The Glossy Details of Creating Your Own Job Title with Samantha Wilson
A Sit-Down Chat With Former Glossier Community Director, Samantha Wilson
by MAYA CAMPOS ★ JULY 3, 2021
Samantha Wilson, former Community Director of Glossier, tells all about creating your own job and being your most authentic self. Samantha has been in the beauty industry for quite some time; she began her career in the beauty closet at Elle, then eventually found herself stumbling into the offices of Glossier as an intern, and eventually landed a job on their PR team. Throughout the years, she learned a lot about how to not only succeed in the beauty industry, but how to brand herself. Here is what she learned about navigating the industry.
UGIRL: I saw you worked at Glossier for two years after your internship. Can you tell me a little bit about how you got the position?
SAMANTHA: For context on how I got there--it was completely unexpected. Glossier, at the time, was not a big company. There were probably around eight to ten people working there. I was working at Elle Magazine in the beauty closet and the Coconut Balm Dot Com got dropped off on my desk and I thought it was really interesting, so I cold emailed the team saying I wanted to work for them.
UGIRL: Can you tell me a little bit more about your overall experience at Glossier and your takeaways?
SAMANTHA: After interning at Glossier, I just got to know the team well. After around six months there, it became apparent there were super fans of the brand. We wanted to figure out how to work with the customers and give them this amazing experience. So I volunteered myself up to be the middleman between the customers and the brand and myself and one other person at Glossier made the community team.
UGIRL: How have you adapted yourself to the new digital world in media and the ever-changing beauty industry.
SAMANTHA: I have always been a digital person. With social media people feel pressured to put numbers and goals behind it but at the end of the day the only goal should be people having fun, are people having a good experience, and are people loyal to your company because they are having such a great experience.
UGIRL: You now work at Westmanatelier. Can you talk a little about your position there and your role?
SAMANTHA: At Westmanatelier, there was no one running community at the company; it was all social. So basically my pitch to them was “Who does this at your company?” When I found out no one was leading the charge I offered myself up and told them what I could do for them. So I wrote my job description and gave myself a title.
UGIRL: How has networking impacted your career? What are your tips and tricks for good networking?
SAMANTHA: Meet as many people as you can. Ask people while having conversations much like this one what they do and explaining more about yourself and what you want to do. People will want to help if they know what you want to do.
UGIRL: What about your job inspires you?
SAMANTHA: I always have to come back to my creative roots--I was an art major in college and so I always crave coming back to bringing in creative elements to my job. So for me, I will never let go of wanting to work on social media. For me, that is the most creative place to be right now.
As college students, we face a lot of pressure to be on a straight career path that will end with our dream job. The truth is, your “dream job” may change, and that’s okay. Samantha learned that you can quite literally do anything--even create your own job title. So as you go out and look for your dream job or internship, don’t forget to just say yes to any opportunity, because you never know where that will bring you.