 Hi, this is Corey Morris with Aarhus University and we're here in wonderful Copenhagen. This is MEC and we've been invited inside by one of our alumni to learn a little bit more about what he does and where he works. Let's take a closer look inside. Thomas Beierholm, thanks so much for inviting us into your humble abode. You're so welcome. Thomas, tell us a little bit more about yourself. My name is Thomas Beierholm. I'm 34 years old. I have a master's degree in corporate communication, graduated in 2007 from Aarhus School of Business. And for the last five, six years I've been working with media and marketing, especially with sponsorship and events. And today I work as a client director at MEC Access. MEC, it's quite new to me. What is MEC? MEC is a media agency, one of the leading agencies in Denmark. And again, MEC is a part of a global media agency network, MEC Global, where we have around 4,000 colleagues in more than 80 different countries. How many work here at the office in Copenhagen? Approximately hundreds, and at MEC Access we are approximately 30. And what's it like to work at MEC? It's great, first of all. It's great to work in the media agency, especially because it's a young environment. It's an industry moving forward, always moving forward. Every day we will meet a new media or consumer trends, which we have to understand and use in our work with our clients. If you look at the culture of MEC, can you use, let's just say, three words to describe the culture here? Yeah, MEC has a strong focus on people, on how to develop, not only the organization, but they know before developing the organization, you have to develop the individual, the team. So there's a strong focus on people and how to develop people. You're a client director at MEC Access. What does that entail? What do you do as a client director? We are working with what is called below-the-line activities in marketing, which is traditionally face-to-face communication, it's sponsorships, it's events, it's guerrilla marketing, ambush marketing, just to give you a few examples. Let's look at an average day. Tell us about home's average day here at MEC. Let's just take it a Monday. We have a team meeting every Monday from 9 to 9.30, just to get a good start of the week. I want to know from my team what clients are they working on this week, do they have any resources, do they have any issues or something we should talk about before starting the week. Afterwards we are all together. The four units and my boss, Kasper, is going through almost the same things. What are we going to do this week? Lots of planning. Lots of planning just to get the framework before having another busy week. After 10 o'clock it's another busy interesting day, working with my team, trying to motivate them, trying to give them feedback, professional feedback on their assignments and of course working with my clients. If I can walk home at the end of the day with a motivated team and we have done something good for our clients, working professionally with our assignments, then I'm a happy man. Let's talk about the path that you took to get the current job. You graduated from ASB and now you're here at MEC as a client director. Talk to us about that pathway. Actually my first job in the industry, I started in June 2007 at a competitor. I started out as management trainee for the CEO of that company. And in four years I've made four steps from management trainee to project manager to consultant and today client director. So Thomas, how did you land this job? Yeah, it's a funny story. I make presentations at conferences, industry seminars. And actually I met my boss, Casper, who's my boss today, at an industry seminar where I had a presentation. And after the presentation he called me and asked me if I was interested in knowing something more about MEC access. How did you deal with the transition coming from, well let's just say Jutland together, both in terms of where you're from originally and your education at ASB. How did you deal with that transition over here to Copenhagen? Yeah, actually it was pretty easy. Mostly because I think 90% of my social and academic network moved to Copenhagen with them these years as well. So actually I just moved my network from Aarhus to Copenhagen and I think we all needed a new challenge. We have been studying for five, six years in Aarhus which we loved, we loved the city, we loved ASB. But we needed a new challenge, a new city and especially for me working in the media and marketing industry there were so many opportunities in Copenhagen. You said you had a big network of friends that moved over here. How have you used that network since you got over here? I was writing on my master thesis. I started a network. It was at the beginning a social network but it has also developed. So today we have a network living in Jutland, living in Copenhagen, 30 people where we offer each other jobs. We give each other feedback. We have meetings where we discuss business issues just to give you one example. A month ago ten of us met here in Copenhagen talking about the transition from employee to leader which is a subject that is interesting for many of us. So we have this strong network and we use it in a social perspective and in a business perspective. What does it mean to you Thomas to be an alum from ASB? They have prepared me through the exchange programmes. They have prepared me through the support of the student union and of course they have prepared me through the education. They are the good teachers. So it means something for me that it is a quality university, that it is respected also outside Denmark. That is one of the top 100 universities. So of course I am proud to be an alumni from that university. It is not something I think of every day but when you ask me I am proud and I used all the tools they gave me during my student period in my everyday life. We are proud that you are proud. Knowing what you know now, is there any advice that you would offer to current students or maybe even prospective students back at the school? Yes. I look at it this way. We are all different and we all have our different ways of doing things. What I would say is take all the challenges that you are given during your study period. Say yes to all exchange programmes you are offered. Say yes to all student jobs, relevant and interesting student jobs that you are offered. And never forget that hard work and good drive is not to beat. Thank you so much for having this conversation with us and inviting us into your office. Best of luck to you in the future. Thank you for visiting us. Again, this is Corey Morris of Ahoosh University. You have heard Thomas Bartholomew's story about MEC here in Copenhagen. I hope you enjoyed it and I hope you join us next time.