This week marks the beginning of my second week as an intern, and my third week in Dublin overall. So far, my time in Dublin has been incredibly enjoyable, and I’m looking forward to what comes next. I’ve been dedicating a lot of time to exploring the city and its numerous attractions, while also taking the opportunity to go to other parts of Ireland. Last week, some friends and I attended a football match between Ireland and Hungary at the Aviva Stadium. Ireland won with a score of 2 to 1, and the experience was unforgettable. This past weekend, a group of us decided to spend two days in Galway. On Saturday, we explored the town, visited various shops, and enjoyed a delicious dinner. It was my first time staying in a hostel, and it surprisingly exceeded my low expectations. On Sunday, we made the journey to the Cliffs of Moher. Despite the lengthy trip, it was definitely worth it. The cliffs were breathtaking, and the surrounding nature was unlike anything I had ever seen. Even though it was extremely windy, the cliffs were clearly visible, allowing us to take some photos, which I have displayed as my featured image. After our visit, we took a journey back involving a bus, a train, and another bus. Despite the rough return trip, the entire experience was absolutely worth it and everything surprisingly went our way.

As for my internship, the first week went quite smoothly. Everyone was very nice when first meeting them and they were all super helpful. I met the entire finance team, and even joined in on one of their meetings to see what their duties were and how they accomplished them. Even though it was quite nerve-wrecking, I started to grow more comfortable and eased into everything. My boss gave me a brief introduction of the company and what I will be doing these next seven weeks, along with a tour of the workplace. I then started out with getting settled with my new computer and email, and signing into their systems and databases. My position mainly deals with the grants and research aspect of finance for the company, and we use a system called Agresso that stores all of the grant numbers and their information. The first few days, they had me doing simple tasks that helped me learn how the system works and where to locate everything. I was also using the excel skills that I learned in my Pitt classes to plug all of the grant information into different excel sheets. Once I got used to the database and how everything worked, they gave me more hands-on tasks that were more challenging. I was nervous to do the more important tasks because I didn’t want to mess up, but everyone was so helpful and eager to answer any questions.

There was no specific time limit to my tasks or a schedule to be followed, so time management hasn’t been much of an issue yet. However, my boss and their coworkers were working on a project that was due in a couple days, and they told me all about how they deal with a time limiting project such as theirs and what their plan is. They taught me a lot about how to time manage and stay on track with the project. A few of their methods included using a calendar that mapped out all of their duties to be completed in a certain amount of time, or meeting up with coworkers every few days to make sure everyone is on track and doing what is required. I have had to deal with time management issues in the past when it came to multiple exams or finishing a project, so I know I will be more prepared when I am eventually given a task that needs to be finished at a certain date. My own time management skills include a planner that marks every important exam or project that needs to be completed, and I make a schedule that helps me spread out the amount of work I have to do in order to finish each one diligently. Overall, this internship has been a positive experience and I look forward to getting as much out of it as I can. I am enjoying the work that I am doing so far, and I know that it will improve my time management skills and prepare me for any other future internship or job that I may have.