1.       Working in confidentiality.
The firm, Flash Communications, is a PR Firm and a Modelling Agency. It is launching a new pageant style competition known and appreciated worldwide to Mauritius. This project, considering the fierce competition in this industry, had to be kept confidential.

This clause scared me as it was the first time that I was getting involved in something so serious.

The clause precisely mentioned that I was not supposed to let any information about this project go out of the firm and that in case of treason I was subject to be sanctioned under the law.
I trembled as I signed the agreement as this was a monster of a deal. The stress of keeping this a secret was terrifying as they were not kidding about it. The manager let me in, as they needed help on this project.

 It was more of a stress than a pleasure to work on that as my laptop could be easily hacked or information may get lost or misplaced which may be considered as treason. Working at the university made me vulnerable.
However, with time. I learnt to live with it and keeping it confidential became more of my cup of tea.

I started using code words and hidden language to process my information and communicate with the firm when I was surrounded by people.
This aspect of hiding things became fun and I was feeling part of a secret mission like in movies. This rose my interest level and I was happy to be part of it.
This confidentiality agreement which scared me made me fall in love with the very same project. This shows to what extent something challenging may enhance one’s performance, due to its uniqueness.
At the end of the day, this policy made my journey more interesting and worth while.

Size Matters: Small Firm Holds Both Sides of The Coin.

1.       Working in a small firm

Flash Communications, the firm, where I did my internship is a small company of communication and modelling agency. It started off as a modelling company which then diversified into a communication and events firm. At the management level, there are two people; the Manager and the Communication executive who employ a graphic designer, photographer and the models who work on a part-time basis. The structure of the company is still very inter-related as the communication department has just started operating. Hence, an office of only two full-time employees and an intern is of no doubt a simple and small company. The manager and the executive are the decision makers and hence, everything goes through them. As a matter of fact, all my work, after being processed, went through them. This aspect has both its positive and negative sides.

The good side of it is that there were less or next to no mistakes after counter checking. This made the work more precise and analysed. The decisions, hence, is taken by the managing partners and sent to the channel of distribution accordingly. This lessened the chance of an intern being accused of lack of focus or possible mishaps. The fact that they took liability for every tasks took me to a safe side of the road.

However, the same process slows down all transactions and created many situations of inefficiency as there was redundancy. The lack of efficiency caused delay in processing and as they say that too many chef spoil the broth, it would cause much controversy and conflicts. The disadvantage was, therefore, lack of effective managerial practice and lack of conflict management. Though the conflict would not last for long, the hierarchy dictates that the manager has the last word, there was not much space for effective discussion and openness to novelty.

Conclusively, the idea of working in a small firm can be sounding safe and well guided but does not empower the interns to take their own decisions freely.