Wittenborg graduate profile

Olesya Andreeva is a graduate of Wittenborg’s MBM programme at New European College (NEC) in Munich, Germany. Recently, she delivered an oral defence of her thesis in front of her lecturers, and obtained an MBM with a specialisation in Digital Marketing & Communication. Born in Moscow, her family moved to Munich, Germany where she still lives.

For most of her pre-university education, she attended Munich International School. “I gathered a very multicultural understanding of the world,” Andreeva notes. “I realised that I enjoy small, multicultural classrooms, so I applied to universities of business in Munich.” She took up a programme at Munich Business School but later transferred to Globe Business College Munich, where she finished her bachelor's degree in 2021. She was directed to NEC after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. “My main plan was to get a job, but with the economic position, it was tough. I opted to pursue my master’s instead,” she explains. “I reflected on the courses I enjoyed the most throughout my bachelor’s and realised that I had a lot of fun with branding and strategy. I remembered NEC (the Munich campus of Wittenborg) as I had considered it for my bachelor’s, so I thought to apply. I liked that it was also a rather short course of only 1.5 years and offered many of the courses I had an interest in.”

“Pursuing a master’s has been an experience like no other, with numerous path-altering experiences in light of countless unknown variables. As most impactful experience I would describe our project weeks in the second semester, during which I was able to network and meet exceptional individuals, allowing me to discuss life experiences and gather advice.”

Importance of support and guidance

Regarding her thesis, which was supervised by Wittenborg lecturer Alexander Bauer, she decided to look at consumer decision-making in the skincare industry. “On a more personal level, the skincare industry has also been one where I was a consumer since my early teenage years, especially with my own battle with acne. I have always paid attention to the differences in purchasing products when it came to my mother and me.”

“I focused my thesis on the skincare industry and investigated what drives the purchased decision of the two generational groups – Generation Z and Millennials." She says that, while one individual might not suffer from anything now, it is not guaranteed that things will remain this way, meaning new consumers constantly enter the market. “A lot of the skincare products that we purchase we either research, they get advertised to us or they are ‘impulse’ buys in the store. Companies invest a lot of resources to advertise the product in a specific manner. I was curious to see if it makes more sense to target it to a generation rather than to focus it just on a buyer persona.”

Professor Bauer supported her enthusiasm about the topic. “I was writing the thesis with the idea that I possibly would like to do a PhD one day and I would be able to further build on my master’s thesis. He was always understanding, supportive and available if I needed anything and had ensured that we find a way to work together in order to reach success.” Being organised helped her studies. “While all is structured, I also prefer the freedom of being able to put my own spin on how things are done and in which way they can be presented.” She also likes to keep tidy. “Mainly, I am a person who needs to have tidy surroundings to be able to focus; however, throughout the process of writing my thesis the surroundings were anything but tidy, you should see the notes and the post-its!”

Living up to expectations

This would prepare her for the Oral Defence of her thesis. “To be honest, I don’t think I have ever prepared for any presentation so much; I tend to just create the presentations and come up with the said text on the spot,” she recalls. “I think the pressure was that a master’s thesis is a whole other load of stress compared to a bachelor’s. Everyone just expects more from you. I practised my presentation every night for 5 days leading up to presentation day.” She even got her family involved. “I made each of my three siblings listen and give me feedback. Truly, only my sister found it interesting because it was about skincare – the boys really didn’t care.”

She also had to deal with stage fright. “You can expect them to ask anything, and the pressure to flip through your 94 pages in your head and all the research you read through to get the correct answer was too much to think about beforehand.” She simply had to let things pass, a motto she lives by. “The direct translation from Russian would be ‘everything will pass and this will also’, which I guess in English the saying is ‘and this too shall pass’. When I was younger and would get very stressed and worked up about situations, this is something that my father would tell me,” she comments. “I come from a family of past sailors, so I often think of a quote I once saw, ‘A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor’.”

Her plan for the future is to go with the flow. “I am not much of a planner and just tend to see where my life will bring me.” After completing her thesis, she was offered a full-time position at NEC as an admission consultant, which she says she is very excited about. “I had such a wonderful experience at the university that I am excited to be a part of the team and help recruit more students! I am hoping that I will be able to share my wonderful experience with them and that they will be able to enjoy the fun and exciting education.”

WUP 13/03/2023
by Olivia Nelson
©WUAS Press