magazine and am responsible for the content of our daily e-newsletter and the website, so I write and edit news and feature articles and also do some HTML code writing for the website. I also work with the advertising manager to ensure the advertising copy is consistent across all our products, arrange interviews with people in the industry, conduct research and represent the company at trade exhibitions, meetings and product launches.

My job allows me to be creative and to help shape the products I work on. I enjoy doing research and writing copy. I like working to tight deadlines and travelling all over the world meeting interesting people. I am also given a lot of responsibility and my company encourage me to be independent because that is the key to being good at the job.

I’m not always interested in all the topics we have to cover in the magazine, and it can be a bit tedious when you have to meet and befriend people you don’t particularly like. Working for a small company gives me plenty of opportunity to learn on the job, but the downside of this is a lack of any formal recognition of my contribution.

Ideally in the future I would like to move into book publishing, but that isn’t really a growth area at the moment so I’m not sure. If I stay in the magazine industry I would like to move over to the commercial side and write for a wider audience, although business-to-business magazines seem much more secure at the moment.

My advice is:

• Throw yourself into job applications as early as possible.
• Grab experience whenever you see the opportunity.
• Be persistent and don’t be down on yourself when you’re finding it difficult to get work.