Interviewer: Mahmoud Mansi
Editor: Mona Morshedy
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Dina, How many jobs have you been through? Which was your favorite? And why did you quit it?
Dina Zayan: Actually, I have been through a lot, but my official long ones, which I write on my CV, are four. My favorite one is what I do currently; a business and accounting teacher for grades 11 and 12 in high school. My second favorite one is a K.G. teacher’s assistant. I have loved it because I love seeing the transformation process of students who know nothing about a certain thing. At the end of the term, or the school year, they almost know everything. It makes me feel overwhelmed and proud of them and myself. I love the love and respect that students give, when they love their teachers. I am a people-oriented person, so I get emotional easily by the good relation established with people, besides, the fact that I benefit someone and add a real value to his/her life. It means a lot to me. I quit being a K.G. teacher’s assistant because it was very far from my educational background, although I loved the job and the kids. Also, I am the kind of person who believes in “specialization; do what you have learned.” I have always wanted to do something, which is related to what I studied in college.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: According to the learning process you give to students, does it make a difference if you have been working your entire life as a teacher, or instead you have been involved in the market in several jobs before teaching?
Dina Zayan: Both would have benefited me a lot and would have helped me more when teaching them. The first would have given me more experience in the field: the way of teaching, making exams, correction, controlling the class, and dealing with the very hyper-active students and the trouble makers easily. The second would have helped me to give them real examples from real organizations, making my words more powerful and convincing, and enabling me to answer whatever question asked with greater confidence and knowledge.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: As a marketing specialist, what’s your comment regarding advertisements in Egypt? You may empower your answers with examples.
Dina Zayan: Look, I am not a marketing specialist. I only studied it in my MBA program, but I haven’t practiced it yet in reality. However, from my humble background, I can tell you that some of the ads in Egypt are very smart and have a brilliant idea that captures the viewers’ attention, and some of them are really of a bad quality and have no message to deliver to the audience to convince them to like or ask about or buy this product. Unfortunately, there are brilliant and creative ads, but also have nothing to do with the product itself or the benefit delivered from it if the customer decided to buy it. There is also another bad thing, which is the overstatement of some ads; lying and making fun of the viewers’ minds. For example, all the hair products’ ads; shampoo, creams, and serums. We all know that they don’t have this effect on our hair, and they still advertising the same way!! Yes they may create a brilliant ad, but if they are not saying realistic words, they will lose credibility and their market shares eventually. People are smart and don’t get fooled by ads. It might work with a new product, but not those which they have already tried before.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: How do you teach your students to be good marketers? What is the most valuable lesson you share with them? How do you define marketing in your own way?
Dina Zayan: Since I teach them business Administration, not only marketing, so I teach them starting from what does the term business mean, how it will be a successful one, and that one of its main conditions to succeed is to be profitable, which can’t be achieved unless this business sells something needed and wanted by a group of people. And here comes the role of marketing; which is segmenting those who might be interested in the products or services offered by the company, specifying the most profitable segment by making marketing researches via questionnaires and focus groups. Then target it by broadcast (if having the budget) and printed advertisements, sales promotions, sales people calls and visits, using the social media if it is a suitable platform for the target market. Selecting a brand name which is catchy, memorable, and relevant to the business, selecting an appropriate pricing strategy matching with what we sell and close to our competitors, if we will sell with a higher price, so we should have something unique and different than that offered by the competitors’, keeping in touch with our customers and know their feedback about our performance on a regular basis, keeping up with the competition to maintain the market share and position, hiring the right people to serve and deliver our values to our customers. To sum this up, marketing is not just about selling what we produce, it is about the whole process and entity! The most valuable lesson I always share with them is if they want to be successful business owners, they should be realistic, honest, hard workers; sell something wanted and not lie to people because this will make them fail in the end.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: What was the toughest interview question you were ever asked?
Dina Zayan: Mention an achievement in your life or in a place where you have worked for. I don’t feel that I have done an achievement yet, so I have a hard time answering this question :))! After completing my MBA program and getting the master’s degree at being young, I feel proud of myself and I feel that I started to be on the right track and that I am starting to achieve what I want, which is being a marketer :))
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: If you are an owner of a marketing agency, on what basis you will select your employees? And what kind of tests would you provide them with in order to empower your final choice in the selection process?
Dina Zayan: I will select them based on their educational background; they should be business administration major college graduates, marketing diplomas holder, joined marketing internships/training programs, passionate about marketing and people-oriented persons, hard-workers, and multitasking employees. They also should have personalities which match with the agency’s culture to be able to cope and give their best. I would provide them with tests which reveal their marketing knowledge. For example, giving them a business idea or problem and asking them to get findings. I will give them the details needed to enable them to analyze the cases as if it is a real one. Based on their performance and their commitment to the dead-line assigned, I will make my final choice.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: What are the additional skills, talents and tools does a marketer need to acquire/learn in order to become a better marketer?
Dina Zayan: Computer, English, writing, creativity, to be a people-oriented person, not to get obsessed about what he has done and believe that there is always a better performance, non-stop learning in many aspects, not only business., following market trends, forecasting, negotiation, leadership, flexibility, patience, time-management, Not to rush in making decisions, and have excellent presentation skills.
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: As a teacher, what is the most valuable lesson you learned from your students?
Dina Zayan: The most valuable lesson I have learned from them so far, that if the students love you, they will surprise you by their amazing academic performance and good behavior. Love and respect create miracles. They have taught me that the good teacher will eventually succeed, no matter how the students seem to be a hopeless case and a big challenge!
- HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Thank you so much Dina for sharing your passion and experience with us.