The End Is Here

Woah, what a ride it has been.

My internship with the Department for Communities has come to an end. On my last day, they surprised me with a farewell morning tea which was very kind of them.

For the last 20 days, the hands-on experience in the office has been a memorable time which I will take on board. I have definitely benefited from having this placement as a unit.

A few things that I have learnt during my placement are that-
- You need to communicate well with all your stakeholders and other colleagues
- The importance of deadlines
- Communication is the key
- Get straight to the point when writing in a journalistic style
- Be open to new challenges

The more experience you get in different industries can help you pick what type of career you want and expand your knowledge in the public relations practice.

Enjoy the rest of your time at your placements :)

Mei Yong
(Curtin Bentley)

DEADLINES!

My time at the Department for Communities is soon coming to an end. One insight I would like to share with you is the importance of deadlines.

I have learnt that you definitely need to be prepared and organised everyday so that you can reach a deadline before it is due. Leaving things too late could cost you a client or even your job. It is vital to have deadlines in projects and normal activities so you are motivated to reach your desired goal on time.

During my time at my placement, all the meetings I have attended have emphasised the importance of deadlines!!! When working in a team, it is essential that all members know their deadlines for their own tasks and the end date for the whole project.

At the office, employees use Microsoft Outlook Calender to book in all their meetings. They also have individual whiteboards on their walls and wall calendars to mark in important deadlines. By utilising these tools regularly, you can become more organised and prepared to reach your deadlines.

Mei
Bentley

The Perks...and the downsides

Hey Everyone,

WOW is all I can say.

I have just completed 6 days interning at the Department for Communities and it has been a fantastic learning experience from Day 1. All my colleagues have been very helpful and knowledgeable in the field of Public Relations and Communications.

The Department focuses on a range of groups that include seniors, carers, volunteers, early years, children, families, youth, and women. I realised that my work mates do A LOT of things and are very hard working. Their area of work is very broad and they might be organising an event, writing media releases, designing a publication for print or writing up articles for the internet.

I have had a real taste of what my career could be after I graduate. Here is a little insight into what I have been doing –

- Written 2 articles on staff members for the intranet
- Called MANY organisations to see if they wanted to be included in a Directory of Services for Women
- Sat in on meetings
- Morning tea for a staff member that was leaving (lots of food which is always a good thing)
- Working on the International Woman’s Day event
- Attended a buffet lunch at the Burswood Atrium (as my colleague was photographing the event)
- Was in a photograph for the front cover of the Directory

I noticed that working in a professional job has its perks and downsides. The perks included a buffet lunch at the Atrium at Burswood which was a real treat. Not all work is writing haha!! The downsides included a full day of ringing organisations asking for their approval of their details in the women’s directory.

Feel free to respond with your own perks and downsides.

Hope you guys are enjoying your placements.

Mei :)
(Curtin Bentley)

Day 1 - Sink or Swim

Hello fellow interns!

My name is Mei and I am very excited to tell you all about my first day interning at the Government Department for Communities in Perth.

Due to the expensive parking costs in the city (so annoying), I had to catch public transport from north of the river down to West Perth. I am not a big fan of our city’s public transport routes and had to take a step out of my comfort zone, or you could say my comfortable car. From my house I travelled on a bus, then a train and then another bus and finally arrived at the office on time. Phew, what an effort!

Stepping out from the elevator, I was greeted by my supervisors who were very friendly. I was overwhelmed by the size of the department which took up one whole floor of the building. I was introduced to many people (I don’t remember all their names because there were too many) who were all welcoming and really nice.

At the beginning of the day, one of my supervisors asked if I would like to join her for a meeting in the WA Seniors Card office which was down in the city. Some of the topics covered were ones that I had learned about in PR Consultancy such as printing, distribution and deadlines. It was very interesting to listen to how conclusions were reached and ways in which challenges were overcome.

