The Penta Podcast Channel
Introducing Penta's young professionals
Today on What's At Stake, we have a special episode hosted by Mark MacGregor, managing director out of Penta's London office, who speaks with four of his strategy colleagues from across the globe: Marykate Maguire, an associate in the Dublin office; Ruairidh Fraser, an associate in the London office; Grace Boyle, an associate in the Washington, D.C. office; and Emily Wilson, an associate in the New York City office.
The conversation, spanning several time zones, covers what it's like to be a young professional at Penta, including day-to-day work, how colleagues communicate across offices, and training and mentorship. Marykate, Ruairidh, Emily, and Grace also share their favorite parts about working at Penta and advice for other young professionals starting their career.
Tune in here to learn more! Additionally, learn more about and apply to the grad programme Marykate and Ruairidh participated in here.
Today on What's At Stake, we have a special episode hosted by Mark MacGregor, managing director out of Penta's London office, who speaks with four of his strategy colleagues from across the globe: Marykate Maguire, an associate in the Dublin office; Ruairidh Fraser, an associate in the London office; Grace Boyle, an associate in the Washington, D.C. office; and Emily Wilson, an associate in the New York City office.
The conversation, spanning several time zones, covers what it's like to be a young professional at Penta, including day-to-day work, how colleagues communicate across offices, and training and mentorship. Marykate, Ruairidh, Emily, and Grace also share their favorite parts about working at Penta and advice for other young professionals starting their career.
Tune in here to learn more! Additionally, learn more about and apply to the grad programme Marykate and Ruairidh participated in here.
Welcome to this week's episode of what's at Stake. I'm your host, Mark McGregor, Penta Managing Director, out of our London office. This week's episode is a special, featuring four of my strategy colleagues from across the globe Mary Kate McGuire, who's an associate in the Dublin office. Rory Fraser, an associate in the London office. Grace Boyle, who works out of Washington DC, and Emily Wilson, in the New York City office. The four of them Mary, Kate, Rory, Grace and Emily are going to talk us through their experiences in Penta, including how they found out about the company, what the day-to-day work is like, and some of the favorite clients and work that they do at the firm. They'll also give some advice about what they would give to other young professionals considering starting a career at Penta. So, Mary-Kate, Rory, Grace, Emily, it's great to have you on the show, so let's kick off with the first question, perhaps with Mary-Kate going first and then Grace what attracted you to the role in the first place? What made it stand out from the things you were looking at doing?
Speaker 2:I think for me what really stood out was the rotational structure of the programme. I hadn't really seen anything like it when I was looking around to see what I would do next after my Master's, but when I saw that we would be able to work from across the Dublin office, the London office and the Brussels office, I just thought that that was really unique. To put it quite plainly, this kind of like diversity in working environment would give you like from the outset I knew it would give me a really broad skill set, but also it would make me incredibly adaptable because we'd have to jump between environments all the time. And then, from a networking perspective, it was also going to give me an opportunity to build upon my network, make some kind of more wide-ranging clients and colleagues to work with. So that was kind of what really drew me in initially.
Speaker 1:That was obviously the pitch. You've been here for eight, nine months now. How does that turn out in reality for you? Is the promise of the work across different countries? Has that worked out? Has that been as interesting as you thought it was going to be?
Speaker 2:It was definitely as interesting. I mean, it really exceeded my expectations because on the other side of the same coin, it is kind of disruptive to jump from environment to environment, but it really exceeded my expectations. All of the teams, virtually in person, make such an enormous effort to integrate you in the teams and they're massively supportive. You know, there were times where I was being handed a task where I had absolutely zero clue what I was supposed to do, managed to figure it out, figured out with my other team members, and now I could probably, you know, do with a lot less stress. So it actually really exceeded my expectations. I thought that it would be really overwhelming, but now that we're at this stage, it's really not. It's actually been really fulfilling and grace.
Speaker 1:What about you? What attracted you to to taking the plunge with penta?
