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What do you do?
I sell standard and custom online advertising, sponsorships and "content integration" marketing programs to advertisers and advertising agencies within the southeast region on the Microsoft network of online sites such as MSN.com and Hotmail.com.

How did you get your job?
I had similar sales roles at Yahoo!, Disney's GO.com portal, Weather.com and AOL. Microsoft recruited me to come here in 2005.

Best professional lesson learned at the J-School?
Use the School's network to meet potential employers...as well as family and friends who might know people in the field you're trying to enter.

What would be your best advice to current students?
Before you start to interview formally, go on at least three informational interviews -- strictly to learn and find out if this career field is for you. Good questions to ask are:

• What they do day-to-day.
• What they like best about the job.
• What they like least about the job.
• Qualities and attributes a person should have to do well in that job.
• "And, by the way, how did you get this job? What was your career path?"

Don't then try to sell yourself, it's an informational interview. The goal is to learn. Know exactly how your unique skills, strengths and background can bring real value to a potential employer in your job field and at their particular company. Articulate that quickly and succinctly -- and use examples. Follow up with the people you interview with, be persistent, without being pushy. Be positive and upbeat. Don't give up!

What is one thing you wish you had done?
Gone to Europe for a year before I started working. Bummed around, worked as a bartender. Done something totally frivolous in an exotic foreign locale. The life experience would have meant more than that first year on the job, which you'll have anyway when you get back and start working. Just be focused on the job when you do come back, and refer to the experience as the "chance of a lifetime that helped focus you on what you really wanted and where you truly wanted to go with your life and career." Don't talk about the drunken night in Milan or how much money it cost. Make it seem like it was a deliberate and calculated expansion of your educational experience that you wouldn't have traded for the world...which it should be!