I grew up in Coventry and was the first person in my family to go to university. I chose Bangor partly for the course and partly because I wanted somewhere completely different and away from home. The mountains, the sea, and the small town feel where I could actually get to know people, it delivered on all of that, and my heart was set on Bangor after the first open day.
I'll be honest, I wasn't the most academically driven student. I scraped a 2:2 and graduated with no idea what I wanted to do. But looking back, so much of what I learned at Bangor, how to write clearly, think critically, speak confidently, and communicate persuasively, turned out to be foundational to everything that came after.
One thing that made a real difference was the flexibility I had with my dissertation. I worked with my professors to tailor it around digital marketing for small businesses, a topic I was genuinely curious about and saw as a potential future career. That project gave me my first real understanding of the industry and what it would take to start a career in marketing. It planted a seed, and even if I didn't fully realise it at the time, it was exactly what kickstarted my career in the industry. I was able to speak in depth about what I’d learnt during my dissertation project, and how I could apply that to the role.
Outside of lectures, I threw myself into student life. I joined the dance society, which is where I met my wife. We're still together, coming up to 10 years now, so I owe Bangor quite a lot. In addition to this, I would play football, climb Snowdon (which I don’t recommend doing in shorts in November), and join the Gardening Society - although I think I joined this one because I wanted to join their pub crawl…
After graduating, I managed to get a job at a small agency in the Midlands, working with universities on student recruitment campaigns. I was able to talk confidently with clients, deliver presentations, and work with a wide variety of different profiles because of what I learnt at Bangor, and the confidence it gave me. Reading poetry in front of class, for example, makes client presentations a walk in the park!
Over the next few years, I moved through agencies and in-house roles, eventually landing at Samsung and then Google. I'm now a Measurement Partner at TikTok, helping brands understand what's actually driving their results, utilising both the foundational skills I developed at University, as well as the more data intensive skills I have learnt throughout my career so far.
It's not the path I expected. But the thread that runs through all of it is communication, understanding people, crafting messages that land, and making complex things simple. That is what my degree taught me.
If I could say anything to current students, especially those studying humanities, it would be this. It is okay not to know exactly what job or career is a strong fit for you. The path isn't as clear-cut as it might be for medicine or law, and that's fine. What matters is developing the soft skills that will make you successful in a wide variety of roles. In an age of short-form content, dwindling attention spans, declining media literacy, and AI doing more of the heavy lifting, the ability to think critically, write clearly, and communicate persuasively has never been more valuable. Your degree is equipping you with a Swiss army knife, ready to be deployed across a range of careers, even if you don't know it yet.