Speaker 3:um, I took the plunge with penta largely because I had always been interested in kind of the role of media and its role in our political system. I studied political philosophy, so I'd done a lot of academic work on like propaganda, even like the sociology of news, so it was really excellent to find a firm that kind of gives you a peek behind the curtain on this relationship between media and like electoral politics generally, and so that's been really excellent to see and to work in. What really also made it stand out was I had the chance to reach out to two people who are working at Penta already and it was very nice to hear them like describe the culture in such a positive way. It seemed like a really excellent place to kind of work across disciplines, work across sectors and really grow, especially like this being my first role after college, it's been a really great learning experience in that way.
Speaker 1:And have there been any surprises on? Obviously you had an expectation about the firm and you talk about the kind of public affairs side and the media side. Obviously, you'll be aware that we have a kind of huge insight business. Was that something you're aware of when you made your application originally?
Speaker 3:When I first applied it was still we were still just the DC firm, the HBS firm, and so this combination of like the research and the strategy was something that was a bit of a surprise when I started, but it's been a really cool way to differentiate the firm from other public affairs firms in DC. Penta stands out because we have this kind of proprietary research angle that we bring all this experience and expertise like just to be able to work with colleagues who have been kind of like the anchors in the media or like led campaigns and have that expertise to bring the research to another level for the clients has been a really, really cool experience to be a part of.
Speaker 1:Very good Well let's bring the others in. Let's have a look at what the kind of day-to-day life is like. Perhaps, Emily, you can kick us off. Just give us a sense of what the work involves for you.
Speaker 4:So I'm in the New York office and it's really been interesting because a lot of my bosses are in the DC office. So the day to day is just constantly on calls with my colleagues in DC or in San Francisco. So I know we're going to talk about that a little bit later, but that is. You know it's a very integrated. All the offices are working together on a bunch of different clients and deliverables. So you know my day is constantly in contact with the other offices in different regions, which I think is really cool.
Speaker 4:Every day at Penta is different, which is a cliche that we say a lot here, but it is really true.
Speaker 4:I'm currently working on seven clients and so each day I have around one to two client calls and then, you know, one to two, maybe a little bit more internal calls just with our teams, and then in between and after these calls, my day usually consists of working on various deliverables for my clients.
Speaker 4:So, for example, right now I'm on a multinational beauty company and I constantly am vetting their potential partnerships between people and organizations that they're thinking of engaging with. I'm also working on a tech company, so we frequently do data analysis and deck building for them about the various issues that are important to them. And then finally, working on a health company and working with their corporate communications team, helping them draft op-eds and land op-eds in the markets that are important to them. Doing ad hoc work for them, including pitching reporters making media lists. Doing ad hoc work for them, including pitching reporters making media lists. Something else that I'll say about the day-to-day at Penta Penta is really relationship-driven, so kind of what I was saying at the beginning about you know, constantly in contact with the other offices. A few times a week I will have networking calls or coffee chats with people in other offices just to get to know them, even people I'm not on teams with and this has been really great to just meet people in other offices and get to know the wider Penta community.
Speaker 1:Do you have to talk directly to clients? It sounds like there's quite a lot of that.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so we get a lot of experience talking to clients, which I think is also a unique part about the associate experience at Penta. I have been able to build pretty robust relationships with my various client contacts, which has been really great and really great experience, especially so early on in my career. Just two weeks ago I was in a meeting with a CEO of a financial services company in New York and you know that's just experience that I don't think a lot of people get elsewhere, which has been really great and just great to get FaceTime with C-suite and execs and, you know, vice presidents of various different multinational firms.
Speaker 1:Yeah, great Rory. What about you? What's your experience? You're obviously based in the London office. How have you found that?
Speaker 5:Yeah, the London office has been really, really good, I think, in terms of how that looks on a day-to-day basis. I mean to echo what Emily said, we do a lot of things that kind of mean that the day-to-day work changes almost every time I come into the office. But I would say there are a couple of things that I will do regularly. So I'm on a monitoring brief at the moment, which means that each morning I come in and I do a couple hours work on that kind of picking out key news articles for that particular client and then we send that over in kind of a big report format.
