Since the launch of Sefiani in 1999, we have considered ourselves a learning agency and have continuously aimed to give back to the industry and our community. This year was a particularly difficult one for people across our industry.

Those in a uniquely difficult spot have been students aiming to get a foot in the door and further themselves ahead of graduation. While internships have been on hold, we have worked to participate across a number of student initiatives to help the next generation of PR professionals’ flourish.

The Public Relations Institute of Australia’s annual Pitch This! competition is designed to help develop public relations students into professional practitioners. The competition involved several university teams taking on a client challenge and delivering proposals against each other, with the winner taking out the title of the competition and the idea being presented directly to the client for commercial use.

This year the competition went virtual and each team had a professional mentor to assist along the way, three of which were Sefiani mentors. Our teams, all from Charles Sturt University, came up with a range of different ideas for the client, Cancer Council NSW, all of which excited our team on the upcoming creative talent for the industry. Excitingly in the end the team mentored by our Group Practice Lead, Nicole Schulz took out the winning prize. Congratulations Team Mercury PR!

In addition to the Pitch This! competition, Sefiani was also approached to participate in an industry panel for a final year UNSW lecture. This was to create the opportunity for students to gain an in depth look at the differences across PR agencies, internal communications and creatives agencies. The panel took place on 18 November, with three industry experts, including our own Senior Account Executive, Shannon O’Mara, offering insight into first steps in the industry, managing stakeholders and the day to day of a PR professional.

One of our values at Sefiani is Learn and we are proud to continue living this value through contributions to the future of our industry. We hope to see our internship program commence again in the early New Year and look forward to seeing some of the excellent talent we have witnessed this year move into the industry.