I was recruited to this company by a recruiter that I trusted and who's associate landed me a great job in the past. I thought I was making a good choice for my next move, but I soon found out I had made a mistake.
The thing I figured out first was that outside of NY or Chicago, no one really ever considered Captivate in their media plan. If there aren't any high-rise buildings, then no one was exposed to the media on a regular basis and no one in the media world cared. Thus it was an impossible sell.
I had a difficult time getting meetings with clients and agencies that I worked with on a daily basis in previous positions much less new business meetings. Although through pure grit and determination, I did land some good ones early on in my employment.
The technology that Captivate uses is over 10 years old with very small screens and has no capability to compete with the proliferation of new mobile technologies. This was mentioned to top management as a concern from the clients/agencies I had met with and it was immediately dismissed by Captivate management including the CEO.
Speaking of management, the newly hired VP in my local office, micromanaged me as if I had never sold media in my life, even though I had almost 10 years of media experience. The ironic part about this is that this particular manager had virtually no experience in DOOH or OOH prior to Captivate and had very few relationships in the industry. I spent the majority of my time dealing with this manager's insecurities and random tasks, which prevented me from accomplishing any meaningful tasks throughout the day.
It is worth noting that for the first 4 weeks of my employment, I did not have any direct in-office management and it was by far my most productive time at Captivate regarding new business meetings and activity.
When I repeatedly voiced concerns over my very uncomfortable daily work situation to top management and HR, I was told to make it work. Every day was more miserable than the last and on day 89, I was let go. Which, in hindsight, was the best thing that ever happened to me because it allowed me to land in my current position where I have been very successful.
