Twice Event, Twice Fun and Twice Responsibility

As referring to the subject above, I, Teo Rui-Ming, Vincent thus outline my personal experience of partaking in two events while interned at Meritz Hotel Miri.

So, I begun my internship last year 29 December 2014 and was immediately put into the menial task force. My task was to swap menus from old to new, run errands, laminate menus and help move heavy things for the coming New Year Eve Countdown. I would say that I was at first quite nervous as the first three days of my internship with Meritz Hotel Miri was just doing the above. Not even once, did I touch on any thing that more PR related. But then, on my third day there, I had sudden realization. 

We learned event planning in Public Relations Media Relations (If I remember correctly), even when it was all delegating task to who and who on paper. It dawn on me that I was actually doing all that delegation work, If you can catch my gist. The thing is, if I do not do all this small work, I won't know how hard or how easy it could be and will thus affect the future me when it comes down to the actual planning stages. 

Another event was the Annual Staff Dinner for Meritz Hotel Miri, as being the "Intern", I was given the heavy responsibility task of corresponding with any sponsorship request from other Hotels or business partners. 

Sponsorship is a big thing if you ask me, in the duration of my internship, replying or corresponding with sponsorship requests was my primary or number one job there. All 28 working days was spent on replying and corresponding the sponsorship requests. I got to admit that it is no easy task. 

Once, during one of my corresponding process, I called the wrong Hotel and I was shamed upon such simple mistake. I had to apologize to the wrong hotel and called the right hotel and when I told my supervisor the mistake I done, I was both lectured and sympathized at the same time. Mistake are always done but learn from it to avoid it at all. 

Anyways, I had fun learning from both events during my internship. I now know how hard it is to actually organize an event and how hard it is if things doesn't go as plan. I will use this knowledge that I gain and put them to good use in the present me and the future me. 

Children at Sedeco

Hello Everyone,

Sedeco is a company which cares a lot for its employees. Sedeco organizes several activities throughout the year so that employees can enjoy themselves. But only do the employees of Sedeco enjoy themselves but also their respective family members as well. That is why on the 16^th April, Sedeco organised several activities for children. The children were either the own children of employees of Sedeco or were siblings or relatives. I personally went to fetch 4 children, 3 boys and a girl from the northern part of the country. My helped in taking a few photographs. Gifts, food and drinks were given to the children. I and other interns were in charge of making the event a success. It was very fun to interact with the children. Face painting activities were organised as well as colouring. The event ended with a song and dance item where the children had to sing and dance.

Overall, I would say, I enjoyed myself. This was the second time that I have worked with children. The first time being with another lecturer during the holidays. We (Interns) had to make paper crowns for the children each crown bearing the name of the each child. At the end of the day, I was very tired. The children were happy and were given gifts at the end. After the activities, I stayed behind to help to clean up and re-arrange the chairs and table. I am very thankful to Sedeco to have given me this opportunity and several other opportunities to learn new things.

An Unexpected Internship

Many students speak of an internship stint as a boring, mundane experience, and I for one did not want an internship that subjected me to menial tasks, like getting coffee for the boss or assigned to me the role of office boy. For those of you wondering what is an 'office boy', it is a job title for the person in an office who runs errands, for instance delivering important documents or the more complex job, collecting documents. To me, an internship was a chance to test the waters of public relations, where I will be awarded responsibilities, tasks, deadlines, and given the opportunity to express my ideas. Interview after interview, it was getting more and more probable that I was to resign to an internship that was similar to the ones my friends went through. "Why not?" I thought, I was after all a lowly intern.

Then it all changed! One bright sunny morning I mentioned to the head of the International Division, Mr. Jean-Paul Mouton that I was looking for an internship and was finding it hard to find one that complied with my requirements. After an interview he offered me an internship that was exactly what I was looking for!

I have never looked back at my decision to carry out my PR Internship at the International Division. Not only are my colleagues so supportive, the working culture has taught me so much since I started. It has instilled in me the habit of coming to work early in the morning and performing as best as I can! There are deadlines, events, and other tasks that I relish, and although the stress levels can get a little much at times, it has only served to make me stronger.

The art of triple checking

9 September 2014

I had to learn the hard way that the client can let you down.

Over the course of my internship I have started to take on a lot more client work for one of our biggest clients. However, the relationship is set up such that, the internal marketing team works with us, their consultancy, to come up with and organise stories that might be of interest to the media. The problem with this is that we often rely on them to play the ‘middle man’ and sometimes details are mistranslated or forgotten.

