Week 3: Friday Summary

Friday, January 20th 


Part A:

This week's agenda was focused on completing the project and working towards improving the event with the sponsorship brochure, foundation folder, and the foundation year-long handout. The timer was selected and the paperwork has been completed and filed. The brochure, folder, and handout are completed and are awaiting any final changes before they are sent to the final printer. T-shirt designs and costs have been initiated and we look to implement a new "dri-fit" t-shirt option for the participants.


Part B:

Over the course of the J-term I truly believe I have learned some valuable new things and improved many of my skills. One of these is research. The first week was dedicated to researching the new radio frequency tags and their costs. I believe that it is important to understand the concept of the item you are going to spend so much time and money on. It would have been easy to just google the term and find the cheapest product and implement it, but in that way the job would not have been completed to the best of my ability and with the greatest outcome. So I know that my research skills have improved through all the hours of studying and phone calls with professionals in the race timing business.
Time management is definitely something I became more aware of through the project design process. I should have allowed for more time of planning the race and spent less time choosing a timer. I also should have written my journals and posted them earlier instead of waiting so long while the information was fresh in my head.
My communication skills have benefitted greatly during this project. Written through the blogs and emails to supervisors and outsourcers, and orally through my communication with supervisors and phone calls made. My communication skills are a weakness of mine that I have found through my evaluations with my internship supervisor and some of my professors. This experience has no doubt improved these qualities and I look to continue to improve these skills through my educational career.
My design skills were implemented and improved through the project. I completely designed the brochure and company packet with only little help from supervisors regarding what information should be included. This experience is something I look to bring to any organization I happen to work for in the future.

I have learned one major lesson during this experience and that is if something you need to get done, you have to go out and do it yourself and not rely on others to push you or remind you as we have been done throughout high school and previous experience. In the work world there is no one there to hold your hand and tell you what you are doing right and wrong and I found that out first hand in the project. The project may have been slowed due to me not initiating the beginning of the project as I should have. I half expected my supervisors to keep me on task and check up on me but I came to realize this is not how it is done in the real world. This lesson is an important one and I am glad to have learned this early on.

As I continue on into my professional career I would like to improve on a few areas. As I previously mentioned I would like to continue working on my communication skills. Part of this involves being more outgoing in my work and with my contacts. It is sometimes hard for me to initiate conversation with others because I fear the dead time in the conversations and that the awkwardness will be very evident. Another area I wish to continue with improvement is the formalness of business. This is not something I was exposed to with the project and I hope to gain some experience in a formal environment in the remainder of my interning opportunities. Lastly I would like to continue on my time management skills and learn to get stuff done before it is due. It is a great feeling to accomplish something ahead of the due date. That way it leaves time for improving the task and going over to make sure there are no mistakes.

If an interviewer were to ask me about this experience I would describe it as a short, but very beneficial experience. In only three weeks I was able to improve many aspects of my event management skills, something that I will surely use in the future. My communication, design, and planning skills were tested during the project and my work will speak for itself when the time for the event comes around. If and when the event runs smoothly, I can be confident that my work was successful and beneficial to the organization.