Speaker 5:After that I generally I do most of my work on public affairs accounts. So it's a lot of kind of consultations, policy updates, and that kind of goes across all sectors that Penta kind of specializes in. So I have clients in the energy space, in the agri-food space, also in financial services, so it's kind of quite a large, diverse mix. And then I also do a fair bit of work spread across offices. So there's a lot of kind of, yeah, internal meetings where we're communicating between our European offices, but also every so often with our colleagues in the US. But yeah, it can definitely depend on the day and whatnot.
Speaker 1:And again, it sounds like you're exposed to clients directly. I know that some other firms you get those who are new to the firm are kind of hidden away or they do much of the work but they don't get much exposure to the invite the C-suite that I was talking about before Is that something you've experienced? Where you're presenting regularly to clients, you're direct one-to-one contact.
Speaker 5:Yeah, and that was something I think that um the company made really quite clear from from sort of day one when, when I joined the team in london, that we would be on client calls and sort of had to be ready to speak up and to be to be able to deliver um on those calls, which which has been really, really helpful, I think, in terms of growing my own confidence that I know what I'm talking about to the clients, but also I think it's been really useful for building the relationship with the client. So a couple of the companies that I work with I've been with now for eight months and I would say that those relationships have definitely got better and I think that's been through speaking to the clients and being introduced to them from a very early stage.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so what about the kind of your initial onboarding, the kind of process for new employees? How have you guys sort of found the training you received, the mentorship at penta?
Speaker 2:perhaps going back to to mary kate, let's start with you so, like I previously said, I think from the outside it would look like it's extremely disruptive and you know I speak for myself, but maybe some others on the call might resonate with this. I had a year of doing university online, which was not great, which was quite difficult, so I was a bit worried about how this might work, like I know that we were sitting physically in one office still working virtually for the other two, but I mean, I think the way they did it was just phenomenal. I mean, when I rotated first to the London office, I was kind of like you know, how is this going to work? How am I going to get to know my colleagues? You know it's not like if I have an issue I can tap them on the shoulder and ask them for some help, but the team like I cannot say this enough the team is massively supportive over there.
Speaker 2:I have really enjoyed working there and, aside from that, I've built really good relationships with everybody in my team, to the point that now that I'm working for a different office, I will still have my weekly check-ins with everybody there and, from a mentorship perspective, I think that's really important that they support you even when you're not working for them and you might not talk daily. And then with the training, the training has also been great, especially in terms of intelligence, because sitting here in the Dublin office we actually don't have anybody from the Intel team sitting here with us, but if I ever had a question or anything, even the most senior person who's working on the intelligence side will happily put 15 minutes aside to chat to me. So I think that really speaks to how we run things here is that it doesn't matter how junior you are, you're just as important and they're always happy to have a chat with you. So overall, I would say the training and mentorship is extremely supportive and, yeah, it's just been great I think and grace.
Speaker 1:What about you? Has your experience been on this or training, mentorship side in the united states?
Speaker 3:it's been truly excellent, like. I totally emphasize the points that have been made. Um, everyone really everyone's busy, but everyone takes the time to like make you feel heard and takes the extra time to teach you, whether it be about the policy issue that the client is concerned about or just like how to write a pitch email to a reporter. You can really easily walk up to anyone's desk and talk through it and people are so like willing and eager to um take the time to mentor you, which is really really excellent. Uh, and to emphasize the points that rory and emily were making, you're trusted with a lot really early on in your career, like I've. You're able to like speak up on client calls or I've like met with a reporter to talk about the client policy issue at like a top tier outlet, and it feels really incredible, like with your in your first year working, to have that level of trust from your managers, and I think it speaks to like the robust training system and mentorship that we have here. When associates in the US offices first start, they go through like two or three weeks of trainings, from how to put together a pitch deck to how to pitch a reporter, to like how to deal with information overload when you're getting like 500 emails a day. So, and these trainings are taught by, like the managers and the associates that you're going to be working with.
Speaker 3:So it's a really great way to like have someone be able to speak about their experience to you and like get to ask questions.