Back at the office, I was assigned to find a database or list of details of telecentres located around WA. The internet was a useful source and I found this in no time. My next task was to do research for the International Women’s Day 2010 theme that they could use for next years event. I also had to look up potential guest speakers that could attend the event. I felt confident doing this task as I have had a lot of experience in researching for assignments at uni.

After this, I was sent a few emails that required me to write articles. I only got started on one which will be published on the internal intranet. I was told that I should understand that my articles will be proof-read, edited and then signed off. This was a required procedure for all published articles.

I was surprised at the amount of responsibility that I was given on the first day of my work experience. I am looking forward to completing my internship with the department and gaining much needed experience from my knowledgeable colleagues. I was glad I got through my first day and I am sure the rest of the journey will be a real learning curve.

Hope your all having a great time at your own placements.

Mei :)
(Curtin Bentley)

Cold Calling

I believe there are inherent interpersonal qualities that make up a sound pr practitioner.  In working at the Department for Communities a great deal of my work responsibilities involved communicating directly over the telephone. 

Cold calling is the process of approaching prospective customers or clients, typically via the telephone, who were not expecting such an interaction. The word "cold" is used because the person receiving the call is not expecting a call or has not specifically asked to be contacted.

I was assigned two relatively important tasks that included securing nominations for the WA Senior Awards and trying to secure nominations for 'One Sky, Many Paths', an Indigenous Youth Leadership Program.  

Regarding the senior awards nomination program, numerous days were spent adding numbers to a database that consisted of over 1600 senior community organisations.  It involved accessing the white pages, typing in the postcode and the address to find out the contact number and than copying the number into the database so the DfC had the information for next year. The same process was carried out for the Indigenous Youth leadership program.  This process in itself took up a considerable amount of time and was very monotonous. 

Following this, I than had to work on both programs at the same time, calling up a wide range of stakeholders from large organisations to Indigenous youth in remote communities, to seniors throughout the state of WA, trying to persuade people to nominate someone and subsequently fill out an application form and send it in.

This task was very repetitive, very long and required me to maintain my enthusiasm as well as trying to be as persuasive and polite as possible.  There were times where I would be speaking to someone from a remote Aboriginal community like Fitzroy crossing for example.  Trying to persuade a young Indigenous man about the skills and valuable experience the youth program would provide was relatively easy and he seemed very interested in getting one of his elder’s to nominate him for the program.  What I didn’t know straight away was that they did not have internet access and his community organisation did not have a fax machine. Whilst this presented a problem I was able to send the nomination kit to another Fitzroy organisation, where the young man was still able to retrieve the information.

At the end of these two tasks assigned to me, I had managed to gain a large number of application forms that were sent into the DfC for both programs.  Even though the time spent finding numbers and calling was not that enjoyable, I was able to improve upon my oral communication skills and my supervisor and other colleagues looked upon my progress very favorably.

If I could offer any advice it would be this: Always be willing to remain positive and proactive regardless of the task assigned to you in a pr environment.  If you are relatively shy or aren’t that confident talking to a diverse group of stakeholders, cold calling is a very effective way in improving upon these skills.  

Reflections

It has been a week since I have finished my work experience at the Department for Communities, and this will be my last post on this blog. I have chosen to only blog now as I wanted to be able to reflect on my time at the Department.

My last few weeks flew past in a blur- we had another intern join us for the same unit, so we worked together a lot. We went to an event called NAIDOC, in which the Department had a stall offering information and services to the public- and I learnt a lot about the setting up of a stall, and how to make it more appealing to the public, as well as drawing them in. NAIDOC is an Indigenous cultural festival held every year, so the target audience was also very different to engage with. I found that many stood back and just peered into the tent, seeming too afraid to come in and access the brochures we had available- as most were on depression, suicide, dealing with divorce and alcohol issues. The other intern and I then decided in order to distribute this sensitive information, we organised information bags with all the brochures in. However, resources could well be wasted in doing this- anyone have any ideas of how to do this differently in the future?

