Nikita Gundala came from her hometown in India to join the ESSEC MSc Marketing Management and Digital (MMD) program in 2022. She hopes to work for a luxury brand in the FMCG sector or an agency that runs marketing campaigns.

From Germany, Maximillian Kern (Max) joined the MMD program just one year later and is interested in entrepreneurship, technology, and luxury brands.

Today, Nikita joined audience intelligence company Pulsar as a content marketing executive.

Despite living in Singapore, Max has managed to grow his Germany-based influencer marketing business, InfluenceHorizons UG. He also received multiple internship offers and is starting work at Christian Dior’s Singapore office.

They attribute their success to the training received at the MMD program.

Practical Skills to Apply at the Workplace

Both Nikita and Max attest to how relevant the lessons they learned during the MMD program are in the workplace. Nikita first realized this during an earlier role as a strategy intern at Edelman.

“My tasks included mapping the customer journey, building consumer personas, and conducting research, all things I knew how to do because of group projects at ESSEC,” she says.

She also found that the regular group presentations at ESSEC sharpened her public speaking skills and gave her the confidence to speak up.

Max also quickly realized that the benefits of participating in the MMD program could be applied to his own business.

“I now have a better understanding of what is considered good content, how to promote content, and how to advertise effectively on platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and Google,” he says.

Gaining these different insights, combining them, and adapting them to my business has been a huge benefit.”

Industry Exposure: an Advantage During Job Search

For Nikita, the most valuable part of the MMD program was working with industry partners on real business challenges.

The two most meaningful to her were working with Vogue Singapore to increase the magazine’s subscription numbers using Web 3.0 technology as part of their Luxury Brand Management course and helping the M&C Saatchi team develop a Key Opinion Leader (KOL) partner program for Guardian as part of the annual MMD Digital Marketing Challenge (DMC).

“During the DMC, we were mentored by M&C Saatchi’s managing director, who taught us how to simplify and back up our ideas with evidence,” she recalls, noting that the projects became a good talking point at job interviews and proved her work experience.

“At an interview at Edelman, I was able to highlight the importance of understanding clients from different backgrounds—which I feel appealed to the company because it’s an agency with clients from diverse fields,” she says.

She believes her ability to do this helped her land a six-month strategy internship at Pulsar in Singapore, which paved the way for her full-time position.

Max, who secured his Dior internship in the regional retail and operations department through networking at ESSEC Talent Day, concurs.

“During the interview, I could explain the different consulting projects I worked on during the luxury retail and brand management classes for Tiffany & Co. and Longchamp. I could share about trends in luxury retail and use this to prove my experience in the field,” he explains, adding that he believes the lessons learned will also become useful when he eventually starts work.

The ESSEC MMD Confidence

Nikita and Max say that besides tangible skills, they also have a new hunger for learning.

For Nikita, this translated to her undertaking an individual project to create a newsletter for the Edelman office and finding the confidence to interact with senior leadership.

It also spurred her to learn new skills, such as using consumer marketing tools BrandWatch and NewsWhip Analytics, which she sees as useful for her future.

Max believes this growth is due to the diversity of the ESSEC Asia-Pacific community.

For example, he says that explaining his business to classmates and professors has given him valuable feedback that has helped him refine his presentation and develop his ideas.

“It makes you think and rethink what you’re doing. You also get new insights and perspectives, which I find very valuable,” he says.

“I think it’s the people you meet, the connections you make, the input they give you, along with the actual hard skills in the social media marketing, brand management, and entrepreneurship courses that make all the difference to an MMD graduate!”