This is a guest post from Ashley R., a Marketing Specialist at Reynolds. She has worked diligently to achieve her goals, here is her story. 

I have always been a hard worker. Aside from doing chores and baby sitting at a young age, I started my first job at 15 hosting birthday parties at the coolest spot in town. Think laser tag, bounce houses, arcade games, and bowling… it was a fun job. While in college, I worked several part-time jobs and held two different internships. Today, I’m a marketing communications specialist with Reynolds.

I started here part-time when I graduated and eventually moved into a full-time position. In 2016, I was voted Marketing Associate of the Year. It was an honor, and honestly, something I had been striving for since I first started. But how did I come to receive this award.

Aside from hard work and determination, I believe there are three key aspects that helped me achieve this award:

1) Ability to work well with others:

When I first joined the corporate world, I had never experienced working with so many different people. There was definitely a learning curve. I work with multiple creative teams, sales professionals, product managers, technical and support staff, and sometimes even customers. Individuals in each of these groups have their own personality and their own way of working.

To be successful, you have to adapt to those different personalities and work well with them. You aren’t going to become besties with every one of your co-workers but it is important that you have a professional relationship to get work done. This will help you grow professionally and build respect within the office.

2) Going above and beyond:

When you first start a new job, especially straight out of college, you can't expect to be given the shiny, fun, really important stuff to work on. I certainly wasn’t. But that doesn’t mean you don’t put 110% effort into your work.

If your management team sees you going above and beyond for minor projects, they might start to wonder what you could do given bigger and better opportunities. Over the years, I have been given more important projects to work on and now have the opportunity to handle the marketing for one of our more complex departments and, in my opinion, one of our coolest products, AddOnAuto.

If I had slacked off in the beginning I wouldn’t have been given better opportunities and I wouldn’t have had the chance to become Marketing Associate of the Year.

3) Continuing to learn:

Just because you’ve graduated college doesn't mean the learning stops, especially if you want to stand out from the crowd. Reynolds has given me every opportunity to learn about my products inside and out, take sales courses to understand our sales cycle and customers, and always continue to fine tune my marketing skills.

Taking the time to learn about both my products and new marketing ideas has helped me become an expert in my field. Because of this my co-workers see me as a trusted asset. I’m able to have intelligent conversations related to my products with them and provide sound marketing advice when planning out projects.

Conclusion

Achieving any award or success in a company takes hard work and dedication, and it doesn’t happen overnight. Remember, you’re going to start out at the bottom of the totem pole but with the right attitude and the willingness to go above and beyond you’ll be given bigger and better opportunities to shine.