Intervju med Cole Roberts
Program: Master's program in Strategic Entrepreneurship
Specialization: Strategic Entrepreneurship
Start of education: HT06
Title: Entrepreneur/Photographer
Nationality:
Canadian
Current employer and country of residence:
Self-employed at Nordica Photography with fellow USBE alumni
Jakob Granqvist (www.nordicaphotography.com) and Way Up North (www.wayupnorth.co). Currently living in Gävle, Sweden.
A few words about your work tasks and responsibilities:
I’d like to say photography is the main task given that we run a photography business, but there’s so much more than that. Being self-employed in an artistic business creates a need to be astute in marketing, customer service, and general business practices, so
there’s a lot more than taking pictures in what we do. “Emailer” feels like a more appropriate job title at times.
If I’m to boil it down though to our main service with Nordica Photography, it’s delivering a story of a couple’s wedding day through images. That’s our key responsibility, and that pressure is what I love about the job.
Why did you choose the master’s program in Strategic Entrepreneurship?:
Being entrepreneurial is in my blood. That might sound weird, but I’ve always felt that way. The program at Umeå appealed to me because I felt it would bring an academic mindset - particularly with the theoretical disciplines you need in academia - which would compliment practical, real world entrepreneurial behaviour. So a different way of thinking - which the program offered - within a discipline that interested me drew me to
the program.
What was your specialty during your Bachelor studies?:
Marketing, which I did in Vancouver, Canada at Capilano University.
Why did you chose that particular specialty during the Bachelor level?
Marketing always felt like a natural fit for me. Within business, attracting new clients via creative means is exciting because there are no boundaries. So the creative freedom and expression within marketing felt limitless, and within business, that connected with me the most.
A few words about how you got your current job:
How long do you have, because it’s a long story. Really though, it went something like this: After graduating from Umeå, my then-girlfriend, now-wife who I met at Umeå (she’s a Swede and also a USBE graduate) drifted back and forth between Sweden and Canada. We were’t really sure where to live, but in 2008 settled in Vancouver. It was a
tough job market, so I needed to stay busy and photography appealed to me. I was also interested in web marketing, so started a blog to learn the ins and outs with online marketing and SEO via the blog. Jakob was dabbling in photography as well in Stockholm, and since we had a shared interest, we decided to start a business together in Vancouver. Nordica Photography was born in 2009, we went full-time from day one
and have been photographing weddings around the world since. Way Up North is something we started this year. It is Scandinavia’s only wedding photography conference and is a byproduct of Nordica’s growth.
Any advice you would like to give to current students:
Discover your passion and realize it. If you don’t know what you what that is, university is the perfect place to help you figure it out. So while you’re getting an education, explore your interests and use the academic environment to take risks and try new things.