By Analyse Jester, Gaylord College Class of 2025
Armand McCoy, executive director and faculty advisor of Lindsey + Asp, continues his career at Gaylord College. Starting at OU in March of 2022, McCoy has been in connection with the university for more than 10 years. McCoy comes to Gaylord from Trifecta Communications, where he served as president and COO. During his time there he had many interactions with faculty and students at Gaylord, especially Lindsey + Asp.
“During my time in the agency, I had several Lindsey + Asp students as interns and hired a few alumni, so I’ve seen the successful output,” McCoy said. “Working at Gaylord is new, but being around it and its talented students is not.”
Passionate about helping students pursue their goals, McCoy encourages students to step up and share their ideas.
Lindsey + Asp is an outlet for students to take what they have learned in class and apply it, and to learn additional skills within the agency, McCoy said.
Lindsey + Asp is an organization focused on pushing students to practice and pursue their careers. McCoy said he enjoys seeing students grow and learn.
“I think Gaylord is a safe space for them to fail-forward, to try, to push themselves to learn to work with others, work as a team, learn the systems and tools and the way we operate in an agency environment,” he said.
Wanting to encourage students to not be afraid of failure, McCoy uses his position to help when needed but still allows for students to take charge. He said he wants nothing more than to set up his students for success.
“They have hopefully figured out their place in our industry, and if they figure that out, I consider it a success,” McCoy said.
New ideas are always needed in the field of communications and advertising. As the field diversifies, Gaylord is hoping to continue to encourage students to share their creativity.
“For me, continuing to diversify our agencies and our workplaces is super important to me,” McCoy said.
“In some ways that's my hope, that Lindsey + Asp will be a vehicle for more people to see strategic communication as a career aspiration, and continue to grow the diversity of our career field for people who want to get into it,” McCoy said.
