There is was, waiting anxiously in the HR Department for the officer to lead me to my boss, and it hit me, "this is probably how I would feel like, again, when I start my first job after I graduate." The person that I met, I call him the "HR guy", was friendly, smiley, nice and approachable, best part was that he speaks my dialect, which makes communication much, much easier. He gave me a pamphlet of working values needed to be a staff at Miri Marriott Resort and Spa (MMRS) and my very own trainee tag. The last time i actually wore a tag with pins on it was in secondary school, form 3, and that was like 9 years ago. Goodness, how time flies and things have changed so much.
HR guy brought me on tour of the whole vicinity including the restaurants, shops, gym, offices and the hot shoppe - where all staffs have their meal during lunch breaks. Oh! And lunch is provided. Awesome.
I finally settled in my boss's office and he stationed me at the table just opposite him. My boss's name is Mr Lian Pasan by the way, and I met the whole Sales and Marketing team, also the PR team. Miss Amanda was the one who brought me to the hot shoppe to have lunch with her for the first time. Basically my first day was an introduction to everything there is in the office. Printers, the password, the resort's regulations and what is in stored for me to do in the next few weeks i'm here.
The following days went on with new jobs directed to me. I was told to do media monitoring (oh shocker!) and pretty much newspapers were my best friend after that. They did not have an extra PC for me so they advice me to bring my own laptop, which i did. At first i was only told to read and identify news article related to MMRS but after a three days, they asked me to actually do media clippings. Well, that is something that we learnt in PR(Media)250 not wasted. It was actually applied in this job. I had no problem doing that because, come one lets face it, that's the easiest thing to do, true? I also had to monitor any articles or advertisements by the competitors around Miri. Advertisement was a little twisted, considering they have the same advertisement running for a month. What i did was i just took them out, but before pasting anything on the ready made template for media clippings, i chose only one out of the similar ones.
First week was pretty much media clippings, and reading MMRS staff regulations and the history of the hotel chain. It was interesting to me because Marriott hotel chain has their own certification for PR practitioners. I studied the Marriott bible (that's what i call it, it was THICK!) but a week after, my boss told me the exam can only be taken by staff and not interns. I didn't regret reading it, but it could have been an extra addition to my resume if i had the certificate.
Updates will be up again soon!
A PR Practitioner to be,
Mea Misnu
Curtin University Sarawak Campus
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