Speaker 3:And there's just kind of this culture where you should be asking questions. Like there are no stupid questions like, especially in your first six months of working here, um, you're really really encouraged to like speak up if you don't understand something, and everyone is always like. I remember being surprised how willing everyone was to lend a hand, even when they are very busy, um, and it like it's also really nice that it kind of ascends hierarchy in a way, like if you have like a policy issue that you're really interested about or like a question that you want to answer, but you haven't used the PentaLive analysis tool yet, you're able to like like I've reached out to like Kester, who's one of the leaders in Europe on Penta Live, and he's like helped me through some really interesting analyses that we were able to like post on Penta's website, which I think is like a very cool experience that like goes beyond kind of the typical day to day work that is unique to Penta.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much for that. Let's take a quick break and when we come back we're going to talk about what it's like to work with colleagues across the globe. I'm Mark McGregor and you're listening to what's in State.
Speaker 6:Penta is the world's first comprehensive stakeholder solutions firm. We are a one-stop shop for the intelligence and strategy leaders need to assess a company's reputation and make decisions that improve their positioning. Reputation and make decisions that improve their positioning as executives in the C-suite must account for a growing set of engaged stakeholders, all with distinct, fast-changing demands. Penta provides real-time intelligence and strategy solutions. We work with clients solving complex global challenges across a variety of industries. Our clients span technology, financial services, energy, healthcare and more. To learn more about how Penta can support your company, check out our website at pentagroupco, our Twitter at PentaGRP or find us on LinkedIn at Penta Group.
Speaker 1:I'm Mark McGregor and you're listening to what's at Stake. I'm here with Mary-Kate Rory Grace, Emily, Emily, let's start with you. What do you think it's like to work with clients and colleagues in different locations across the globe?
Speaker 4:So I alluded to this earlier.
Speaker 4:But someone in my early days at Penta, when I asked them that same question, said that it really feels like we're all working in the same location, and this is really.
Speaker 4:I've really found this to be true throughout my time at Penta in but I'm in constant communication not only with my bosses but also with the other associates on the team pretty much all day long, so it really feels like we're in the same location, which has been really great, and I think it just speaks to the communication environment that Penta really helps foster.
Speaker 4:I remember actually it was one of my first weeks working at Penta and I was on a team with Grace and she was just so willing to jump on a call with me and to walk me through this deliverable that we were working on and that has really held true throughout my whole experience at Penta, so it's really been super great. I'm on colleagues, I'm on teams right now with colleagues from Hong Kong, from London, dc, san Francisco, so even though we're all on different time zones, it's really easy to get in contact with everybody and everybody's super willing to collaborate and talk about any problems that we're having on the client or talk about any issues or really just willing to chat and get to know you, which has been really great.
Speaker 1:And for those clients that are in very different time zones, what does that mean? So you mentioned Hong Kong. That's obviously going to be a completely other end of the time zone to you in the States. How does that work?
Speaker 4:Yeah, so Hong Kong, it gets a little tricky.
Speaker 4:The time zones, I think they're around 12 hours time difference between us here in New York, so it gets a little bit tricky then time difference between us here in New York, so it gets a little bit tricky then.
Speaker 4:But you know, we're just mainly with our Hong Kong clients. We're mainly in communication over email, but they're always super willing to help us, help us on any client deliverables or just provide the perspective that they have living in Hong Kong, which has been really helpful, especially on some of my clients that have a huge market presence in China. It's been great to get our Hong Kong team's perspective just on various issues or questions that our clients may have. I'm also on, as I said, a team with one of my colleagues in London and we meet pretty regularly and it's just been great because she'll be able to work on a deliverable morning and afternoon her time and then she'll be able to pass it to me and my colleagues in the US and East Coast time. So it really has made the days feel longer and we've really been able to collaborate and pass off deliverables and work on things that way, which has been great.
Speaker 1:And Rory. What about you? I know we were kind of some American clients together, but what's your experience been like working across different locations?
Speaker 5:Yeah, it's been really really interesting Again, something that I started doing almost immediately when I began at penta um working with clients in the us and then since christmas been working quite a lot with um clients in the european union.
