Did you know that India is the biggest whiskey market in the world? Irish Country Living certainly didn’t – but that’s why Jameson has two graduates based in Dehli.

This year, Jameson is celebrating 25 years of its graduate programme, which was launched in 1991. Since then, Jameson has recruited over 350 graduates altogether and 34% of them still work in Irish Distillers (which owns Jameson) or in the wider Pernod Ricard group (the wine and spirits giant that, in turn, owns Irish Distillers).

Jameson’s international graduate programme provides a pipeline of talented individuals to become future leaders for Irish Distillers and Pernod Ricard.

Listen to a discussion of Jameson's graduate programme in our podcast below:

Listen to "Jameson recruiting for its graduate programme" on Spreaker.

In referring to the career trajectory of some previous participants on the Jameson graduate programme, its manager Sinéad D’Arcy mentions one ex-graduate, who is now heading up Pernod Ricard Philippines. She also names Simon Fay, who started on the graduate programme in 1998 in South Africa and is now the director of international marketing in Dublin, looking after international marketing for the whole of Jameson globally.

Jameson is currently the fastest growing whiskey brand globally. “Jameson has had 27 years of consecutive growth – and the graduate programme has been around for 25 years of that,” says Sinéad D’arcy.

“The graduate programme really has been an integral part of the success Jameson has had in going from a domestic brand – which it pretty much was in 1988, when we were bought by Pernod Roicard – to where it is now.”

In 1988 Jameson was selling less than half a million cases and most of that was sold domestically in Ireland. From 1988, Pernod Ricard plugged Jameson into an international global distribution network, which allowed them to start seeding Jameson in markets it wasn’t previously available. Today, Jameson sells 5.7 million cases. Five per cent of those sales are domestic (in Ireland), while the rest are global, across 130 countries.

“We have graduates in 42 countries around the world, so there’s still a lot of work to do,” says Sinéad. “It’s such an exciting industry to work in, because there is so much potential for growth.”

So do you have to love drinking whiskey to work for Jameson? We’re told there have been some pioneers on the programme over the years, but Sinéad stresses: “Graduates always tells us what that they love about us is our history and our heritage first of all. So, apart from the product, they’re very proud to represent an Irish brand and help that grow globally.”

Sinéad says graduates are also interested in Jameson’s craft credentials. “Everything that we do is embedded in craft, like our using the Dungourney river, which runs through our distillery in Midleton. Every drop of Jameson that you get anywhere in the world comes from Midleton.”

Get with the Programme

Jameson looks for the X-factor in graduates – or what it used to call the “vital ingredient”. “What that basically means is that they’re quite creative, they’re very innovative, they’re real self-starters and they’re really autonomous workers,” says Sinéad.

“They go abroad to a market and they may not, for example, be sitting beside their manager. They could be based in Lille in France, and their manager could be sitting in Paris. While they will get a lot of direction and support from the market, they need to very much be self-starters and autonomous workers.”

“America is the biggest market for Jameson globally – they know Jameson very well. However, if you then go to a market like Tokyo, or Japan, do they know where Ireland is? Do they know what Irish whiskey is? Have they ever heard of Jameson?

“So graduates in those emerging markets – or seed markets, as we call them, especially the Asian markets where awareness of the brand would be quite low – really are explorers, going out and learning about the city they’ve been placed in.

“They have to find out where in the city would be a good fit for Jameson, where we should be targeting, what type of relationships we should be building, who should we should be connecting with and who the influencers in food and drink are in that sphere,” says Sinéad.

Given Jameson operates in 42 markets, it’s no surprise they’re interested in graduates with languages. Graduates with German, French, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Korean, Japanese and Mandarin are all sought.

Sinéad says 80% of Jameson graduates speak a second, third or fourth language, though 20% don’t speak another language at all, as Jameson has so many markets where English is spoken.

There is also no doubt the locations can be far-flung and exotic: Jameson even has a graduate in Kazakhstan and sent their first graduate to the Democratic Republic of Congo this year.

While overall, Jameson hires mostly business or language graduates who specialise in marketing, the brand is open to candidates from any background.

“We’ve got physiotherapists, we’ve got lawyers, I myself am a primary teacher by trade, and we have archaeologists and psychologists too,” says Sinéad.

“What we hire for is attitude. So if you have the right attitude and really want to work in the area of sales and marketing, we can teach you everything else you need to know. We obviously can’t change your attitude – that’s something you come with – but we can definitely teach you to be the best you can be in the area of sales and marketing.

“We don’t mind if you get a pass, a 2.2, a 1.1 or an honours degree – one of our best graduates has a 2.2 degree. I think sometimes companies get a bit too hung up on the level and type of degree.

“We don’t. We thankfully have the freedom to say: ‘Look, as long as you have the right attitude, you want to work in fast-moving consumer goods, you want to work in the spirits industry and you want to have a global career? Then we can teach you everything else you need to know to be the best you can be.’”

Those who get a place on Jameson’s graduate programme are called brand ambassadors. They are the face, voice and eyes and ears of the brand on the ground in their local markets.

Sinéad says it’s not a nine-to-five job. “That’s why people need to be very autonomous – very flexible in terms of their working,” she explains. “Where there is no direct Pernod Ricard office in your market, your office is the nearest café with wi-fi.”

Candidates need to have a full, clean driver’s licence, because they have a company car in market – “or they have a company moped in Asia. Because if you drive a car, you’re not going to get anywhere”, says Sinéad.

Responsibilities for the brand ambassadors include working with PR and media. Graduates look for the influencers in their market – by finding out for which bloggers could be a good match with Jameson, for example.

Graduates also look for opportunities for Jameson to be in publications. “One graduate in Argentina had his own weekly radio slot,” says Sinéad, “so they can’t be shy.

“We actually ask them to apply with a video. We don’t accept CVs, so we see their personalities from day one. Are they happy in front of a camera? How do they express themselves? How do they communicate?”

Jameson takes between 20 to 30 graduates on to this programme every year. The programme is three years long, and graduates rotate to a new market every 12 months. Applications close on 1pm on Monday 16 January 2017. Visit www.jamesongraduateprogramme.com

Jameson also has a distiller graduate programme, which science and engineering students may want to explore next year.