My First Impression

When I first got here I was quite nervous, it was my first time travelling alone and also my first time in a corporate setting. I had a vague idea of what YAP did but it boiled down to just knowing they were a PR firm. My impression of what my days would be like was based on movies where the job shadower just runs around and fetches coffees and tries to stay out of everyone’s way. However, I soon realized when I got to the office that I would enjoy my stay since everyone was so welcoming.

What Have I Been Doing?

I firstly wrote a sample LinkedIn post advertising the weekly newsletter The Context. Since I have never written something like this it was a good learning opportunity. The marketing exec somehow convinced me to make reels for Instagram and I ended up being the victim in front of her camera twice, but in all seriousness, it was an interesting experience to see the process behind making the reel. The idea of making more reels felt encouraged when I saw the positive feedback from both the team and Instagram. A conversation with the marketing exec gave me deeper insight into what content is performing well and the key factors to weigh when creating it. Like how the first clip of a reel should be just long enough for the one watching to be able to read the text. I even edited my own reel (the one where I make myself shadower of the year) where I learnt that one can look at how well different templates are performing on Instagram or which songs have been going up or down in popularity.

The bigger project I did was a research paper looking into the legislation and regulations surrounding the crypto ecosystem. This gave me a new perspective, considering I had very limited knowledge about crypto when I first got here and only knew about Bitcoin, Ethereum and Binance. Now I have learned more about blockchain technology, crypto regulations and different ways crypto can be used.

What I Enjoyed the Most

The most interesting part of my job shadowing must have been all the people I met. It has been very nice and rewarding to be surrounded by people who are so knowledgeable in their fields. I learned a lot in a short amount of time. Whenever I had a question, there was always someone able to answer it.

Getting to know people from different branches, hearing their stories, their career paths and their perspectives on corporate life was one of the most rewarding parts of the experience and something quite different from what I was used to from my small Swedish town, in a good way. The team lunch stood out in particular, everyone coming together to eat gave me the chance to finally talk to colleagues I had not yet had the opportunity to sit down with and hearing how differently everyone had arrived at their roles made the whole team feel more like a group of individuals than just job titles. On my last day, going for afternoon pints at a local pub with the team was a fitting send-off. It was a first for me and a nice reminder of how much the people, more than the work itself, had shaped my time at YAP.

Final Takeaway

My experience at YAP Global has been unlike anything I could have imagined beforehand, and I am very grateful for the opportunity. I feel that these two weeks will have a profound impact on me since they have allowed me to peek into London life, which has made thinking about studying abroad easier and trying to pursue a life outside of Sweden. Overall, my experience in London has been very pleasant, and I have gotten to try many nice things outside of the shadowing as well, like going to church and having food from a plethora of different cultures unavailable in Sweden. I have had a lot of asian food and my favourites were Pho, Gua Bao and Hong Shao Rou. KFC was also something I had for the first time since we don’t have it in Sweden and it was okay but next time I am excited to try Korean fried chicken, which I think is most likely the better KFC.

“Visiting the Bloomberg near the YAP Global office”