RYNAQUE
Sometimes, we imagine that internship life is boring or sometimes, torturous. Think again! One of our seniors, better known as Singapore’s plus-sized blogger, RynaQue shares her fun internship experience in an advertising and marketing agency, WILD Interactive.
In fact, before RynaQue started her internship, she was slightly intimidated by what her relatives would say: “ When you’re doing your internship, your bosses will be really mean to you and take advantage of you.”
Well, it seems that they were wrong because she is having a great time in her company, learning new things and enjoying the camaraderie with her colleagues.
As a digital marketing intern, she does online monitoring of conversations and the Facebook pages of WILD Interactive’s clients. Also, she gets the privilege to tinker with Facebook’s applications and read a lot of blogs too.
Of course, as an intern, RynaQue still does the typical intern tasks like scanning documents, downloading of files and keying in data. But that does not make things any dull, especially in a workplace that allows you to use the various social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter) and play around and shoot your colleagues with nerf guns during working hours! How cool can it get?
Fun, creative, cool and clean, WILD Interactive also encourages their employees to take the responsibility to wash their utensils in the company pantry. Check out what this sign says:
To conclude this post, RynaQue leaves us with some tips to excel in her line of work:
• KEEP YOURSELF UPDATED- What's the latest social networking website? What's the latest app that is slowly gaining popularity? What's Facebook's latest feature? Who's the latest/top digital influencer? What's the latest online ad campaign?)
• READ. A lot!
• Build your own social media presence. You get to meet new people- even your potential employers and most probably be able to get a lot more opportunities
• Be willing to learn.
• Always be early for work! (Like me!)
Check out RynaQue's blog at www.rynaque.com
Written by: Kayla
Edited by: Clare
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AMANDA
Amanda Tan is a Year three Diploma in Media and Communication (DMC)student studying at Singapore Polytechnic.
This is her account of the internship experience:
I'm actually currently interning at 2 places, with Miss Pam at C4SM(Centre for Social Media) and Brandtology.
At both places its really 2 different experiences. Which is kinda cool.
At C4SM, we (me and daphne) are pretty much the leaders of what we are doing and Ms Pam is boss (yet a lecturer at the same time, still guiding us and stuff). But we have control of the things we do. We recently revamped our blog too. I took on most of that project. And Ms Pam always tells us to decide on what we think would look best. We're also helping with the Mass Media Research (a research module in DMC) conference presentation teams. I would say I really enjoy it. I was involved in last year's MMR press conference too, so this was like a reminiscing moment sort of thing. And it is kind of one of the times i actually feel my skills and knowledge are being put to use and passed on.
At Brandtology, its different. We are the interns. The lowest in the hierarchy. My simplified illustration of the hierarchy is basically, boss -> secretary -> manager -> old intern(under of supervisor at Brandtology there's another intern who has been here way longer then us) -> new intern. I would say honestly, i did not get what i wanted to do at Brandtology. In a sense that, i wanted to do research that was similar to Mass Media Research with analysis and all.
But i ended up doing... "Hey interns, can you guys research on Adwords", the next thing you know it, we are going onto "google.com" for research. I wanted to learn social analysis skills, researching via softwares other then SPSS, and not efficient researching via google. BUTTTT! I DID learn other things. TONS and TONS of terms and online business intelligence tools which i've never heard before. Metrics used by tools to calculate things such as traffic counts, audience, unique visits and so on. There are a lot foreign stuff and I find it very interesting.
I think i'm considered lucky though, to have a job that allows me to work and knock off on time, have a full 1 hour lunch break, and i'm confident i don't have to work on a weekends unwillingly. I have friends in events and production who works for long hours, weekends and even during their lunch (they pack lunch and eat next to lagging laptops. After 3 years you laptop slows down); writing for long hours, overtime, during holidays. And friends in advertising getting pushed around to do things that others don't want to do. Or even data entry while some are extremely busy attending meetings etc.
BUTTTTT, they are the ones that are truly learning, experiencing and getting the best out of this 3 months internship (6 months for the coming batches). For them, it is really nice for me to heard them say "Oh man! the event that day, success uh, but wah.. the models, cannot listen one you know? Need to be fierce. Then the tentage guy, come so late. I had to scold him" OR "My supervisor kept criticizing my work but she's very nice. She really tell me how to improve then i went to change it and she say i got improve*smiles*"
I'M NOT LIKING IT CAUSE THEY ARE NEGATIVE but because they are learning and experiencing the industry. Feels nice to hear them say such things :D
I would say an internship anywhere would enable everyone to learn different stuff and to experience different things. Good ones, bad one, extremely lousy ones.
But at the end of the day, we all realize and know, that is what working is like. No such things as "uh... miss pam, we're a bit lost...." OR "Did you do that essay? aiya, 10% only right? don't care ah". Everything has to be your best. You don't know how to do? Go figure. You can't bother your boss, they are too busy. You're on your own. I'm not trying to scare anyone. This is just what internships are all about. People should be mentally prepared for such changes before going out for their internships so they don't end up getting a "culture shock" on their first week. I don't want to glamorize internship and say only the good stuff. There sure are good points to working life though. The pay, the "no need to bring work home after working hours", parties of various types[yes, free drinks too], new friends, some of us get claims, the sense of achievement, and a lot more. But it is really rewarding after long hours of being in the office or even out of the office.
ALL IN ALL, for me, when i start to realize that after Christmas, i'll have less than 2 months left till a officially graduate, it’s really emotional. I am starting to miss all my projects, cursing and swearing with my classmates about this CA that CA, staying up all night, getting angsty at my own classmates, the feeling of "YES! CA 2 IS OVER!" all these things.
I believe that everyone would enjoy internship, especially when they realize it’s the last 100m to graduation. This last line is soooo cliche but its sooooo true: It really is, the last 100m left to dash.
Here's a look at the C4SM website: http://www.centreforsocialmedia.com/
* Screenshot of the C4SM Website
* Screenshot of the Brandtology Website
Written by: Zhi Yi
Edited by: Clare
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