Marija Sarafinovska Joins the Department of Marketing as New PhD Student

The Department of Marketing welcomes Marija Sarafinovska as its new PhD student. Marija’s interest in brand management and ethics began during her BSc studies: due to her desire to explore the effects of psychological, social, and emotional factors on marketing decisions, she conducted a quantitative analysis on the impact of environmental consciousness and brand loyalty on consumer purchasing intentions towards sustainable products for her BSc thesis.

After her BSc studies in Business and Economics at University of Bologna, Marija moved to Denmark to pursue a MA degree in Accounting, Strategy, and Control at Copenhagen Business School. During her studies, Marija worked within the Patient Engagement and Advocacy team at Novo Nordisk. She was organizing the DEEP Summit, a key international event including patients, patient organization representatives, and leaders. Moreover, she was responsible for communication with internal and external stakeholders regarding Patient Engagement Network meetings, which involves more than 80 colleagues from across the value chain. Her experiences at Novo Nordisk fueled her desire to investigate the field of brand co-creation further from an academical point of view.

After her MA studies, Marija became a Sales Financial Analyst at Reckitt Benckiser, a British multinational consumer goods company, where she worked with monthly reporting, forecasting sales, and balance sheet reconciliations, as well as providing financial support to the sales and marketing teams. Specifically, she was responsible for supporting the Norwegian and Finnish markets for the megabrands such as Vanish, Finish, Harpic, and Cillit Bang. In her latest role, Marija worked as a financial analyst for Park Street Nordicom, an asset management company, where she contributes with various accounting tasks including accounts receivables, corporate taxation, and bookkeeping, amonst other.

Marija originally comes from Macedonia, but has lived and studied in Turkey, Italy, and Denmark. Through her international education and experiences, she developed strong communication skills with teammates, mentors, and stakeholders alike.