Feature Friday: Sissy Yee.

I’m kind of taking a new direction with my blog and thought I would start  “Feature Friday” to spotlight my fellow PR folks.

This just happens to be my first “Feature Friday” victim interview. Enjoy!

           

• Brea: Tell me about yourself.

Sissy: Hi! I’m Sissy. I’ve recently graduated with my B.A. in Public Relations from the University of South Florida—while also going down an educational path in Fine Arts, Graphic Design, Business and Philosophy. It was a fun ride but I’ll admit, I’m glad to be off :P

After graduating I traveled around the world for four months and now I’m currently in Florida trying to pursue a life in NYC or London…whichever shows an opportunity to me first! I’m open to breaking into the world of PR, advertising or graphic design. Preferably something in fashion, art or music.

• B: What do you like most about PR?

S: Oooo there’s a lot I like about PR! I actually didn’t really even know what PR was until I was in the midst of doing it! I was working with a musician friend of mine, Luminary Youth, working as his manager. While doing so, I was actually doing a lot of PR work and struggling to decide what to major in when he suggested I do PR! Then I did my research and found out a lot about it and came to really like what it was.
So, what do I like most about PR you ask? The main things I enjoy about it are: it’s social, it can be free and it gives a lot of room for creative thinking. The social aspect hits me because I think it’s great that a large part of the PR world is networking and maintaining relationships. Doing this helps open a myriad of opportunities and learning about things you might not have ever thought you’d be interested in.

What I mean about it being free is that it’s not like advertising, where a company has to pay to be seen. With PR, you can just write a press release, granted it must be of worth, and it could make front page of major news outlets.

Lastly, I enjoy the spaciousness of creative thinking. I’ve always been a fan of guerilla marketing and with PR, you can implement some really interesting guerilla tactics to gain attention from the masses. There’s not many limitations with how creative one can get, as opposed to advertising where there’s usually a lot of guidelines or rules to be followed with your client.

• B: What are your career goals for 2014?

S: I’m hoping 2014 will be a year of a lot of learning and of providing. Ideally, I would like to find an entry or mid-level position at a company in the industry of fashion, art or music. I want to gain a lot of experience and knowledge but also provide my own. Essentially, I just want to find a “home” at a company I can thrive in to make some type of change in whichever industry I find myself in.

• B: Like a true Millennial you have a few side hustles, tell me more about them.

S: One is freelance graphic design and commissioned paintings.

The other is Résumé Rawr, which is a resume enhancing service. It’s a simple yet highly beneficial service to people. I started Resume Rawr because it’s fun for me and helpful for others. Also, I’ve seen similar services out there in the World Wide Web, and their prices are so high; mine are about a third of what they charge! I figured my market would be good for people who weren’t carrying around fat wallets and it’s simply just nice helping people out. Karma, heyyy!

• B: What advice would you give to those still in undergrad who are interested in PR?

S: Do as many internships as possible!!! It looks awesome on your resume and it’s great for gaining knowledge for what you want to do; especially if you don’t know if you want to work in an agency setting or doing in-house PR. Both are very similar but also very different!

You should also know which industry of PR you want to tackle when you graduate! For instance, if you compare fashion PR with healthcare PR…those are two COMPLETELY DIFFERENT jobs. Definitely do some research on this because they don’t really teach you about every industry of PR there is and how different they can be.

Undergrad was helpful in learning the generals of PR like writing press releases and working with the media, etc. but there is a lot of jargon that’s used in particular industries and you won’t know squat if you’ve never worked in it.

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