SurfAid - Final Blog Post

It is hard to believe that I have come to the end of my internship at SurfAid! Writing my placement report I have been overwhelmed by the amount of skills I have learnt during this time and how much I have developed professionally.

I have been extremely fortunate to have been provided with such a diverse range of tasks during my placement. Not only has this taught me above and beyond what I expected upon entering this placement, but has shown me further insight into areas that I would potentially like to work in. During my final weeks I was given greater responsibilities and helped work on tasks such as post event sponsorship reports that I really enjoyed and also learnt a lot from.

This internship has taught me that I LOVE working in events. Having some experience working in events management prior to the placement I knew that this was an area I wanted to explore further, however being involved in such a large scale event at SurfAid has proven to me that this is a career I want to pursue.

I feel that there is always something new to learn from every job, especially in PR and events, and that given a new internship I would probably walk in and learn a whole range of new skills and approaches. However, I feel that open completing this internship I now have the confidence to go into an entry level position knowing that I can rise to a challenge and apply the techniques and theory that I have learnt throughout my degree at Curtin University.

I would like to thank both my lecturers and the team at SurfAid for proving me with this opportunity that will hopefully leading the way to landing me my dream job in Sydney!

My final week.

Hi everyone,

So this is my last post for this semester. I hope all your internships has been treating you well and you have enjoyed this experience as much as I have.

I would just like to take this opportunity to do a little self-reflection. From the start of my internship till now I believe that I have improved on my writing and communication skills. These two skills are very important if you want to be a PR consultant. I know that he mistakes I have made during my internship will allow me to be a better consultant in the future. There is this saying, "No pain, no gain". Its through failure you lead to success.

I was given an opportunity to do an internship in Singapore and I definitely have made full use of it. I do enjoy working in the Singapore industry and someday I wish to come back home and practice public relations may it be as a consultant or as a lecturer. Public relations is said to be boring by some of my friends but I think you need to have a liking for it to appreciate it.

I do enjoy every bit of public relations and cannot wait to graduate and head into the PR workforce. All this positivity is because of the wonderful support from my colleagues at McGagh Communications and my lecturer, Shalu. Without these people, I probably would have suffered my internship and the PR Professional Practice unit.

I look forward to my last week at McGagh Communications not because I am leaving but because I am going to end of my final week with helping out with an event for a client. I am very excited about what is going to happen and how it is going to run. I really am eager to see the media interview take place and how my colleagues would be preparing the spokesperson. I will finally get to see how it is done in the "real world".

So the final week is going to be filled with mixed emotions. In one hand I will be happy because I will be able to help out with an event and network and meet new people. But on the other hand I will be sad because I'll be leaving McGagh Communications. Each and every colleague has left an imprint and I am very grateful for all their help and guidance. I hope to keep in contact with them as they are wonderful people.

With this, I end my final post and wish everyone all the best with their exams (if any) and a happy graduation for those who are completing their final semester.
Take care.

- Priya Suraindran
15403351
Curtin Singapore

Final thoughts on my time at Devahasdin

I am a bit late with posting my final blog post for my internship, I guess in a way I didn’t want it to end!

Throughout my internship I was involved in countless activities and projects for the many Devahasdin clients. In the beginning I was nervous and the thought of writing even a media release all on my own was daunting. Even though I had learnt the theory and certain practical aspects of what is required in such a document, I was still worried that it would not be good enough. I shouldn’t have worried though, everyone at the organisation was extremely helpful and understanding and most importantly, always took the time to explain why and how we would do certain things.

Some of the highlights of my internship include:

Mundaring Truffle Festival

The Mundaring Truffle Festival was held on the weekend of the 28^th and 29^th July and I was involved in many aspects of media relations. For example, ensuring media attendance, press and VIP passes, event preparation and many other small tasks required for such a large event. I also had to collect and value the large volume of media coverage the festival received leading up to the event. I really enjoyed working on this event, as I got to experience the enjoyable world of event co-ordination. Obviously the best part was going to the event and seeing all the hard work of the Devahasdin team going into such a wonderful and successful event.

