Communicating the Stanford way with a British twist
Beth Coetzee is a Jill of all trades, having started in the conservation industry, moving to the journalism industry and now settling as Stanford Lake College's Communications Manager
POLOKWANE – Good communication skills, keeping a good handle on sport and academic successes are only a few of the duties that Beth Coetzee has to carry out.
Having started the year as the newly appointed communications manager at Stanford Lake College, her journey began in a totally different industry and so she shares her story with Review.
Beth moved to South Africa in 2010. After completing a degree in Zoology with Conservation at Bangor University in 2009, she was at a bit of a loose end.
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“My head told me to carry on studying, to take on a masters degree. My heart told me to travel, to seek adventure. My wanderlust brought me to South Africa, where I decided to embark on a 12-month safari guide training program. Six months of the program was spent training and six months was a work placement. For my work placement, I decided not to enter the world of a guide at a luxury safari lodge, but instead chose to live with no electricity, in a dilapidated farmhouse, working as a research assistant on a predator monitoring program. There I was offered a job and stayed on as their Science Coordinator. In the meantime, I met the man who was later to become my husband”
After spending a few years as a guide and racking up experience in the hospitality and tourism industry, she and her husband made the move out of the bush, to Tzaneen. “He had recently got a job in the citrus export industry. I wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself in Tzaneen and decided to focus on something that had always interested me, writing. I wrote to the local newspapers and was offered a job as a journalist at the Letaba Herald.”
“During my time at Letaba Herald, where I was a journalist, I was often in communication with the previous marketing manager of Stanford Lake College. Being British and stronger in English, and useless at Afrikaans, than some of my colleagues, I was allocated the English medium schools to communicate with and received schools news from SLC. During my time at the Letaba Herald, I saw the head of marketing position advertised and decided to go for it,” she told Review.
Beth’s main duties at SLC revolve around communication.
“How we communicate our brand and our image to prospective parents and learners, as well as present parents and learners is important. I maintain the website, as well as social media pages and I am responsible for designing our printed and digital marketing material. Another important aspect of my job is to maintain and strengthen community relations, be it local and further afield. We have many cross-border learners and so arranging and attending school exhibitions and conducting presentations alongside the headmaster locally, nationally and in countries such as Botswana and Zimbabwe, is really important. I also communicate school news with the local newspapers and help to coordinate events at the school such as our annual open weekend.”
A trait she feels is important to have, is to be able to perform well under pressure, as there are often several tasks to juggle at the same time.
Challenges she faces include working under pressure in order to meet deadlines. “I do not even see this is a challenge in a negative way. All the challenges have been absolutely positive and there is no greater satisfaction than crossing off something on my ‘to do’ list. Outside of work, I enjoy running, but mainly to exercise my dogs and riding my horse.”