The rest of my time consisted on working on the “Living Histories” project, writing up stories for the intranet, and calling seniors featured in local newspapers about nominations for Seniors Week. I learnt a great deal whilst working with the Department, and am grateful for the experience! I hope everyone else has learnt as much as I have- this has defiantly reinforced the fact that this is what I would like to do for my career!!

LM

Ps: My media release I wrote in week one of my internship ended up being published in five newspapers, and once on radio! Not bad for a first go!

Lonely Jelly Bean

Well, what a huge week it has been for me! I don’t really know where to start…

On Monday, my supervisor was not in at work due to sickness, but she had sent me a lengthy email asking me to do a few tasks- including driving a company car to the Department of Sports and Recreation to drop off some books. I was so astounded- I had only been here for a week, and they trusted me with the company car? Not only that, but the Department of Sports and Recreation is actually where I work as my part time job!

On Wednesday I also joined the department for Children and Families, on their launch of “Support for Mums when Dad works away”. This event was held at Brooklyn House, Langford. I was speaking to some of my colleagues earlier in the week about how their job description always contains the words “and any other tasks”, and saw first hand at the event what these “tasks” could include~ we were cleaning, reorganising, preparing, weeding, removing dead trees and making fruit platters!

The event was very successful, we had aimed to create an event in which people from major companies such as BHP and Woodside could create contacts with organisations such as Ngala and Red Cross. There was a lot of card swapping occurring at the event, which was great! I also got to meet the Minister- who was there to launch the booklet, and key contacts from major companies and organisations. The West Australian was there, and I had the job of taking photos for internal uses (our website, intranet and possibly community papers.) I took some lovely shots of some of the babies who were around, and unfortunately due to privacy laws (even though everyone signed a photo release form) I can only include these in my final report, and not here on this blog.

I also carried on working on the Living Histories project. Two of my colleagues, who work on this project are actually going on leave from today; one for a week, the other for three weeks. They have left me in charge of the project! Yup! Flying solo on another project! It’s scary, but such a huge honour that they think that they can not only trust me, but consider me capable. I have grown to quite like these two colleagues of mine, as I have spent most of my internship with them, and as I will not be seeing one again during my internship- as he is only coming back when I have left- it is quite sad to say goodbye.

Update on my CAT bus trails: I had a meeting with the Director this week about the work I had done for the trails, to get approval to go ahead with the trails, and begin ringing places to get further details. Now the director’s office is plastered, literally plastered, with certificates and recognition for her work in public relations, so I was feeling a bit nervous about our meeting. However, when she saw my work she kept exclaiming that I had done such a great job, and how pleased she was with my work! What a compliment! Since that meeting I have been ringing around, getting special deals and offers for the seniors during the week- which is time consuming, but very rewarding when you get fantastic offers. All my hard work will be published in the October issue of Have a Go newsletter, and possibly community papers.

I am thoroughly enjoying my placement, and have received such encouragement from all my colleagues here. Not only have I been told that I am “worth every penny I am not getting paid for” and also asked if I can stay on to help (I kindly declined- I need the money for petrol etc when at uni!) One colleague has also shouted me coffees for all the work I have done for him over the past few weeks, and given me coffee vouchers to use in the last two weeks of my internship!

I hope everyone else is having as good a time as I am :)

LM

Red Shirted Independence

Today is Red Nose Day, and to mark the occasion the entire office wore something red! I have just finished my first week of work experience at the Department for Communities, and have already earned the honour of working on projects independently!

It began on Tuesday, where I was working on the second edition of the “Living Histories” project. This project is amazing- seniors from all over Western Australia sent in their stories and experiences of WA in the 1950s to the Department, to be edited and published in an electronic publication. Why is it in an electronic format and not book format? Well last year they had around 170 stories sent in which was produced in a 2.5kg book, however this year over 650 stories were sent in!! So as you can imagine, it would not have been feasible to create something so large for this year. My job was to check that all editing has been corrected, so to prevent disappointment from any seniors if their story was incorrect (spelling, grammar etc) once the publication was released.

