This week on Career Crashers Joel is joined by Emily Cozzens, partner success manager at PandaDoc!

Many people believe a job at a high-growth startup is out of reach unless you’re a superstar programmer or experienced marketer. The reality is that some great projects and initiative will go along way to getting your foot in the door.

In this episode, Emily shares how she used her early career experience working in a cheese store to develop great customer service skills and how taking initiative to create projects allowed her to win a great opportunity and advance quickly once she had it.

In this episode:

• How Emily got her first job as a teenager working at a cheese shop
  
• What skills Emily learned in her early service industry job that have helped her in her work at a tech startup
  
• How Emily challenged herself to learn marketing and writing skills by creating a blog and Instagram page for the cheese shop she worked at
  
• Why adding constraints can improve your creativity
  
• How using projects to build skills helped Emily prepare for her current role
  
• Breaking down big projects into small stages to make it more achievable
  
• How Emily won her opportunity at PandaDoc and what her experience and evolution from customer success to marketing was like
  
• Using you current job as a launching pad for more interesting opportunities
  
• Learn more about Emily at Emilycozzens.com