A Day in the Life of a Work Experience Student

Hi Everyone!

Things have been ticking along very nicely and I have really enjoyed the placement experience to date. As of this Thursday, I will be finishing my placement at one of Clarity’s clients, Barking Gecko. I’m really excited to finish off there as it will give me the chance to see the client side of the consultancy relationship, as well as it being a wonderful organisation that gives so much to the community.

So far I have worked 14 days in total, the nerves have faded and I’m feeling more at ease with how I’m performing. The graph (below) that Katharina drew during our second 393 seminar of how students feel over the 20-day placement experience has certainly rung true with me! The red circle is where I am currently (and feeling good!). Did anyone else feel the same way?

I was having a look at our textbook the other day and I was reading a number of the individual Q&As and typical working week bios of current PR professionals. It got me thinking about my next blog topic and I thought, why not delve into a day in the life of a work experience student. And hence today’s blog topic. So here we go. A day in the life of a work experience student at Clarity Communications…

8:30am – Day Starts

8:40am – Morning Huddle
This is a chance for the PR team to get together every morning to discuss the work involved for the day, individually and as a team. Ideas are thrown about relating to existing projects and input is encouraged on all fronts of discussion. Having a team discussion widens the scope of ideas generated through the varying degrees of experience and knowledge of the personnel. What a great way to start the day!

When it comes to my turn, I mention that I have a Mediaportal report to work on for a mining client but would love more work throughout the day. A couple of jobs pop up so I look set for the morning.

9:00am – Media List Update
One of the girls would like me to call a number of resource reporters/journalists to update their contact details as a number of media releases sent the afternoon prior bounced back. These are also reporters/journalists we need to keep on the Clarity system for regular distribution of media releases pertaining to ASX announcements of mining clients.

9:30am – Mediaportal Report
This exercise has been a fascinating experience and one of my favourite tasks at Clarity. Whilst it may seem uninteresting to some, learning about the mining industry up north proved to be an exciting read.

Basically, Clarity receives media coverage on a number of local mining companies and specific client projects on a daily basis. Coverage comes in the form of print, radio, Web and TV. My job is to read through each article and highlight the relevant company name/s mentioned. I then choose from a list of 12 key topics (topics such as investor news, community projects, environment, community consultation, government relations etc) to which I feel the article relates. Finally, I indicate whether the coverage is positive, negative or neutral. These details are then compiled to build a report based on the type of coverage received using graphs and tables to display the information. This report is compiled at the end of each month and a copy forwarded to the client.

12:00pm – 40under40 Event
40under40 is an annual event aimed at celebrating the achievements of 40 WA business men and women under 40 years of age. Clarity founder Anthony Hasluck was one of the 40 winners recognised in 2003 for his contribution to the field of PR.

WA Business News is behind 40under40. Nominations for the event have just opened and it is Clarity’s job to get as much coverage as possible, which has been an interesting experience. The major state newspapers who would provide excellent coverage are in direct competition with WA Business News. But with all newspapers, it’s just a matter of trying and using angles that might persuade some editors.

I am given the task of sending out media releases to a number of community newspapers. I get a few positive responses, and one even asks me to send him a photo of last year’s winner as he knows a photo will get a lot more attention than plain text.

The big aim is to get Matt Zis, Editor of Community Newspaper Group in on the story as there are 20 individual newspapers under the Community Newspaper Group banner, all distributed to different areas across metropolitan Perth. This would provide great coverage across a major area of the state with the potential for a greater cross-section of nominees. Unfortunately we get an email back the next morning suggesting that using supporting partners, or paid advertising, would be best fit for publicity in the lead-up to the event. This sort of result is often expected from the bigger newspapers, however they are likely to run coverage on the topic post-event when winners have been named and are relevant to the area. Alas, we tried!

1:00pm – Lunch
Yum!

2:00pm – Community Consultations - Mining Client Project Developments
I was asked to contact a list of regional residents to invite them to the next community consultation held by one of Clarity’s mining clients. The consultation related to developments on one of the client’s projects. I was a little apprehensive of the responses I was to receive, however these residents responded very positively to the invitation. For those I could not make contact with, we had a list of their email addresses. So I suggested we follow up with an email to everyone on the list so that those who’d received a phone call would be reminded again, and those who I was unable to make contact with would at least receive an email.

3:00pm – Email to Regional Residents about Community Consultations
Following on from the previous task, I was asked to draft up the email to the residents on the list, on behalf of our client. I made it short and sweet as the flyer we were attaching said it all. I handed it in for proofing, it was given the okay as it was so it was sent direct to the client for approval and for them to then forward on.

3:30pm – Final Preparations for Community Consultations
As part of the final preparations for the community consultations, the design team had put together a lovely looking foldout brochure with DVD attached for those who would attend the consultation. Together with another employee, I had the task of putting the DVDs inside the brochure and boxing them up ready for the journey up north.

4:00pm – Mediaportal Report
I finished the day by again trawling through the Mediaportal report. Yes, they are big!

5:30pm – Day Ends

So that’s a typical day at Clarity. And it’s certainly not boring!

Hope everyone continues to take with them a whole bunch of exciting new discoveries about the industry and themselves.

And it’s on to another day in the life of a work experience student…

Claire