Students from SME went to Hong Kong for the opening ceremony of the Women@Dior Mentoring Program

On 18 April 2017, Estelle Ziyue Yang and Chloe Yitong Zhou, attended the Opening Ceremony of the Women@Dior Mentoring Program in Hong Kong. Both students are very honored to be selected to participate in this unique global mentoring programme with Dior executives in the coming year.

“Women and Dior, when these two words combine, they indeed create amazing magic!”, Estelle gave us a brief introduction. “The welcome event started by the talks from regional directors, followed by a networking session and ended with a Dior boutique visit. There were numerous lovely moments that are worth reminiscing.”

Chloe put special emphasis on how this Mentoring Program is a rare and valuable opportunity to her, “It is my honor to be part of this program. To me and many other girls the fashion industry seems to be glamorous but beyond reach. The Women@Dior Mentoring Program offers me an opportunity to gain an insight into the industry and to see how it actually works in reality.”

Having learnt a lot during their trip, both students shared their experience with us:

“My mentor Stephanie is a Regional Merchandising Manager. I feel incredibly lucky to have her as my mentor. After just one day, I have already discovered a new métier that I didn’t know about before, but now I feel like that it might suit me. Merchandising requires both data analysis techniques and guts on fashion fads, which is why my supply chain background and my passion towards fashion fit quite well. Stephanie shared a lot of valuable insights of the merchandising industry and she also revealed some key success factors for pursuing a career in the luxury industry. Not only the talks with my mentor, but also the talks with other senior executives were very inspiring. I was deeply moved by the passion and commitment implied by their words, their energy, and their manners. I believe that once you are doing what you truly love, you won’t calculate about your efforts putting in and instead will take ownership of the company and treat it as your own business.  This is the ideal state of career which I have always been dreaming of and it is also the career which I will always strive to achieve. As lucky as I am, I can now pursue my dream with valuable help and support from my mentors – my role models. Can’t wait for the coming exciting events!” 

——Estelle Ziyue Yang (Year3, Supply Chain and Logistics Management)

“I'm major in supply chain and logistics management and my mentor, Sarah, is the Regional Logistics Manager of Dior. During today’s event, she shared lots of her experience in this field and how supply chain in luxury retail industry is different from those in other industries. This is what I might not be able to get from lectures. In the afternoon, we also visited the store in Landmark, where we got to know how the store was designed in a way to provide a unique shopping experience for the customers. All the interior design colors, textures, and store fixtures were well-chosen to achieve this objective.

Today is just the beginning of this one-year program. And I’ve already learned a lot. I’m really looking forward to my next meeting with Sarah again!” 

——Chloe Yitong Zhou (Year2, Supply Chain and Logistics Management)