Lachlan Kirkwood – Digital Marketing Specialist

Have you ever questioned the importance of the work you produce? Have you ever felt inadequate compared to others within your organisation? If you just answered yes at all, you may want to read on…

At the end of last year, I caught up with a recruitment agency who was expanding into the startup landscape. As we sat down, they wanted to pick my brains about the ins and outs of startups. We delved into how a startup culture stacks up, what the average working day was like, and what the positives and negatives are when working amongst a startup. It was my response to the last question that made me momentarily pause and have a long, hard think about the answer I instinctively splurged out. My response was this;

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“The only negative that comes to mind from my experience in a technical startup, is the feeling of working alongside such a talented team – which is an incredible privileged, but somedays, I often go home and question if the work I’m doing is half as meaningful or impactful in comparison to my colleagues. I sometimes feel like I’m not good enough, or can’t provide enough value to my organisation”.

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As the importance of mental health for workers becomes more relevant, I wanted to open discussions around self-actualisation in work, and see if anyone else has or is experiencing the same feelings as myself.

Before I dive a little deeper into this response, I should give you a brief background story about myself in case you’re new around here. I come from a background in tech startups. I’ve worked both internal and agency side roles for software engineering studios. Working alongside technical teams, I have a profound respect for the truly cutting-edge work that developers and other team members constantly produce.

By all means, I’m rapt with the quality of work I’m producing, and I wouldn’t change the organisation I work for in any shape or form. Each day I push myself to bring as much value possible to both my organisation and our clients. As a conversion focused marketer, I’m incredibly satisfied with the authenticity of my work, and I’m absolutely infatuated with the tasks I’m presented with at my current role. But I guess that at the end of the day, I’m just a digital marketer. In hindsight, I’m literally just creating ads… I’m by all means not changing the world.

The organisations I’ve been a part of truly have created some ground-breaking developments, including a more recent contribution in advancing genomics research to deliver more effective immunotherapy treatments.

It seems that almost any given person can write a blog post, or even push a button on their Facebook page to ‘boost’ their content. Sure, this work may not be superlative, but at least anyone can give it a try. I for one surely wouldn’t know how to jump into Watson and start training a neural network.

It’s common for developers to write enticing content about their projects – just jump over to Medium and you’ll find a myriad of insightful research case studies. Most front-end developers could even make profound search engine optimisers. There’s plenty of different scenarios where developers or fellow colleagues like designers have the ability to undertake some form of digital marketing task.

I guess what I’m trying to get at with this post, is that as I aim to shift my career into a more technical role, I hope to create more enticing work that leaves a greater impression on end users. We’re all trying to up-skill ourselves in some shape or form, but for the time being, it’s important to stick to your strengths and take pride in what you do. 

I’d love to hear about your experiences in startups or even large-scale organisations. Have you ever questioned the importance of the work you produce? If so, I’d love to connect with you and chat. 

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About me: 

I’m a twenty-two year old Digital Marketing & Conversions Specialist based in Brisbane, Australia. With a passion for all things digital and tech, I aim to connect and learn from as many like-minded digital enthusiasts as possible. If you have a passion for emerging technologies and digital practices, I’d love to connect and hear your story.