Time and efficiency tips that we all can identify with!

Whether it’s against the clock, other members of the team, other consultancy’s or your personal best it’s a hard game!You have to be resourceful with your time and efficient whilst still being on the ball.

Here is a guide that I set my day by while at my internship that I've found really works well to ease nerves, make anything seem achievable and help maintain professionalism. 

Keeping to schedule 

It's really important to estimate how long a task is going to take you and keeping to that deadline. When you have a busy day planned you must otherwise things won't get done that with either put you back the next day or missing a clients deadline. This also means not getting distracted by other tasks even if they appear more enjoyable or you have pressure on those tasks.

Planning

Don't spend too much time planning your day however 5 minutes before you drive into your tasks and are checking emails etc. create a list of tasks with those that are most important or have deadlines at the top and those that aren't as critical at the bottom and start you day there (unless otherwise advised of course!). As you day goes on quickly check back at your list especially if urgent tasks are thrown your way that need to be dealt with straight away meaning you need to quickly adapt. 

Helping Others

It's always not only a good feeling and rewarding once you have finished all your tasks for the day to ask if other staff members need help. Consultancy's work as a team and providing that extra hand is overall helping your clients. It means that you get to learn more and if ever you need extra help more than likely if there is the time your team will support you. 

The End of Day Stress

Your looking at your to do list and it's still got lots of items on it that really need completing by the end of that business day (i.e. 5pm or earlier if its for an eastern states client). Take a deep breath and approaching your supervisor or other staff members is the best idea. Sometimes the tasks that we are given as interns as really large and it's completely understandable that you might need a bit of help. An example is a database of over 200 names that I had to call and confirm our system contact details were correct, that's 200 phone calls and a lot of research to complete to even be able to contact them (due to new numbers or websites etc). I had a lot of other urgent tasks to do so unfortunately it was postponed to the next day however this was completely fine as my placement understood the enormity of the task .

Any way hope these can help you! or you can identify with these processes. 

Cass

Making the switch to marketing and interning from home

Hi guys,

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;

1. 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
2. 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
3. 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

TICK TOCK ON THE PR CLOCK.

Wow, this PR internship has really uncovered the importance of good time management skills, and I say uncovered because my time management skills  duly need some sharpening up! 

I found, whilst I was completing tasks and projects I was assigned to during my work experience, I was failing to manage my time well and was spending many hours outside of my placement just trying to complete them.  I suddenly realised I was going to have to review the way I was approaching tasks, and the process I would take to complete them.

 My role at the creative studio has been one of great contribution. I always have writing tasks to complete for my supervisor (Vision, mission, stylist profile write ups, strategies, situation analysis)  on top of drafting creative ideas for the strategies we wish to implement and event production ideas.   

Sure enough it is easy to complete writing tasks, but creative thinking requires another energy! 
I have been asked to contribute my styling and stage production talents for  a photography/ fashion parade to be included in the  Perth Fashion Festival Cultural programme.  This sort of creative work involves set design, visions boards, mood boards for fashion, hair and make up,  venue hire, and basically a whole lot of emails, meetings and creative thought!

I’m thrilled to contribute my time! however, I struggled as juggled time between uni, work and my internship.  Lots of little tasks started to overwhelm me and I would feel anxious all day. 

It's essential to be able to manage your time in a PR consultancy if you have any hope of surviving, especially as an intern trying to complete more work than you should to please and impress everybody.

To keep improving on my time management skills I have enrolled into a Kiki K time management workshop, that was suggested by one of my colleagues.  Again, a basic skill that can be the difference between working efficiently and reaching organisation objectives and, ultimately failing. If i learn to manage my time better it will give me confidence to go for that dream job too, as fashion PR is made up of frequent events, that time management is a very important skill to retain. 

The mood board for our show to be featured as apart of PFF Cultural programme DEC 2014 (Keep your eyes peeled for the Aaron Mcpolin collective show featuring garments by Jomay designs. 

One more week to go of intense time management! time to get this PR report out of the way!

Phoebe :)