Sophia Forsén

I worked extra as a waitress and bartender at the local pub. I served lunch to business guests, took care of buffets, à l carte guests and conferences. And so stood I many long nights behind the bar. That was an interesting new challenge where I learnt a lot about guest service, restaurant business and new ways of team-, planning- and project-structure.

After a short training-on-the-job I decided to buy a store that sells handbags and accessories in Arboga, Sweden. A girl's dream come true ;-) But not only selling was part of the deal. Accounting, advertising and negotiations with suppliers became my daily business. I've learnt a new language, Swedish, a lot about retail and even more about living in a small Swedish city.

As project manager and team leader at La Red I worked for clients like Kia Motors Europe, Ferrero Deutschland, Unilever and eBay Kleinanzeigen. Especially the Kia account was challenging and combined all the skills I learnt throughout my career. With an excellent team we served not only Kia in Frankfurt but also Kia offices from 25 european countries. We created digital campaigns, applications and games for social media, iPhone and iPad and content for country-specific homepages.

Working at Interone in Berlin involved a lot of cooperation with the other network offices - Interone in Hamburg, Cologne and Munich but also Pleon and BBDO in Berlin. As account director I served clients like Allianz, E-Plus, Strato and Elixia with different teams (freelancers, teams att other locations). Temporarily, before we started in Berlin a join venture with Pleon Online, I was leading the Berlin office and learnt quite a bit about corporate management.

Mars was my first "real big client" as project manager with its brands mypetstop.com, Kitekat and Pedigree. We worked together with Grey Interactive Toronto and I was responsible for the German speaking country-rollouts ensuring quality, timing and budget. Later one we developed the first e-commerce platform for E-Plus. That was my first big project as account manager with a very high demand on technology. Up and running, online media, affiliate, SEO and SEM became an important part of my everyday job life.

I started right after German gymnasium to work as "Volontär" (trainee) at Grey Interactive. This was a two-year-program where I even attended an academy to study about communication, time management, economics, advertising law, media and (digital) advertising. In 1999 digital advertising just started and was a very young field of expertise. My first clients were E-Plus, Seagram (Mumm Sekt), Masterfoods/Mars and Procter & Gamble.