Qatar Airways Perth route launch

I started my internship while the planning for major events surrounding this client were underway. As such, I had to learn all about what was happening, what events were planned and exactly what Devahasdin was doing for them very quickly. Being involved with such a major client was exciting and gave me an idea of the hard work and long hours are involved for the account manager (and others within the organisation). I saw major logistical issues resolved, ongoing communication between Perth and Doha (capital of Qatar) and perfectionism in all aspects of planned events. One of my tasks was to drive to DHL at Perth airport and collect items for the Qatar Airways media launch, where I was given a fluorescent vest and escorted through the busy storage area to where the items were. They weren’t what we were expecting. Of course I panicked and frantically said there must be more somewhere and called my supervisor. It turns out this wasn’t an issue and we had been given the wrong description of the items by the sender. They were the right ones after all. However, it really demonstrated to me that public relations requires clear communication at all times.

I’m very grateful to have been given the opportunity to do work experience at Devahasdin. I was also very lucky to have been offered a paid position at the organisation, where the director was happy for me to work around my uni schedule until I could work full time. It was very unfortunate that I was not able to continue with the job offer, due to the very high demands of my final semester. However, I do believe the experience has opened my eyes to the world of public relations and I cannot wait to start full time work in the industry!

Let's make it personal

Over the past couple of weeks I have been tackling a lot of different projects including helping organise kids for photo shoots for the 2013 PMH Foundation calendar, interviewing and writing up stories of kids at PMH for the Ambassador program, visiting some in hospital dressed as the Stitches the Bear, writing and changing the monthly media report template and finding stories to pitch to journalists who wanted to write articles about the Foundation. Through all of these different activities I have been amazed at how versatile our team has had to be in adapting and accommodating key stakeholders. Each person has a completely different background, relationship to the hospital and the Foundation, interests and experiences. The Foundation does a lot of qualitative and quantitative research on its key publics through online campaigns, database information, commissioned reports and media monitoring to keep updated with changing social trends, issues and behaviours. I have noticed that the key concept used to successfully engage key stakeholders is to customise all messages and make things as personal as possible. Two recent tactics PMH Foundation is thinking of adopting to achieve this are email testing and a proposed online newsletter.

Email Tests

As discussed in my last blog, I have learnt a lot at weekly team meetings. We recently talked about testing donor responses to ‘thank you’ letters and welcome packs by sending one letter to half our database and a different one to the other half to see which one gets a better response. I was interested to learn how tests such as these help organisations better understand their key publics and tailor their messages and activities to suit their supporters needs and interests.

Online Newsletter Proposal

Another proposed activity was the idea of creating an electronic newsletter for our donors that could be tailored to suit individual interests. For example there are some donors who participate in certain events every year and are only interested in this, others are keen to give specifically to something like research and others who just like supporting PMH through buying merchandise. There would be significant benefits in creating a newsletter that could customise, and essentially personalise, information to suit certain stakeholders. The concept would be to make sure people are targeted individually and not made to accept a ‘one size fits all’ template. This way donors and supporters are not hassled by things they are not interested in and maximum awareness is stressed about things that do interest them. I have recently been involved with research into different online services that help to facilitate this sort of online newsletter, a service I never knew existed. I was introduced to http://mailchimp.com/, one such service that impressed me so much that I wrote up a recommendation and proposal for its use by the Foundation.

It has been fantastic to see how even up until my last days working at the Princess Margaret Hospital Foundation I have continued to learn so much about the many functions and activities associated with public relations. Although a lot of the activities I have been involved in often cross over into marketing activities, I still strongly believe that each one helps build relationships and communication channels with key stakeholders and thus falls under the PR banner. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time at the Foundation and it has helped me better prepare for a life outside of university both professionally and personally. I would like to personally thank all the staff at PMH Foundation for having me and investing time into giving me such an amazing and beneficial experience. Thanks also for offering me a paid position! PMH Foundation is an awesome place to work and I love the added benefit of knowing I am helping sick children and the WA community. At this point I am proudly going to say non-profit is the best PR sector :)

The End is Nigh

My 20-day internship is soon coming to an end. With only one day left after two and a half months of interning, I thought I would use my last blog post as a reflection of what I've learnt. I've worked on four major events, and a couple of small-scale events. One of the most interesting aspects of the internship was the research component. I really enjoyed researching the different topics that I wasn't familiar with before.
As my internship progressed, I noticed how different PR is at Uni and how different it is at 'work'. This was slightly relieving and slightly annoying. So much of what I have learnt at Uni is relevant to the professional practicing world but the aspect of Social Media has not been taught extensively, I realise this might be because it doesn't need to be.. Young adults already have the knowledge and drive to use Social Media professionally. But this might not be the case for mature students.
Writing in the professional world is also slightly different, for example the media release is taught as short, concise and a succinct piece of writing but this is not how I was taught to write in my work placement. I was told to write a story... develop an idea.. and provide a solution to an existing problem.
Overall, my internship was very insightful and I realised how much it makes a difference if you are learning and growing in a comfortable environment with lovely, talented and fun team members!
Even though events is an area that I am not looking to work in, this was a great experience and I look forward the windows of opportunity that await me!

