GO, GOING, GONE

In my final weeks at Go Communications I have been lucky enough to attend client meetings with my team. The client, Zurich Brand, was acquired due to another teams work with Zurich Corporate. Zurich’s core business is offering the Malaysian public general and life insurance products and services. Our team was to pitch PR collateral throughout the launch of Zurich’s new brand campaign “For Those Who Truly Love”.

OBJECTIVES:

Through a targeted PR campaign the strategy is to:

-Build awareness and positive opinions

-Increase market share and share of voice

-Attract new customers and agents

-Become a leading insurer in Malaysia

It would be the task of Go Communications to assit with media liasing, cover-story concepts and drafting of print material. It was inspiring to attend the two pitches and geting to see Peter DeKretser work with Karen (my team leader) to deliver the material. Peter, really does have a way with his words and making other people see his vision, he also has a brutally honest and cut to the chase kind of attitude. This I believe has been keen to the success of the consultancy, as both Michael and Peter don’t mess about and seek for straight to the point answers.

Having to see the types of stories that were pitched was also really intriguing, and really shows just how creative you have to be to get the media’s attention. I also found it relevant it to understand and know your cultural context, as this has a major influence on how media operate and what the public is interested in reading or viewing. Especially, in such a diverse country as Malaysia which has a very fragmented culture.

During this time I also got to attend “Zurich Love for Football” launch. “Zurich Love for Football” is a CSR initiative aim to promote health and wellness among youths. In collaboration with Little League Soccer Sdn. Bhd., Zurich Insurance Malaysia will run a series of football clinics across ten secondary schools with existing football clubs in various states.  For more information about the day, VIP’s and Zurich CSR campaign, click here.

It became apparent that Team Vertical was brought on board perhaps due to relaxed attitude of the other team. When I arrived the morning of the event, I definitely felt the stress in the air due to last minute preparations. Although I can’t really further comment due to the little involvement I had in the lead up to the event.

Excitingly, I got to play the role of the usher, who got to bring VIP guests to the stage along with being the bearer of the golden whistle. The sound of the golden whistle blown by Y.A.M. Tunku Tan Sri Imran ibni Almarhum Tuanku Ja’afar, President of the Olympic Council of Malaysia initiated the friendly match between coaches and students. View the video below to gain further insight on the event:

Embarrassingly, I managed to have a few flaws in my performance as cushion bearer for the golden whistle, this can be viewed at around 0.20 minutes.

My Time at Go:

I have had the opportunity to make life long friends, and established networks in Malaysia. Luckily, I had an extremely friendly team to work under, which definitely made the experience more enjoyable and rewarding.

Above: Whitney (another Curtin intern), me, Kuan Ting (Team Vertical Supervisor) and Karen (Team Vertical leader). 

Highlights:

• Sharing team lunches and even dinners with Karen and Kuan Ting. Kuan Ting ad I definitely shared a love for food, and I believe I dumbfounded everyone, as I loved spicy food and was willing to try anything. Luckily for my Iron stomach.
• On our last night my team shared a Ramadan dinner together, this definitely showed just how welcoming Team Vertical were and how much I would miss them.
• Attending events, the preparation, planning and detail that goes into a one to three hour launch amazes me. As a PR consultant it can be very demanding what kind of work and preparation is expected form the client. Also, you always are expected to perform miracles on very tight budgets.

Above: Last night in KL enjoying Ramadan dinner at the office.

Lowlights:

• As my team had only been established around a month, it was very slow in terms of work and clients. This meant I was left to do a lot of tedious mind numbing tasks, but at the end of the day they were things that needed to get done.

Lessons Learned

• Always bring the right attitude – attitude is everything in a working environment especially in terms of working in a consultancy team.
• Be willing to do any task, it’s not always a glamorous job.
• Use your initiative and when work is slow find tasks that need doing, I found this helped my team trust me more as they began to saw what I was capable of.
• Always be well groomed, you never know what situation you may be put in and could jeopardise your chance of attending client meetings.
• Be confident in your own abilities and work.
• Always SPELL CHECK and read over your work and make appropriate edits.
• Don't be afraid to ask questions.

I would just like to take this opportunity to thank Go Communications and my team, Vertical for being inspiring leaders and enabling my experience to learn from some real life PR experts.

I wish all of you the best of luck in your own internship and thank you for reading.

Felicity

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