I’m fast learning that direct contact with the parties immediately involved in the media opportunity is necessary, especially when I’m responsible for liaising with the media regarding where and when media opportunities are occurring.

I was responsible for organising a photocall for an ice bucket challenge that our client was doing in memory of a resident who had passed away from ALS. I managed to secure a few local reporters who were interested in covering this story and part of my role was to coordinate the timing of their arrival, so that their photographers could capture pre, during and post event images. One day prior to the event I made email contact with the team leader organising the challenge at the site and confirmed the time and location that the challenge would take place. I then relayed this information to the reporters via email that afternoon, securing a time for them to attend the event the following day. I really thought I’d covered all bases to make sure this photocall ran smoothly.

However, this was not the case. There was a last minute change to the timing of the event – it was brought forward by an hour. Therefore the reporters arrived after the challenge had taken place, resulting in the photographer missing the photo opportunity and the reporter missing an interview opportunity.

Successful Outcome 

Fortunately, the story was still published. I received a call from the journalist who attended, informing me that the event had taken place earlier than advised and that they had missed the photo opportunity. Luckily I had a good relationship with the journalist and when I explained what had happened, they understood. To make it up to them, I managed to track down some images that had been taken at the centre and arranged for a telephone interview, so the story still ran.

What I learnt 

My first mistake was assuming that nothing would change from one day to the next and my second, was not triple checking everything the morning of the event.

Additionally, I learnt that although it’s in the best interest of our client to accommodate the media, the parties involved, for this particular client, are usually based in centres around Western Australia, not in head office, so they don’t understand the protocol when it comes to the changing of event timings, nor the value of not wasting a reporter’s time. I learnt that clients require explicit instructions – the process and consequences of not following this process need to be clearly explained to them, preferably by phone, rather than by email.

Finally, I learnt that relationship development is the most important aspect of public relations – with both the media and with clients. This is also best done in person or via telephone – emails are less personal.

The Two Week Event – A Colosoul* Endeavour

*Mind the pun, I do mean colossal.

When I first entered the office of Colosoul Group Inc, the brain-child of Tricia “Trish” Ray, I didn’t know what to make of the group of 20 people crowded into the room with eager faces. I nestled into a chair of my own up very the front as my face morphed to mimic the group of other potential volunteers.  Trish opened by discussing the company, and the mission she has endeavoured towards since it was first established.

Colosoul Group has an somewhat unusual internal working, which in my eyes seems to work to benefit the productivity of Colosoul, as there is a strong sense of team work and co-operation between departments in order to get work done by people who are passionate about the projects. This is as opposed to forcing people into a role they wont enjoy and end up putting little effort into – which I’m sure we are all guilty of in those first few jobs, the ones we needed as stepping stones into desirable employment.

Colosoul has ongoing, permanent projects that include 8 publications, all for different demographics and to help promote awareness and gain charity for other not-for-profits such as Extinction Sucks, FTP, PMH and the Esther Foundation.  While people where allocated roles for particular publications (print and online magazines), they also have departments dedicated to particular focuses such as film, fashion, design, journalism, human relations, public relations and more! I found the harmony in the spread of people and relaxed nature of Colosoul – motivational messages line the walls of the small office, and it is a very close-knit environment. With people available as “general” Colosoul staff who have different specialties, we are encouraged to seek out the help of others by the means of a Colosoul Facebook Group, or just face-to-face to see who is interested in helping with projects here and there.

Having already spoken with Venus the company director, the publication I was handed the reigns to was Greta Photo Book, which has a message to promote awareness and to erase the stigma regarding Mental Health – which is a cause I couldn’t have been happier to be involved with. It also aims to help photographers Australia wide (starting locally) to have a chance at being published and getting their name out there – which also gives the publication a theme. Overjoyed, but overwhelmed I took in the news, excited for this new stage in my life while feeling butterflies in my stomach at the idea of taking on a virtually abandoned publication by myself.

I had a lot of brainstorming to do, a lot of phone calls to make, and Mental Health Week fast approaching. Given the cause, this seemed like a fantastic opportunity to re-invigorate Greta with an exhibition. Unfortunately with only two weeks to plan and put together it was time to say good-bye to my friends and hello to technology, as I research; plan; call; email; beg; and organise. My new friends are my phone, the Greta facebook account which I hastily revamped (**picture below), and email.

