Jessica Hatz recently graduated with her MBA from the University of Washington Foster School of Business, where she was the president of Foster Tech Club. Last summer she interned as a Product Marketing Manager at VMware and continued her internship throughout the academic year. She also interned at the venture capital firm, Flying Fish Partners, during the 2020-2021 school year. Jessica is passionate about cross functional collaboration and loves to help her customers. During this interview, we spoke to Jessica about her experience as a Product Marketing Intern at VMware, what she learned about the experience in Product Marketing and at a large organization, and her advice to students considering PMM internships.
MBASchooled: What sparked your passion for product marketing and customer focus?
Pre-MBA, I held a variety of roles in product management and marketing at small businesses. These roles allowed me to work directly with customers and understand their pain points and the product or service benefits customers were looking for. These experiences solidified my desire to pursue a customer-focused role both for my MBA internship and post-MBA career.
I fell in love with product marketing because the function sits at the intersection of product management and marketing communications. My background in environmental science and work at an air pollution instrumentation firm pre-MBA inspired my love for more “technical” marketing and crafting value propositions that align customer needs with our product’s unique capabilities and specs. Additionally, I love collaborating cross-functionally—in product marketing you are working with sales, marketing communications, product management, external partners, engineering, customer success, and more; product marketing does not sit in a silo, and you need to understand and work with different perspectives across teams.
MBASchooled: How did you come across your internships?
I primarily leveraged University of Washington Foster School’s job database and applied to roles I found on LinkedIn and other job boards. I applied for roles in both the function I was interested in and geographic locations I would be happy working and living in.
MBASchooled:What were some of the unexpected challenges that came along with interning with VMware?
The greatest unexpected challenge of interning with VMware was onboarding and working remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Although not having in-person time with my team was hard at first, I learned how to connect and build relationships in the virtual environment. This initial challenge was actually a blessing in disguise for me – I was able to continue my internship virtually throughout the 2020-2021 school year. If the experience was in-person, I would not have been able to continue my internship due to my location in Seattle (my team sits in Palo Alto, CA) and the extra time associated with commuting to campus for classes (I would not have had the extra time to “switch” between work and school).
MBASchooled: What projects, tasks and responsibilities did you have as a product marketing intern?
As a product marketing intern, I was responsible for a variety of projects. Unlike some internships where an intern receives one project to complete for the summer, I was able to work on over 5 projects during the summer and even more during the school year! Some of the projects I worked on included creating sales enablement tools (training and learning resources), writing a campaign messaging template, conducting an analysis on work from home savings, developing new content for our external website, and overhauling our business unit’s intranet portals for sales executives and our channel partners.
MBASchooled: Describe your daily work tasks as a product marketing intern.
My daily work tasks as a product marketing intern included working on my specific projects, collaborating virtually with my team members or other VMware employees, and, of course, spending some time learning more deeply about our product! Additionally, I often attended webinars hosted by the team and got to listen in on customer calls.
MBASchooled: What was the remote work experience like for you? What helped you adapt to the conditions of working completely at home?
The remote work environment became one that I thrive in. At first, I was nervous I would not build true connections like I would in-person, however I found that to be untrue. Since VMware is a large and globally distributed company, working remotely allowed me to connect with colleagues across time zones and meet more people than I would have in-person. Additionally, I find myself more productive at home and love how my dog can curl up next to my desk all day.
To adapt to working from home, it was crucial to set a schedule for myself. I would wake up at the same time each morning, make coffee, walk my dog, and then start work at 8:30 AM. It’s important to get into a routine when you are working from home—for example, I would block a specific lunch time off in the middle of the day to take a break and recharge before starting the second half of my day. Having the “morning commute” is important too, whether that’s going for a workout outside or walking my dog, which allows me to switch into my “work” mindset for the day.
MBASchooled: VMware is a large and successful company, what was it like to be a new intern at such a large organization?
Joining as an intern at a large and successful organization like VMware was at first daunting. Prior to VMware, I had worked at small businesses where I knew each person, their specific role, and how we could help one another and collaborate. At a large organization with 30K+ employees, I would never know every employee. I had to learn how to navigate VMware, both in terms of building relationships and finding resources. At first, it was hard, but with confidence and relentless pursuit, I developed my own process to enable my success as an intern at VMware.
MBASchooled: What advice would you pass along to current MBA students and interns who want to be successful in product marketing management?
While the product marketing function differs from company to company, at any company you must showcase your ability to learn quickly and collaborate effectively across teams and functions. You need to be willing to continuously learn and adapt as your product and market change, while managing relationships along the way.
By, Julia Posz