I recently attended the Jedi Council organized by RED Academy in Vancouver. RED is a well respected training academy offering courses like Digital Marketing. I was asked to join a group of industry professionals to guide their curriculum planning process. As a marketing recruiter, I prepared some thoughts on the biggest priorities and knowledge gaps amongst candidates when filling junior digital marketing roles. As a group, our objective was to keep RED’s curriculum aligned with real industry needs.

The experience with the Jedi Council was really interesting. Myself and a few marketing professionals and recruiters gathered in June to better understand the market needs, and based on that, what they can improve in their courses. The goal was to gather feedback from digital marketing professionals to make sure their course is effective in preparing students to be valuable entry-level employees.

The interaction between guests and hosts was amazing and they carefully listened to suggestions coming from the audience. We discussed the three month digital marketing course they offer, analyzing each week’s plan in order to review and possibly adjust its content based on what companies require.

Nowadays digital marketing is essential to organizations that want to effectively expose themselves and attract more clients. However, the tools that digital marketing offers are numerous and it’s hard for both educational institutions and students to decide which direction to take. Interacting with future employers and understanding their needs is an intelligent way to offer quality (and qualified!) candidates to a demanding market.