Thanks for reading!
- Sarah Awan, Bentley Campus

Final Blog Post on KAB Internship

Hi everyone,

How is everyone going with the placements and placement reports? It is amazing how fast time flies when we are having fun with our placements and university life! I have thoroughly enjoyed my placement and this shall be my final blog post for my internship with the Keep Australia Beautiful Council WA.

Just a summary of the placement with the KAB, I was in charge of an agency project named "Communicating with ESL Communities in Western Australia" and after intensive desktop research and interviews with stakeholders, wrote up a 76 page report consisting of important information on the major ESL groups, statistics as well as recommendations for the KAB to implement in order to reach out to these groups and effectively target litter-free messages to them which you can see on this link http://pr393reflectiveblog2.blogspot.com.au/2012/04/communicating-with-esl-communities-in.html .

I was also involved in two projects by the KAB which were the Kwinana Freeway Clean Up with Main Roads WA as well as the project at the Perth 2011 World Sailing Championships. To read more about my experiences during these two projects, please click on this link for the Clean Up project http://pr393reflectiveblog2.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/kwinana-freeway-cleanup.html as well as this link http://pr393reflectiveblog2.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/kab-volunteer-at-perth-2011-sailing.html for my involvement at the sailing championships.

Apart from that, I carried out minor office tasks such as cleaning up and putting away the tools used for the Kwinana Freeway Clean Up as well as tidied the cabinet for the KAB which consisted of caps, vests and pick up tools. I was also given the task to prepare the necessary tools requested by members of the community that were registered with the KAB for clean up purposes at their neighbourhoods and preferred places that consisted of a set of pick up tools, a KAB diary and wrapped them with brown paper before sending them off. I was in charge of calling up KAB volunteers that were registered in the KAB database to check whether they were still interested in taking part in projects organised by the KAB and sent them emails that linked them to the Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) website featuring the most recent volunteering opportunities as at that point of time there were no projects by the KAB. Another task was to update the contact details for Clean Marine project by calling the (DEC) employees or by checking for their details on the DEC employee database.

I've learnt a couple of things during the internship with the KAB :

1) Communication skills
- Excellent communications skills, both written and oral, are vital in workforce, especially in the public relations field. It is mindful to have professional writing skills, research and interviewing skills in order to perform well in the public relations field. So hone up those skills PR peers!

2) Reaching out to stakeholders
- I have realised just how difficult it is for government departments to establish relationships with their stakeholders, and in KAB's case- the Western Australian community coming from all walks of life and are different in every way and to engage their awareness and action in taking part in environmental projects and in changing littering habits that may be acceptable in their home countries but not in Western Australia. It is therefore very important to have a goal and identify the stakeholders that the government departments would like to focus on and to implement a well planned strategy.

3) Deadlines and good time management
- It is vital to follow strict deadlines in the government department as there are many procedures that has to be taken before the approval of reports and it is best to practice good time management to avoid delays. Good time management also demonstrates to employers the ability to multitask and perform well on the job without having to worry about the progress of tasks given.

4) Empathy and understanding
-After carrying out consultations with stakeholders from war-torn backgrounds, it is difficult not to have that sinking feeling felt for the experiences by the unfortunate ESL communities. It is crucial that all Australians play a role in making these people feel welcome in the society and feel safe in this country. They should also be given ample moral support to adapt to their new lives here in Australia.

5) Littering and Environmental Issues
-Western Australians need to be aware of, and practice good environmental practices by totally refraining from littering because litter from only one person may seem insignificant, but it does accumulate when littering is carried out by a large number of people and it is very expensive for the governments every year to clean up the environment caused by ignorant and selfish litterers.


Lastly, thank you for reading my blog post and do check out the Keep Australia Beautiful Council WA's website at http://www.kabc.wa.gov.au to find out more about their efforts in the fight against litter in Western Australia and do take part as volunteers in their exciting projects! All the best for the remaining days for your internships and have a wonderful semester.

Debra Tan
14626063
Curtin Bentley