Career & NYC Q&A: Career Advice, Blogging, and Finding An Apartment

Do you have any career advice? 

Nope, none at all! I'm totally kidding. As someone who moved here with no connections and still have a limited number of connections, don't be like me. Talk to people, network, find people on LinkedIn and don't be afraid to reach out to people or recruiters for help. I mean, it's literally their job to get you hired and they get paid when you get hired, so it's in their best interest to help you out.

But if you're a shy little stubborn nugget like me, you gotta keep giving it a go. It took me ten months to find my first job and it's taking me about the same amount of time to find something else. It's a struggle, especially when you don't have all of the free time in the world to search for a new job or do not live in the city in which you are applying, aka me when I was living at home but was trying to find a job in New York City.

You just have to remind yourself that you are smart and capable and not alone in this. Finding a job is a struggle and it can be a frustrating process, but you can't let it defeat you or make you feel less than because you will succumb to the pressure and stress and it will deter you on your journey to finding the start or next part of your career path.

What is your favorite part of blogging? 

Being able to get all of my thoughts out there. Literally, my posts are typically just a stream of consciousness and things that just float around in my head at all times. It's also nice when people find my posts entertaining. I'm That Bitch that wants everyone to think that she's funny over anything else in this world, so it makes me feel all warm and cozy inside when I give someone a little dose of humor in their days. It's also just nice having a creative outlet, plain and simple.

Can you go in detail more about New York City and your job?

Whew, this is a hard one but basically, I work in influencer marketing doing...a lot. It's a startup company so the staff is pretty small and my responsibilities were pretty major from day one. Okay, or maybe closer to like week two when I got the hang of everything. Currently, I do the Instagram feed and Stories daily, edit blog posts, do two newsletters per week, answer influencer's emails (some of y'all need to be nicer) and vet the girls signing up to our platform (SocialBlade exists guys and people look at it!). I also curate custom lists for certain brands if they want to work with specific types of influencers and plan events and what not. Basically, anything to do with influencers, I do alongside my beautiful tiny little team.

As for New York City, I'm still having the time of my life. It's really weird, it feels like I've lived here forever but it hasn't even been a year yet. I've already gotten to the point of comfort (and have been at this point since the summer, basically) where I can be a homebody here and not feel like I'm missing out. When I used to visit I would literally spend every single possible second in the day and night out and about. But now that I know that I'm not going anywhere for the very foreseeable future, I can chill out and give myself more time to do all of the things that I think I want to do.

Do you have any job advice as a journalism major?

So, I'm both a bad and potentially good person to ask about this. If you didn't know, my degree is actually in Journalism and Promotional Communications (but mainly journalism) because I thought I wanted to work at Rolling Stone for three months when I was a freshman in college and chose my "path" under the general Journalism & Prom. Com umbrella. That changed like three months later but my neurotic ass basically figured out the rest of my schedule for the next couple of years and realized I could graduate early and couldn't think of anything else to major in so I just...stayed. And wrote some articles. And suffered through my degree. And vowed I would never work in journalism.

However, journalism has served me well! I started recently contributing fairly consistently to TODAY which is a great side gig and a way I can pay off my credit cards without taking away rent, utility, and grocery money. Beyond the actual act of writing articles though, I think my journalism degree comes up positively in every single interview I've ever had. Even if you don't want to write or edit, people in digital media and creative fields appreciate someone with a journalistic background because it shows you know how to write and edit and most of the time, in fewer words. You journalism degree can help you with copywriting, social media (you have to be concise when it comes to captions!), marketing, PR, anything really that involves writing and pitches and needing to know how to make your words have an impact. Play off your degree to your strengths because it can go so much further than just writing articles.

Do you have any recommendations on the best ways to find housing in the city?

I did a whole long post about this already and honestly, the thought of moving hurts my head so I'm going to link to that post here and try to sum it up to the best of my abilities. First thing's first...there are a few things that are important when picking out a neighborhood. There's proximity to the subway, how long it will take you to commute to work, safety, the number of things to do in your area, size of the apartment, and amenities. You're never going to get it all. It just doesn't happen, unless maybe you have an unlimited budget which I'm sure is not really realistic. I personally found my apartment on StreetEasy and that's where I saw a lot of the places that I toured as well. I found a super brief sublet on Roomi when I first moved here so if you're moving by yourself and want to find roommates, that's a great place to find subleases or even full leases. But for real, this post will be much more informative!

How do you balance that work/life grind?

Part of my job is social media so it's hard to fully leave my work at work, but truthfully that's the best way. I'm lucky that even if I work for a startup, I have fairly normal hours and don't really have to stay much past 6/6:30 unless I have an event. When I leave the office, I try to keep my mind off of work things so I can enjoy the rest of my life in the city. I think since having weekly breakdowns in college trying to balance work, school, and friends, I've gotten much more self-aware and know how to handle my stress now. I don't force myself into situations that I know I'm not ready for and know when I need time to myself and when I can devote my free time to do things for myself without having to cry every single week. This answer is pretty chill and unhelpful, but it took years of me running myself into the ground between the ages of 19 and 21 that I basically felt the worst of the worst probably way too early in my life. Who knows, maybe things will change but for now, I have a pretty healthy work/life balance!