OTAS, you found it

The new job is finally picking up. After a couple of weeks of rather boring orientation and self-study, I’m finally getting out there and meeting clients, starting a project, and getting to know my colleagues. All and all, it’s good. (Hell, even if it were a complete bore, I can at least say that I’m being paid a lot more than the previous job.)

So what is this exciting new job of mine? Well, let’s see, I’m working in an industry known as “marketing analytics”, which can perhaps claim the responsibility for the annoying deluge of media that comes your way. For the time being, the project I’m training with is for a barbeque sauce manufacture. I’m doing some statistical modeling to determine how much sales their media are driving.

We are owed by a London-based media conglomerate that helps clients manage and create their brands. And, apparently, they felt it was natural to have an analytical team to test its efficacy. So we work out of our sister company’s Chicago office. The climate is a lot different then the conservative world I came from: there are radios playing, people screaming at television stations, and a pool table in the meeting room. . . . . And, oh yea, people are nice.