This first week has provoked my thoughts and affected my actions towards my PR skills. To understand my process of revelation, I welcome you to join me on a journey through an amazing week in my life.
It is eight o’clock and my alarm rings and at that moment I understand that my life is going to change: "The first day in the real world". I was scared, because as an international student my English is not perfect and I knew that in the real world people will not be sorry for me, they will just expect the best from me. I was scared, but exited to start this adventure. Being a PR person in an organization is something very interesting, as you can help everyone to improve their job. At the end of my placement I would like my organisation to understand that corporations need proper PR to be successful. According to Fraser (2007,34) most companies today do recognize the importance of proper PR in the conduct of their business.
My first day has consisted of meeting people and settling down in a new environment. People have been very nice to me and have helped me a lot in the process of discovering this new place. The Graduate School of Management at the University of Melbourne has four very important departments: the Admissions, the Student Experience, the Graduate Careers Centre and the Marketing departments. I am going to help these four departments with my PR skills. For the moment I have been working with the Student Experience and the Graduate Careers Centre teams. I have worked on two different events for my first week.
The student experience team
Ben and Jerry during their presentation
The second event was an event to wrap up a program for graduate students called Career Mentoring, which aims to help students move forward in life through the use of professional mentors. I have applied all the tools I learnt in my PR techniques unit into a real workplace.
The mentoree students
My speech during the end of the mentor program
Within this week my supervisors have given me different projects that I will have to achieve before the end of my placement. In fact they have given me five projects: one personal big project, three major and one minor project.
The first big one is the Welcome function for the new 400 postgraduates students, which I am going to manage by my own with the monitoring of a manager. The three major projects are graduation night, the creation of new brochures and the orientation week. For these three projects I will be working with different teams. The minor project is profiling students who are going to graduate for the University of Melbourne website.
I am very excited but very conscious about the importance of doing well. This is why I am very careful and always ask for feedback. Tomorrow is the beginning of a new week, in which I have to find different quotes for the venue of my BIG project and start to contact the students that I am going to profile. This first week has given me a taste of my future career. I really enjoy managing events and I will probably work in this area. Managing events is like being pregnant: you prepare the event with all your energy, you look at it taking shape and then you give the birth and that the most beautiful day of your life when you see the result of all your passionate work. I was born to manage events...
Let the dream keep going...
Fraser P, S. 2007. The Practice of Public Relations. New Jersey: Pearson Education
3 comments:
Hello!
I enjoyed your detailed blog post very much, as it gave a well explained and expressed account of your week's activities. Well done on landing the job in an interstate organisation! It must have taken a lot of time and organisation to land it!
In relation to my placement, I have found that I also use tools from PR Techniques the most on a day-to-day basis. It also sounds like you have been given a lot of valueble experience and will have compiled a lot of projects by the time you have finished your placement. I felt like I had a lot of responsibility writing up a media kit by myself, but you have been given a lot of responsibilty (managing an event for 400 people!), which demonstrates your ability and how much your supervisors value your input.
Hope all goes well and look forward to reading your next post.
Rachel P :)
Hi Rachel,
Thanks for your comment. I have been very busy but should write my next post in the following two days. I'am currently preparing the graduation night for the postgraduate of University of Melbourne which will occur this Friday. Where did you do your placement? which element of a media kit did you write? Apparently I'm going to work with a professional PR on a new project at the end of January so I will probably have to writ up a media kit.
Bye
Melissa
Hi Melissa,
It's Mei here from your PR Media tute with Jennifer.
I really enjoyed reading your blog. It sounds like your having a great time in Melbourne. I have just completed my 6th day at the government Department for Communities. It has been a fantastic place to complete my placement.
By the looks of things, you have been given many events to work on. I am also working on an International Women's Day event. I realised there is so much that you need to take into consideration when organising an event.
I would also like to share something my colleague told me when we were brainstorming ideas for the event with you. She said that when you are brainstorming, nothing is a bad idea. I really like this perspective because that means you have a lot of ideas to choose from.
I am looking forward to your next post.
Mei
(Curtin Bentley)
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