Speaker 5:Uh, and I think that that to begin with was challenging in terms of the different political systems, uh, between what I was used to in the UK versus how things are done in the EU, where there's quite a direct process, step by step, of how legislation will kind of end up going through the parliament and the commission there.
Speaker 5:But everyone was in the teams was really really helpful to kind of get you up to speed quite quickly and to understand how that process takes place, what the key updates that we needed to be sort of aware of recently on that piece of legislation was made things a lot easier from that perspective. And then I think the teams at PANSA have got pretty good kind of communication on all the accounts that we have, and that's been really helpful to make it not really feel like you're working with people who are physically based in another office. I feel like I've actually got to know some of the members of those teams really really well, even though we've actually never really met each other in person, so that has been pretty cool. And then on the American side, obviously, similar kind of stories. I'm aware there One of my deliverables I do in the morning and then I hand that over once our American colleagues are up and ready to go.
Speaker 1:And there may be people listening to this that are interested in joining Penta, considering a career here. I just wonder if there's any advice let's start with Grace any advice you'd give those young professional thinking well, maybe I should give Penta a go?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. I've been thinking about this a lot, being a young professional myself. Giving advice to young professionals feels a bit funny, but you learn a lot here in a very short amount of time, so I'll do my best to impart this wisdom. Like being in DC, we're all very like type a like excited to dig in, like kind of always. I don't know.
Speaker 3:I feel like a lot of people who move to DC especially are always kind of looking for the next best thing and kind of like treating these jobs as like a transactional kind of stepping stone, which is great, like you should be doing.
Speaker 3:You should be going to the like networking happy hours on the Hill and you should be like trying to develop these relationships outside the firm.
Speaker 3:But I think that it's really important and you like get the best experience when you really dig into every opportunity that you can here um, and that involves like taking the extra time to like do the extra research, um before a pitch or something like making yourself a resource and an issue expert by like really digging into the policy material is something that like is a extremely like. It will help get you noticed by the people above you if you become helpful in that way, it's also like taking the extra time to like develop relationships with your colleagues Really, even like just getting coffee or getting drinks with them after like digging into every opportunity you can to like soak up as much like knowledge as you can from the people that you're working with is really really important and has like served me so well as someone who's like still very young in their career, um, and so, yeah, I would just say that like focus on like creating these relationships, digging into all of the opportunities that you can while you're here, is really important to do.
Speaker 1:You notice that obviously you're talking about the strategy people, public affairs. Have you noticed different people that are applying for particularly on the inside side of this, the research side? Is there a different pull for them?
Speaker 3:I think that there's been. It's a lot of, I think that there's been, it's a lot of, I would say it's a lot of the same type of people I think that are applying to the job, that are very like, excited about engaging in public policy and excited to work on these issues. I would say that, like the, the associates coming on now I think are doing are able to engage in both the research and the strategy sides more often than we did when we started. So I would say it's not a huge difference in the people who are applying. Like it's, I think it ends up with like more well-rounded young professionals at the end of your associate experience more than anything right and mary kate.
Speaker 1:What about you? What advice would you give to someone thinking you're working here?
Speaker 2:advice I would give. I think that's, um, I would echo what what Grace said, but I would also add that I think that if you have a really strong interest in current affairs I mean myself and some of the other graduates in the program we all come from different backgrounds, like some of us are, you know, would have done a master's in something related to business only, or you know politics and public policy and all of these kinds of things, but I think what we all have in common is that we're very interested in current affairs and we are, all you know, good at research. I think that's important for wanting to enter into consultancy. But I would say that if you know you're somebody who's on the fence and you're not sure if it would be a good fit for you or not, my advice to them would to be you know, go on to the website, go on to the LinkedIn, see what kind of content we've written about there. We do a lot of analysis, blog posts, things like that and then reach out to whoever has written that and, you know, ask if they'll have a chat with you about working there.
Speaker 2:Um, I think that was my experience. Anyway, when I was going to apply, I did actually reach out to somebody who would already, who was already working here, and we had a lovely chat and I got to ask him some very, very, um important questions about working there, and I think what was nice is that this person was extremely senior but had time for me just because I showed an interest, um, so that would be my kind of advice okay, two more quick fire questions.
