Rebecca Geraghty, Director of Product Marketing at Publicis Media was inspired to take part in PMA’s Product Marketing Mentorship program by the various mentors that have helped her throughout her career.

In this case study, she discusses:

  • Why she signed up
  • Why she picked us,
  • PMA's Mentorship program's main benefits, and
  • Key outcomes

Rebecca’s motivation

“I was drawn to the program as I’ve had tremendous mentors forming what I call my career “council of advisors” that I continue to turn to at each new phase. When PMA launched the program I was interested to give back in the hope that even a fraction of the advice I’ve been lucky enough to receive could help someone else.”

What are the mentor programs’ main benefits?

Taking part in the program for the past 9 months provided Rebecca with an opportunity to assess herself as much as her mentee Asya, and reflect on how to approach future people management and mentoring she anticipates in her career.

“I loved what Asya challenged me by bringing real situations to the table that I could easily find myself in too. She’s as capable as I am of reading career blogs and finding inspiring quotes that sound lovely but offer little for navigating a thorny situation in practice. Her questions forced me to think critically and answer honestly, letting my mind draw a blank, free of assumptions on what to do, and instead imagine myself in her shoes. Honest truth? I usually started with a rambling, all-over-the-place response as I worked through my thoughts out loud. It didn’t sound slick or TED Talk-worthy—but it was real and honest, and ended up leading (usually) to an approach that we’d both agree made sense. We worked through those thoughts together, challenging, and shaping it into an insight of value.”

Key outcomes

“Asya was a newly-certified Product Marketing Core grad schooled in PMM-approved best practices. But she raised an important concern early on: certain approaches might not resonate in her particular company environment. For example, her stakeholder dynamics didn’t bode well for a messaging exercise corralling everyone in the same room for what they’d see as time-draining kumbaya work. So how best to proceed here?”

“Well, I shared, try to get there another way. If you expect resistance to an up-front exercise find an upcoming content creation effort to get to that same endpoint via a different route. I’ve often found that first-time messaging discovery ends up happening anyway when you sit down to produce a tangible piece of content that people can react to. This then ends up being the vehicle through which the messaging gets hammered out, people engaged and aligned with clarity on what to say going forward.”

“A few weeks later and I was delighted to hear this played out exactly as we discussed! Asya’s recent website overhaul project offered this messaging-by-another-name opportunity to get clarity to extend outward and inform the wider marketing effort.”

“2020 is wrapping up with Asya settling into a new job with the brightest of horizons. Our interactions have shifted towards texts lately, a more expedient way to stay in touch for quick updates. And as avid readers, we’ve decided to take the relationship to the next level and co-host a book club focused on marketing and sales to keep us both learning and growing.

“Special thanks to PMA for offering such a unique way to grow and build connections this year.”

If you’d like to help other product marketers reach their full potential as a mentor or tap into invaluable expertise as a mentee, sign up for our Product Marketing Mentorship program.