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Manpreet Dhesi, Faculty Director of Communication and Marketing, The Bartlett.

I am The Bartlett’s Faculty Director of Communication and Marketing. My role entails every part of the full Marketing Communications spectrum within Higher Education, but I would sayÌýmy role falls under internalÌýcommunications. Being in a faculty role requires internal stakeholder engagement and communications about projects and initiativesÌý– without internal buy-in, none of them would happen or be as successful as they are.

The Faculty Communications and Marketing team are all specialists looking after areas that are aligned to the Communities of Practice; this enable me to be very diverse and that’s what I really enjoy about my role – I get to have my fingers in many pies and focusing on many audiences. A typical day could go from having a meeting about strategic initiatives the Dean would like to implement, to a conversation about student recruitment marketing throughÌýto some events planning, to looking at printed proofs and seeing how this publication could also work online.

I joined UCL eight years ago and I started Ìýas a Marketing and Communications Officer in a Professional Services Ìýdepartment Ìý– this taught me an Ìýincredible amount in terms of working collaboratively at 911±¬ÁÏÍø.ÌýI got involved in Astrea when that was launching and I got to work Ìýon Ìýprojects that covered the full spectrum of Marketing Communications both within Astrea Ìýand my day job, but I was also completingÌýmy Master’s degree and running a coffee shop I owned with my brother! I came over to The Bartlett on a secondment and the reason I applied was that I was looking at the scale of the projects I could be involved in – I didn’t want to Ìýdo Ìýthe Ìýsame thing I was doing on a day-to-day basis and TheÌýBartlett had a number of high-profile change management projects, which placed me firmly outside my comfort zone, but has ultimately helped me grow and Ìýbecome even more ambitious on projects.Ìý

My advice is simple: be strategic in what you do. I was signed off with exhaustion by my 28th birthday as I was doing far too muchÌý– you get into the mindset that you need to do everything to get experience or have anÌýedge and being signed off taught me the most valuable lesson I’ve learnt to date: everything in moderation. Think about the longer-term goal and what steps you can take to get there without it being detrimental to your health!

Internal communications - grade 9