Hope everyone is enjoying their internship, it really is such a great component of Curtin's PR course as it gives us students the opportunity to work in the PR industry, and I can say that I'm so happy that I chose an industry that I find exciting and enjoyable to work in.
So as mentioned previously I work at PR firm Savvy Creations who have just expanded to marketing as well. This leap has been both challenging and rewarding as I am now accumulating more skills and a greater understanding of the communications industry. For my task this week, I have been asked to create a brochure that will feature as part of Savvy Creations' media kit which will offer 3 PR and Marketing package deals for businesses and individuals . A few weeks prior to this, I was asked to research the types of services other marketing firms offered in order to incorporate those to the services we already provide. I found that a lot of marketing these days is based around the internet, whether that be e-marketing through email campaigns, web and logo design, merchandising or market research, many elements of PR transferred over to marketing. This made the task a lot easier as I could get a better understanding on how the two complement each other and which services could be of use to our package deals. With already having gathered the information on what types of marketing and PR services will be on offer for our introductory, intermediary and advanced packages, this will make the task a lot easier and will finish before the next scheduled meeting which will be held in a week's time.
Speaking of meetings, as Savvy Creations is independently run, it currently has no head quarters. This means that our meetings are held on location and us interns work from home. For the past 7 or so months that I have been interning, the meetings are quite structured and have to be to ensure that an efficient work environment is maintained. The meetings are held every 1.5-2 weeks depending on the size of the workload, and are scheduled in the mornings To start off with, we talk about any challenges we have had with the work or any comments regarding it, we go through each of our tasks and either have a printed copy to give to Sandra or e-mail her the work (either way, all work must be emailed to her). After this, Sandra goes over her current projects and clients, giving feedback on the previous week's work and runs us through what needs to be done for the upcoming week. She then allocates work loads. With two interns, me being a PR student and the other who is a Marketing student, our tasks are designated to suit our skills. Sandra runs over the things she would like me to do, discussing the specifics of each tasks which I will ask questions so I can fully grasp what needs to be achieved. This routine is something I have gotten very familiar with over the course of the internship, however, requires lots of communication and mutual understanding as the work is done from home.
Completing the tasks from home is something that I have never experienced before, but it has made balancing uni life and a part time job so much easier. It allows me to complete the work at a time that suits me, but also requires a lot of motivation in order to complete the work on time to a high degree. This is because you don't have to leave the house, dress up in certain attire and behave a certain way when you are in a corporate environment which help to shape performance levels due to expectations. What I have learnt that when working from home, motivation is key and needs to be maintained, which is why I allocate myself certain times when I have to wake up early in order to complete the work and enforce a sense of professionalism.
Working from home, I have learnt a few key things that I would like to pass on to those who may be thinking of starting their own freelance PR business after uni or those who may also be working from home as part of their future internship;
- Communication is key: It's easy to get immersed in your workload with no-one standing over your shoulder giving you feedback on your work. Make sure you touch base with your mentor often to ensure you are on the right track. Even if you don't have any questions or inquiries, by communicating it builds a greater working relationship dynamic and allows team members to see where you are on a project
- Maintain professionalism: Even though you are working from home, you are still working in a corporate environment. Try and get out of your pyjamas to do the work, put on the alarm to wake up early to get you in to a routine (as your clients will most probably have a typical working day from 8am-5pm) and therefore still need to be contactable within those hours
- Don't slack off: Self-explainable. Its so easy to do when you are in the comfort of your own home but point 1 and 2 sum up how best to avoid this.
(How not to do it)
Hope that helps!
Tahlia