I was the fourth person to check editing again (including professional editors that had been hired outside of the Department), and one other to check after me. After all this double checking you would think that this job would have been boring as the stories would have been 100% correct right?

Wrong. I found so much editing that had been made on the original versions, which had not been carried out onto the final versions- that my days (I took two full days on this task) were very busy. Some of the stories were so interesting- Western Australia sure seemed a very different place in the 1950s!!

This task was so interesting, as whilst at university I knew that a tactic we could use was to create a tribute book (I have even used this tactic for some of my assignments) However, when actually implementing this tactic, the amount of work is extraordinary!! I never expected so much time to be dedicated to this type of tactic. A team is specifically dedicated to this project. This project has been in operation for a year now, and it still has a long way to go.

I have also been working on my own little project independently. On Tuesday we had a stakeholders meeting, and they were mentioning a project that had been run in the past- CAT Trails. The stakeholders were very keen for the project to be run again, however in our team meeting which followed; it was ‘pushed out of the window’ so to say, due to lack of time allocated to the tactic. After I had finished my Living Histories editing, I approached my employer for more work. Seeming unsure of what to allocate me, I offered to take the CAT Trails under my wing- and have been in charge of it ever since. Today I finally completed the background research required- and on Monday we are organising a meeting with my employee’s boss to show her my work, and get approval for the tactic to go ahead! It’s so exciting working on my own little baby J

Remember to nominate a senior for the seniors awards, closing dates are nearing! (See last post- High Heels and Coffee) Application forms are downloadable on www.seniorscard.wa.gov.au

LM

High Heels and Coffee

I started my work experience at the Department for Communities today! It was a bit of an adventure using public transport – I haven’t used much public transport since high school! Not only that, but catching the train and cat bus in peak traffic was a different experience to say the least!

When I got off the cat bus, I got a bit worried because the buildings didn’t look the same as they did when I first went to the office to meet everyone four weeks ago (I was on the other side). However I was lucky enough to ask the right lady for directions as she was in the same department as me!

My morning consisted mainly of meeting those I hadn’t yet met, getting familiar with my surroundings (being given the grand tour) and the intranet. I came across an old bulletin on the intranet (they keep all old files in an archive) informing the office that they had began using Media Portal- and where to find the reports. So I went onto the database and found the reports, which was very interesting to see how the reports are delivered.

Then it was onto my first assignment.

I was given a list of names and numbers of the winners and runner-ups for the 2008 Seniors Awards, which I had to call. The aim of the call? It was not only a courteous call to see how they were going, but also to inform them about possible media calls that would occur later on this week. Given that they are seniors, they may find a stranger phoning up, asking about them winning their award a bit intimidating- so I was just informing them, and getting their permission to give their phone number to the media. They were all so lovely to chat to (and they did want to chat!) and excited about the media calling them up to get their story for the paper.

Then, another lady in the office who works with Children and Youth asked my assistance once I had finished with my phone calls. My task was to read a case study, and then summarise it for the Minister of Youth! It was a very interesting case study on Cyberbullying- and gave me an insight to what research is to be undertaken before a campaign can begin. From this I had to summarise strategies in order to reduce the incidence of cyberbulling.

Lastly, I worked on my first ever REAL media release which is going to be sent out in a few days. It was very exciting, and everything I learnt in PR Techniques 200 came flooding back to me! It was also very satisfying to send it off to my manager with a new angle (which is very hard when it comes to this media campaign) only to get it back hardly corrected at all! That is a good feeling! One major thing that surprised me about doing media releases in the real world... I actually have to make up the quotes that the Director General “says” and then it gets approved by her! I don’t actually get quotes from her to slot in.

Before I sign off: if you, the reader of my blog entry has a amazing grandma, or equivalent (over 60) who you think is eligible for the 2009 Seniors Awards, and you would like to nominate them, please do! It’s a fantastic opportunity to say thank you to those who do so much for the community. You can download application forms from the website: www.seniorscard.wa.gov.au Applications are due 31 July 2009

LM