My personal values: Artistic, Investigative, Enterprising, Creativity, Communication
Occupation #1: Film and Video Editor
What is interesting:
I think it would be fun to edit movies/tv shows. I like to watch films and one of my favourite hobby is photography and editing. I catch myself analyzing films and tv shows and how well things are done or what I would do differently to improve it. I also enjoy music and sound editing which is very crucial in film creation.
Occupation #2: Sustainability specialists
What is interesting:
I care about the environment and appreciate the environment so if I could make a big impact on it, that would be something I would be interested in. I would like to work with companies and small businesses and their use of plastic waste. I could give suggestions on how to reduce their carbon footprint as well as spread awareness to the public about sustainability.
Occupation #3: Wedding Event Planner
What is interesting:
I enjoy organizing events and seeing everything come together. I love working with people, especially for happy occasions such as weddings. This career would align with my creativity and communication values. Weddings take a lot of time and dedication to come together and I would love to have the opportunity to make a career out of it.
I have developed a variety of skills from my internship at Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories (SEL). My internship is in the marketing and communications department, and I work in the website team.
I have developed planning and organizational skills in my internship. For example, I helped contribute goals for the organization by helping contribute ideas in revising the company’s mission statement. I also learned how to prioritize and delegate tasks because I was given 5-6 tasks per day of updates and edits to the website. How I completed this was by looking at the due dates and organizing the priorities of these tasks. From there I would do the most important updates first and then go through which due date was closest. Lastly, I also have skills in conducting meetings because I would host weekly meetings as an intern leader for new interns across the company via zoom.
I have developed interpersonal/teamwork and teambuilding skills as well. For example, with the website rebranding, my coworkers and I were working toward a common goal of meeting deadlines for each part of the website and preparing presentations to present to the executive board. I understood my strengths and weaknesses as well as my coworkers’ which was helpful when delegating different tasks.
With research and investigation skills, this is the category that I feel was most impactful. When I started my internship, I did not quite know what I was getting into. It turned out that I had to research and learn about coding. I took a 500-hour course on my own in order to get up to speed with my team. I also continue to research other companies websites and how they organize their sites. I also had a book on coding and website building that I would often refer to when given new edits and tasks to do. I found this helpful because I was able to figure skills out on my own instead of relying on my co-workers to teach me.
For critical thinking, problem-solving, and conflict resolution skills, I was able to implement sound decisions during our group peer-review meetings. I learned that even if your ideas during peer review are not taken, just having a conversation helps the website designers. It helps when there are multiple points of view because our audience has a variety of views as well. This also relates to the skill of explaining unpopular decisions to others which is a skill I now have.
My verbal and written communication skills have improved as well. Each week we had multiple different meetings where I was expected to contribute. At the beginning of my internship, this was intimidating, but with each week and more practice, I was able to explain ideas concisely and clearly. I believe I have the skill of debating issues without being perceived as abrasive to others effectively. I remember talking with my advisor to make sure he also believed I had this skill, and he said I did indeed.
Lastly, I have decision-making and leadership skills because of this internship. I was able to recognize and communicate if there were any issues with a webpage, define the problem, and demonstrate how the problem can be fixed. I also developed multitasking very well and was capable of handling more than one problem at a time because of my organizational skills, and taking on new tasks because of my leadership skills.
Overall, the internship at SEL whose values such as communication, quality, and creativity align with my personal values. It is important for me to find people and work that align with my personal values so that I am passionate and relate to them.
Grace Allenstein 