One area that I know my hard skills are lacking is in technology. I have never been a math or science person and for me any skills with IT or programming falls under that category. I have only had experience with anything super technical in an information systems class that I took at Pitt and have been kind of scared to try to learn anything new in that field since I know that I am not good at it. In my internship so far, I have had a lot of opportunities to learn about the technological side of marketing which is something that I avoided up until this point. When my supervisor asked me if I wanted to learn more about the back end of the website and other systems they used, I was really hesitant but didn’t want to say no to anything. The first assignment I was given is to edit some of the pages on the Impact Hub’s website by updating active links on the page. I worked closely with someone from the IT team to help teach me how to access the website and use different plugins to edit and I was surprised that I was understanding how to do it. Once I was comfortable using the system, I was able to finish the assignment over the course of a week without making any mistakes. Next week I will be starting on another assignment where I will be going through a few spreadsheets of the most recent data from research done and updating several parts of the website. Being able to learn about the more technical side of marketing is definitely something that I would not have done outside this program and I’m hoping that it makes me a more well-rounded candidate when applying for jobs after I graduate.
Along with the two assignments I was given to edit the website, I have a list of other tasks and projects that members of the consulting and marketing team have shared with me. At the start of my internship, certain people from each department reached out to me and gave me the task that they wanted help with and a deadline to have it done by. Some were in the first week, but there were several that were assigned to me that won’t be due until the end of the program and throughout July. I know from taking courses at Pitt that I have a tendency to procrastinate and wait until the last minute to start a paper or assignment that is due instead of working on it throughout the semester. I knew that doing the same thing during the internship would not make me a very good intern. Learning how to manage my time with all of the tasks that I have been given as well as events that I will be helping with and consulting projects, has been a really useful life skill that I have been developing.
To keep myself organized, I went through all the tasks that I had and put everything into my work’s google calendar and set reminders for myself to start working on something and to let me know when a deadline is coming up. I also often will have two things due on one day or an event happening that I need to help with, so having everything visualized in front of me helps be budget my time to make sure that I’m not late for anything or missing a deadline. Being well organized helps me manage my time better, and that is a skill that I can take into any job that I do in the future.