Welcome to WACOSS

6th September 2013

Hi everyone!

This week i started my placement at the West Australian Council of Social Services, commonly known as WACOSS. All I can say is wow! no amount of study could have prepared me for the crazy work environment i was about to step foot in. When i was looking for a placement i was really drawn to not-for-profits. After weeks of emailing numerous charities and not-for-profit organisations in WA , my friend who interned at WACOSS in the past highly recommended i contact them. After looking through their website and seeing what they do i decided that WACOSS seemed like a great opportunity. I emailed the Director, had an interview and here i am 2 weeks later, at the end of my first week on the job.

I started my week by meeting everyone in the office, Directors, policy managers, finance assistants and program support officers. Everyone was so friendly it helped to settle my nerves a little. In my interview  with the director I was told that I would be working alongside the membership and communications officer, Carly, However she wasn't in on the day so I didn't get to meet her until I started. When we met we sat down for an hour and went through the plan for my placement and had a chat about what i wanted to gain from this whole experience. My plan for the next 10 weeks covers a lot of areas! They have planned to have me working on rewriting promo materials, membership acquisition campaigns, website management, social media, as well as assisting in event organisation and management. It seems pretty daunting to have so much to do in such a short time, but i'm excited at the range of different things i'll be working on.

I did a lot of reading on the WACOSS website before i started and was kind of nervous that no matter how much i read i still didn't fully understand what they did. So when Carly (the communications manager) gave me a stack of books including the annual report, membership booklet, and Strategic mission amongst others, I was more than happy to spend the bulk of my first day reading every last sentence. From reading the materials I was able to understand that WACOSS themselves were not a charity, however, they represent hundreds of WA not-for-profit organisations and work to try and improve the social policy that affects disadvantaged people in WA. Overall I really support what WACOSS stands for and I'm interested to see exactly what i'll be doing in the weeks to come.

With no time to mess around I got straight into evaluating all of WACOSS's promotional materials. This includes the webpage, membership booklet, and membership letters. Carly told me straight out " they're crap, change whatever you want".  With that she gave me everything I needed and left me for the day to pick apart their materials and write down my ideas and recommendations.

Now that I have finished my first 2 days I will admit that I am excited but somewhat nervous as to what is to come. Walking in to a new place I was very intimidated, and questioned whether i knew enough to be going in to the real world and working. However,   I already feel like i'm surrounded by people who will teach me a lot and help me take my first step in to the real communications industry. At the end of the day I know everything I learn at my internship will help me at some stage in my future career. Now that I have survived the first week I definitely have more confidence in myself and am less hesitant to share my ideas with my colleagues.

I hope everyones placements are going well! I look forward to reading about everyones experiences.

Good luck

Bri

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