Alumni Spotlight: Fernando Valdes – Meadows School of the Arts, SMU

Meadows is committed to ensuring that graduates are prepared for life after graduation and equipping them with a broad set of skills in their specific area of ​​study. Although Advertising major Fernando Valdes graduated when the job market was not in great shape, his experience at Meadows helped him land a role at an advertising startup. Having acquired a variety of skills while working in the advertising program, he was an asset to the company because he was able to work in many different positions.

“Being able to contribute in this way allowed me to apply my skills in web design, account planning and media planning,” explains Valdes. “Each of these areas required different skills that I learned at Meadows, and this hands-on experience helped me quickly realize what I loved doing and what I wanted to continue to improve.”

This early, broad exposure allowed Valdes to tailor his own career path and ultimately led him to his current role as Director of Global Sales Compensation at Uber Eats. In this role, he leads a team that designs incentive plans for all Uber Eats sellers and account managers worldwide, with the goal of designing, implementing and managing performance-based compensation plans that motivate sellers across all industries.

Understanding consumer behavior and preferences is invaluable in his current job, and although Valdes no longer works in the advertising industry, many of the courses he took in the program that touched on these topics, such as the account planning course taught by Dr. Alice Kendrick, have had a huge influence on his entire career.

“Whether I was developing customer strategies or developing incentive plans for Uber Eats, my ability to recognize audience insights helped me build an effective customer-centric approach,” he says.

Because Meadows offered a wide range of courses, Valdes was able to choose classes that really interested him and also aligned with his major, such as account planning, media planning, investigative journalism, and personality psychology. Ultimately, this resulted in providing him with a broad range of knowledge that he could apply on the job throughout his career.

“The skills and perspectives I gained in these diverse areas during my time at Meadows have allowed me to excel in every role I have taken on.”

You can learn more about the Advertising Department here.