Speaker 1:Um, and we'll start with Emily. What's your favorite aspect of working at Penta?
Speaker 4:similar to what Grace and Mary kate were saying earlier. I think um penta has a huge commitment to growth and learning um across all levels of the firm. So, uh, in the day-to-day this manifests in directors who are really willing to teach associates, push us to grow and help us define new challenges. And this, you know, spans up throughout the firm. So I have constant face time with higher-ups, including the partners. I'm usually in one to two meetings per day with a partner which is, I think, really unique to Penta and has really helped me grow early on in my career here. Just seeing how the partners think about questions, approach problems differently, I think that experience has been hugely invaluable. Also really unique to Penta, the partners in all of my bosses are really willing to meet with me, talk with me, talk about my career, tell me about their career and their experiences, provide advice, and I think that this has just provided me with a really unique and invaluable experience so early on in my career.
Speaker 1:Same question, Rory.
Speaker 5:It's definitely the I really enjoy politics and learning about politics and being around it. I think the culture in the London office especially has really helped me on that front to kind of nurture that and take it sort of to the next step. Take it sort of to the next step. There's so many people in the office with kind of interesting backgrounds in that field or have done other things prior to kind of joining Penta that are really really interesting and I think that that has been probably my favorite thing.
Speaker 1:so far and Grace. What about you? What's your favorite aspect of working there?
Speaker 3:I think my favorite aspect of working here is how much everyone here really cares. Uh, I think it's a very unique place where people care so, so much about the work and so so much about each other, uh, and like a good example of this is we have this tradition in the us offices at least, um to do farewells, where a person who's moving on to their next position, we have like a happy hour for them and celebrate their accomplishments here at Penta and then moving on and everyone gives speeches about what they've learned or like funny stories from their time there. And I remember going to my first farewell a couple months into being at Penta and being so like genuinely like surprised how much these co-workers cared about each other. Like it was really. It's a really unique space where you spend a lot of time here getting to know the people that you're working with and you can develop these really like meaningful relationships with them, and so I would say that's my favorite part, mary Kate.
Speaker 2:I would echo everything that everybody else said, but I would also add that one of my favorite aspects of working here is that you get to just try out so many different sectors and there's massive diversity in work as well. I mean, I've worked in agri-food, I have worked in trade, now I'm doing a bit of energy in the environment, and I did financial services as well and like stepping into this program, I had done a bit of work in a few of those areas in my master's but it gave me an opportunity to like go into something like the financial services and be trained in that and support in that and be able to like deliver week on week for a big client there. So that would be my favorite aspect and final quick question.
Speaker 1:Then three words to describe penta's culture.
Speaker 4:Let's again start with emily I would say collaborative, um inquisitive everyone's pushing each other to think a different way, do things differently. And dedicated everyone's dedicated to like the deliverables, their clients, their teams, each other um grace, three actual words um collaborative was one of mine as well.
Speaker 3:Emily um academic is another one, and then supportive great rory, I'm not going to produce the classic.
Speaker 5:All those are my words, but um, so I am going to go with diverse as a day-to-day work and I'm struggling now. I may need to be brought back in for this one.
Speaker 1:Mary-Kate, you can do three different things.
Speaker 2:Okay, pressure's on. Okay, my first word would be innovative, because I've really enjoyed being trained in the intelligence side of what we do and it's just really, really interesting. I've really enjoyed it. I would have to say supportive, because it's true, everybody is extremely supportive where we work. And a third word I'm going to have to say collaborative. I'm going to have to opt out and say the one everybody else has said, because it's true again.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you Mary-Kate, rory, Grace and Emily for coming on to what's at Stake To our listeners. Remember to like and subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts and follow us on X, formerly Twitter at at PentaGRP. Anyone thinking of applying to work here? We're always looking for new talent, so please get your applications in quickly. I'm your host, mark McGregor, and, as always, thanks for listening to what's At Stake.