Winter commencement speaker Jamie Sohosky sees power in saying yes
COLUMBIA, Mo. (Dec. 9, 2024) — Jamie Sohosky, chief marketing officer for Bath & Body Works, has always been curious.
She was curious when, while studying advertising at the Missouri School of Journalism, she sought journalism experience and contributed articles to the Columbia Missourian and Vox Magazine. She was curious when her family and career took her to the UK and back again, with stops along the way at Fortune 500 companies like Campbell Soup Company and Walmart in various marketing roles.
Now, as she prepares to address the graduation class at December’s winter commencement ceremony, she is curious about what is on the minds of students at the world’s first journalism school.
“I certainly remember being in their shoes and being really stressed out about my next move,” Sohosky said. “What was going to be my first job? Was I making the right decision? I’m humbled and honored to be able to speak to these students at a time which feels like yesterday and a million years ago for me.”
For her part, Sohosky has embraced uncertainty throughout her career, whether it was fostering an unplanned specialty in international business marketing (including the development of Walmart’s expansion into India), moving from early agency work into brand management or heeding a mentor’s call for assistance at Bed Bath & Beyond, the latter ultimately opening a path to her current role at Bath & Body Works.
You have to say yes to some things that you never even thought of, even if you can’t see where it’s going to take you. It’s curiosity that gives you the confidence to take that chance, and at the J-School, you are constantly curious and wanting to ask why? The ‘why’ is something that has stayed with me.
Jamie Sohosky
“You have to say yes to some things that you never even thought of, even if you can’t see where it’s going to take you,” Sohosky said. “It’s curiosity that gives you the confidence to take that chance, and at the J-School, you are constantly curious and wanting to ask why? The ‘why’ is something that has stayed with me.”
Something else she has learned: the answers to that question sometimes take many years to reveal themselves. The move to the UK initially happened because of a business opportunity for her husband, enabling a chain of events that has not only given her a wider-than-typical breadth of experience from which to draw when developing innovative new marketing approaches, but has also offered other surprises. One of her sons, for instance, competed in the Baseball World Cup earlier this year … for Team Great Britain.
Closer to home, Mizzou’s community has in some ways been part of her life from the beginning. Her parents and an uncle all attended Mizzou, with her father graduating from the School of Journalism.
Her youngest son is now a freshman at Mizzou, and as he embarks on the start of his college career, it’s fitting that Sohosky is pondering how to address graduates who are approaching a different kind of beginning.
“You can’t get too stressed out about what your career should be and what you think it’s going to be,” Sohosky said, in words that might just as easily have been advice to her son or her younger self. “I’ve had so many amazing experiences that I wasn’t sure about at first. Sometimes you have to take a right turn to take a left turn.”
Updated: December 9, 2024