Chris Stephenson
MSc Advanced Marketing Management, 2005
Country of origin: UK
Employer: Lshift Ltd
After graduating from The University of Sheffield with a first class BA (Hons) in Business Studies, I joined the Marks & Spencer commercial management graduate training programme. I spent nine months as a trainee until I was appointed as a commercial manager responsible for annual sales in excess of £10m and a team of around 75. After two years I decided that although I love the retail industry I wanted to develop further and move into a more strategic role.
However, after being in business and learning to appreciate the value of real-life experience, I decided that a theory-based programme was not for me. I needed a course that would really bring marketing to life, so Lancaster was the obvious choice. In addition, I was keen to study in an institution that sees marketing as something that businesses do rather than merely a department that produces brochures and advertisements. I started the MSc in Advanced Marketing Management at Lancaster in September 2004.
I completed my dissertation, titled 'You are where you shop: Symbolic consumption and Supermarket Chains', in August 2005. My research was a departure from many of the traditional studies in the self-concept and symbolism literature, as they tend to be based on categories that are perhaps traditionally considered symbolic, such as fashion clothing or automobiles. However, none have looked at how we can apply what we know about symbolic consumption to categories that are perhaps considered mundane, such as supermarket brands. I have just finished co-authoring a paper along with Professor Margaret Hogg and Dr Emma Banister for the Journal of Business Research. The paper is partially based on my dissertation and is currently awaiting acceptance into the Journal’s special edition on Anti-Consumption. We are currently in the early stages of producing a second paper.
I graduated in December 2005 with a distinction and became a Member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and a Chartered Marketer as a result of the exemptions provided by the MSc. Similar exemptions have allowed me to join the Chartered Management Institute and work towards Chartered Manager status.
I joined LShift, a software development and consultancy business, as a Product Manager one month after completing the MSc. At LShift I specialise in software product lifecycle management-from initial concept and business case to research, development, branding and marketing. During this time I have also been working on building up my Project Management expertise (as a PRINCE2 registered practitioner) as well as industry specific knowledge.
I am currently working towards the Chartered Institute of Management Accounting qualification and hope to complete it early next year.