**Greta Photo Book Facebook www.facebook.com/gretaphotobook

I cannot wait to let you know how this unfolds!

Until then,

Imogen Clark

Curtin Bentley Campus 

Momentum's 10th Anniversary Pink Ribbon Ball

After weeks of planning and organising Momentum's Pink Ribbon Ball has finally arrived. The Pink Ribbon Ball attracted over 400 guests and featured a banquet dinner, live auction, testimonial speaker, raffle prize, live entertainment, Belle of the Ball competition and Prince Charming award. The events mission is to raise awareness and funds for breast cancer research. The night turned out to be a huge success and one of the best Pink Ribbon Ball's thrown so far. I found it a very rewarding experience to see all the hard work pay off and produce a memorable night for a worthy cause. It also showed the importance of public relations in creating these events.

Some of the public relations activities used to produce the Pink Ribbon Ball included:

• Media Releases
• Newletters
• Sponsorship Proposals
• Advetorials
• Flyers
• Banners
• Speeches

These activities were inexpensive and critical in producing publicity and increasing ticket sales leading up to the ball.

On the night of the Pink Ribbon Ball I was in charge of the volunteers to ensure all tasks were completed on the checklist. This involved placing the corporate signs, name place cards, auction catalogues, menus, raffle tickets and ballot bidding on the tables. However, there were a few mistakes with the name place cards so I had to print more by going to the Hyatt's Business Centre. Therefore I tried to take initiative and solve most of the problems on the night to ensure Barbara wasn't continually bothered by easily fixed mistakes. I also took charge and briefed a journalist from The Sunday Times STM about the night's special guests, performers, speakers, awards and auction items.

After the room was set up I was in charge of the guest list where I helped guests find their seats and made sure all special requirements was met. Overall the guest list was successful as the only problems were a couple wanting to sit with their friends on another table. I was pleased with this as I had been updating and following up on the guest list leading up to the event. After all guests were seated the volunteers were instructed to circle the room in case anyone had any questions or problems. Barbara told all the volunteers not to stress if they didn't know the answer but to be polite and find someone who could help them.

The other task the volunteers had were to inform guests about the raffle where guests could win two business class tickets to any Singaporean Airlines destination and to collect the raffle tickets. The raffle had a few issues as people weren't aware they cost $50 as it wasn't written on the tickets. Therefore next year we've taken to note to make sure the price is clearly stated on the raffle tickets. After the raffle tickets were collected we assisted with the live auction by taking the winner's details and handing out the item vouchers. Every item was sold in the live auction raising substantial funds for breast cancer research.

Overall the evening went relatively smoothly and all guests enjoyed their night based on the congratulations Momentum received after the event. I improved a lot of my public relations skills organising this event and look forward to perfecting my skills in my last few weeks at Momentum.

Stay tuned to hear about Momentum's next event the Melbourne Cup Luncheon!

Thanks,

Ashleigh Mills
14843011

The start of the Agricultural shows

Making progressive steps in my internship! Half way through my internship and I’m understanding how the business operates and where I fit in as an intern.  I was a bit lost for a while and didn’t know if what I was doing was right. With the agricultural show season upon us, I didn’t know if events really fitted into the whole public relations area, but handing in my 10 day update I was reassured that it was all apart of the job and to make the most of what I was doing. 

Finally being able to finish the companies facebook page and getting full approval to get that up and running, I was feeling positive about the impact I was having on the business. The facebook page was a lot harder then I thought because BAJV doesn’t have a policy that covers social media. Meaning there needed to be an alternative email created and used for the facebook page, to ensure it didn’t link with personal accounts. So I was pretty excited about it all when it was finally functioning!

I’ve also been able to participate and learn about all the efforts that go into organising events. BAJV participates in a number of agricultural shows and I was able to help set up their stand in Northam. It involved making site maps to show where everything was going to be located within their designated area, as well as a trip to their warehouse to organise and make a stock list for everything that would be needed over the weekend. I really enjoyed the set up as it was efficient and fun. You learn that the maps made are more guidelines then strictly needing to be followed. I very much enjoyed this and cannot wait until I’m able to participate in both the set up and the running of their next agricultural show in Toodyay in October.

So far I’ve very much enjoyed having some freedom to do my own thing but have also been stuck with odd jobs that need to be done. This includes tidying up work sheets, websites and spreadsheets. But it all adds to the job and to the experience!

Stay tuned! Hopefully next blog will update you about the agricultural shows! Or at least the lead up and preparation for them.