Hillary Lassoff turned 24 on the day of PGN’s visit to her workplace.
In just the two years since she graduated college, Lassoff has launched her own apparel company and landed a position at one of Philadelphia’s top marketing and advertising agencies.
Lassoff has not only “learned the ropes” at Neff Associates in the six months since she started, she has mastered them — it’s apparent from observing her work throughout the day and her interaction with colleagues, not to mention the confidence and trust that Neff CEO and president David Neff has in her.
The Bucks County native coordinates ad purchases for the media arm of Neff. She begins by planning a year-long ad campaign for each client that timelines all radio, TV, print and outdoor (transit, billboard) ads for each month and how much they will cost.
“We typically do year-long campaigns,” Lassoff explained. “But it varies from client to client, and according to budget. Sometimes we have to adjust based off certain industry standards as well.”
Her clients include United Tire & Service; Hutchinson Plumbing, Heating & Cooling; Safian & Rudolph Jewelers; and a regional financial institution.
These media flow charts are sort of like a year-at-a-glance calendar for the client. When Lassoff makes a proposal for a client, she compiles the flow chart and puts together a recommendation packet that is full of “sales-ey copy,” she said.
After the client reviews the proposed campaign and any adjustments are made, they sign off on it, giving it their stamp of approval. If all goes well, Lassoff can implement the campaign line by line throughout the year without issue, a relatively easy procedure, she says.
“We love the days when we can get the clients to sign off on something and be done with it for a while.”
But, as she is wont to admit, every day is different, which is also part of the job’s appeal.
“Sometimes a client will call up and say, ‘I want to be on the radio in two days,’ and it wasn’t in the original plan,” Lassoff said. “That’s when it gets fun.”
A couple of quick phone calls later and the radio ad has been purchased and developed. After updating the numbers on the campaign spread sheet, it’s on to the next task.
Lassoff will also do the occasional lunch meetings with client reps or potential clients. She thrives off the direct interaction.
“I love the one-on-one,” she said.
To borrow one of Lassoff’s expressions, “on the daily,” she begins with the usual and oft-tedious email sorting upon arriving at 9 a.m.
“Standard email stuff,” she says. “Some days we will come in and have a lot to do right away, catching up on late client emails from the night before; others are slower.”
On average, Lassoff says she manages about five to six clients each day.
Back-and-forth phone calls seem to comprise a large share of what Lassoff does. She attributes that to being direct with clients, calling them rather than sending emails, as one reason why she has picked things up so quickly.
“I was just thrown into the job and I just had to learn it,” Lassoff said. “I love talking to people on the phone, so I just call the client instead of emailing them. It’s enabled me to get to know the clients, build rapport with them and just get things done quicker.”
Her grasp of the position has not gone unnoticed my Neff higher-ups, especially to CEO and president Neff, who has even nicknamed her Eddie Haskell, “a world-famous brown noser from ‘Leave It to Beaver,’” Neff said jokingly, a reference to Lassoff’s trademark sycophant humor.
But not everyone in the office gets a nickname, which underscores the trust Neff places in Lassoff after only six months on the job. During a recent meeting with the CEO, Lassoff and her colleague, Rhea Weaver, submitted media campaigns they drafted to Neff for his input and approval. With almost all of the work done already by Lassoff, Neff’s edits are minor, and he approved most of what she did without second thought.
In fact, the scene more resembles a team effort than a traditional vertical boss-employee relationship. Neff is very receptive to feedback from Lassoff and vice versa — a conversation between equal peers instead of one-way dictation.
They discuss fees associated with the campaign, the effectiveness and impact of Pandora ads and e-newsletters — always trying to maximize the client’s budget.
“We always avoid ‘spitting in the wind’ with regards to expenditures versus impact within the budget,” Neff said.
Throughout the meeting, there are constant (and hilarious) exchanges between Neff and other employees in the office that take place by hollering over divider walls. During these impromptu conversations, Lassoff could have been Neff’s personal assistant. She was so readily able to fill in gaps in Neff’s memory on a project, offer a piece of advice or connect details, it was easy to see why Neff hired her.
Lassoff says Neff saw her entrepreneurial spirit in her hiring interview, and that helped earn her some respect right off the bat.
“I told him about my golf apparel line and everything I had done with that in Florida,” she said, “and I think he really respected that about me; he saw my inner businesswoman.”
Lassoff played on the varsity golf team at the Florida Institute of Technology as an undergrad. After graduating in 2013 with a degree in advertising, the scholarship-athlete also started a women’s golf apparel line called LOAG.
“Golf is a passion of mine, Lassoff said, “and Life of a Golfer is a product of that passion.”
LOAG is currently “on hold,” and is in the investment phase, according to Lassoff.
“My business partner and I decided to put it on hold and raise more capital, even though we did get as far as purchase orders. I definitely plan to pick up where we left off as soon as we can.”
Several of Lassoff’s family members also own their own businesses.
“I guess it runs in my blood,” Lassoff said.
And coming out to her family in college never affected their strong support for any of Lassoff’s future business ventures. Their support, as well as a very welcoming environment at FIT, made it possible for Lassoff to proceed with confidence.
“I wish I had a more grandiose story,” Lassoff said. “I never knew that I was gay in high school, but I think there was something missing. But when I finally went to college — it was a really small school — it worked out perfectly. There actually turned out to be a lot of gay and lesbian students there. There was a senior on the golf team, a lesbian, who I really took to, and I thought, OK maybe I am?
“From there, I was totally free and open, and started dating someone my freshman year. It was a very welcoming environment.”
While a little nervous at first, Lassoff came out to her mother via email, then talked about it over the phone.
“My mom was a little thrown by it in the beginning,” Lassoff said, “but now my family is totally open and perfectly fine with it.”
At Neff, Lassoff was 100-percent open from the beginning, but thinks no one really knew until she ended up coming out to Neff himself one day.
Lassoff’s family has a shore house in New Jersey and, as it turns out, is just a couple blocks away from Neff’s shore house. One day this past summer, Neff asked Lassoff for a ride to the shore.
“We started talking on the ride over, and he shared something very personal with me,” Lassoff said. “So I thought it would be a good opportunity to share that I was gay, and I did.”
After which, Lassoff said, she encountered nothing but support from her colleagues and felt comfortable talking openly about her girlfriend of over a year.
“I don’t feel any pressure,” she said. “I just see myself as normal, not necessarily lesbian. Of course I am proud to be one, but just not in a wear-it-on-your-sleeve type of way.”
Lassoff said she planned to celebrate her birthday by going out to dinner with her girlfriend that evening. And, after the workweek, she and her family were planning a trip up to New York to visit her twin sister, Rachel.