Leave Your Mark, by Aliza Licht

Title: Leave Your Mark
Author: Aliza Licht
Publisher: Piatkus
Release date: May 2015
Genre: Non-fiction - Advice/Autobiography
Source: Bought

Description: LEAVE YOUR MARK isn't an advice book -- it's a mentorship in 288 pages.

Aliza Licht -- global fashion communications executive, AKA fashion's favorite 'PR girl' and Twitter phenomenon -- is here to tell her story, complete with The Devil Wears Prada-like moments and insider secrets.

Drawing invaluable lessons from her experience, Licht shares advice, inspiration, and a healthy dose of real talk in LEAVE YOUR MARK. She delivers personal and professional guidance for people just starting their careers and for people who are well on their way. With a particular emphasis on communicating and building your personal brand, something she knows a thing or two about, Aliza is your sassy, knowledgeable guide to the contemporary working world, where personal and professional lines are blurred and the most important thing you can have is a strong sense of self.

My thoughts: Although Leave Your Mark charts Aliza Licht's route into working at a fashion magazine, it provides excellent advice for starting careers in the media and in general. I read it just as I was starting to apply for publishing jobs and found all the advice very helpful. As that's the stage I was at, I was mostly interested in the early sections, which focus on getting your CV into shape, and how to get work experience. I read through the whole book once, then made particular notes based on those sections. Later, as I was invited to interviews, and got a longer work experience placement, I read on to the bits dealing with those. I found the section on making the most of a placement particularly helpful.

The book charts Aliza Licht’s career so far, so there are definitely sections which I’ll revisit as they become relevant - such as the etiquette for looking for internal and external jobs, or requesting a pay rise. Even though these sections weren’t stuff I needed to hear, it’s still an interesting account of Aliza’s life and I enjoyed hearing about the trials and triumphs she experienced as she started out in the world of media. She became the voice of ‘DKNY PR girl’ when the account was started and shares the story of how the account was planned and how it became her running it.
That lead in to the other section which I really enjoyed, something you can appreciate and learn from even if you’re not looking for careers advice: using social media as a marketing tool. I think a lot of bloggers would find some interesting things in this section as Licht writes about figuring out the defining features of your personal brand and how to harness social media to tie in to it.

Overall, I give Leave Your Mark by Aliza Licht 8 out of 10. It has excellent careers advice, particularly for anyone looking to work in media. I’m really glad I found the book when I did as it gave me some very helpful tips.