Scott Smallman, who graduated from Teesside University with a first class degree in web and multimedia design, works as a User Experience Business Analyst for Amplience.
He secured his first job after impressing industry experts at the annual ExpoTees showcase event, where he became the first person to win two awards.
Now Scott and representatives from Amplience are returning to this year’s ExpoTees, to be held at Teesside University’s Darlington campus, in a bid to recruit more talented final year students and add to the number of Teesside graduates already employed at the company.
ExpoTees is an annual showcase of outstanding work by final year students from the School of Computing. It is also an opportunity for businesses to come and meet students and recruit bright new talent to their organisations.
Scott, 24, said: 'ExpoTees offers the opportunity to understand the networking process, to get exposure for your work and to meet and talk to people from all kinds of backgrounds and industries. It offers so much in your own personal development as well as a potential career.
'At ExpoTees I was able to demonstrate my final year project and dissertation and was given the opportunity to talk directly to companies about my work. It was my first experience of true networking and gave me a real understanding of what I needed to do in order to break into the industry. It just opened a gateway that I probably would not have had if it had not been for ExpoTees.'
Scott secured his first job as a Software Engineer at Orange as a direct result of ExpoTees. After expanding his knowledge and experience, Scott then moved to London to take up his current position with Amplience.
Amplience, which also has offices in America, Germany and Teesside, is a digital company that helps clients create effective brand campaigns. Clients include Marks & Spencer, Halfords, Morrisons and Shell.
The company’s Teesside office has 15 members of staff – nine of whom are graduates from Teesside University.
Scott said: 'Amplience hired directly from the ExpoTees exhibition last year and hopefully we will find one or two this year.
'There is something about Teesside University graduates that makes them extremely eager to broaden their horizons. We keep coming back because we are extremely impressed with what the students are learning at Teesside.
This year’s ExpoTees takes place on Wednesday 15 May at Teesside University’s Darlington campus – with the exhibition from 1.00pm to 5.00pm and the awards from 6.00pm to 7.00pm.
Event organiser Joanne Noble said: 'ExpoTees is a fantastic opportunity for our final year students to really show potential employers what they can do.
'Scott is a perfect example of what can be achieved by immersing yourself in ExpoTees and we are delighted to have forged such a strong relationship with Amplience – we look forward to inviting them back again this year.'