First bump on the road...and not the last

ACCEPTING AND UNDERSTANDING FAILURE 

Good day everyone and welcome to my third post about my Perth Fashion Festival (PFF) journey. I think it's safe to say that we all dread the day we make a detrimental blunder at our work place. Rehashing the required tasks as an intern, my job was primarily to assist with sponsorship proposals prepared on Microsoft Power Point slides. As a non-profit organisation, PFF heavily relies on corporate sponsors to come on board to support the Festival. In order to get a strong foothold on this task, it is vital to understand the organisation's business drive as well as their goals and objectives. 

Each proposal needs to be tailored according to its respective corporate sponsor - both current and prospective. This task involves a mixture of public relations, marketing and even some journalism. "A sponsorship proposal needs to be tailored to each prospective company by using available information to define the synergies between the respective marketing synergy and the sponsorship offer" (Ferrand, Torrigiani, and Povill 2007, 98). In a hypothetical situation, if an organisation offers brand building and profile, we must understand the prospective client's target audience. As a Fashion based organisation, PFF has taught me that you have to learn the "corporate language". My supervisor made an interesting point where she mentioned that as a fashion community we have to play with the people in suits. This applies to every industry co-existing within the corporate community. 

Gauging my experience as a journalism student I have heard on multiple occasions on how the grass is always greener and more truthful on this side as opposed to the public relations side. As different as these disciplines may be, some fail to see how dependent they are on one another and a mixture of these skills help you handle tasks better. As a PR and Journalism student, being placed in the sponsorship and business development department was challenging and became more daunting as the internship progressed. At the same time, I liked the idea of being thrown into the deep end where it is really a sink or swim sort of situation. I realized there was a lot more that this job needed and I started teaching myself about marketing to keep up. 

Handling these proposals and working on the day after day proved an amazing learning opportunity. It was my first attempt at putting together corporate proposals and my supervisor was supportive and willing to teach me tricks of the trade. Another point I would like to stress on is the importance of listening. This extends beyond instructions where it also applies to listening to your surroundings. Working in a new environment like Perth helped me learn different ways of communicating and also be more outspoken about my opinions. 

Reverting back to the title of my post - the first bump on the road. The day came sooner than no later. As an intern, you are determined to do your best and impress your supervisor. We may face various kinds of pressure to do our best and at times, we get caught up in the ride. In a fast-paced environment like PFF, time is always of the essence and we have to keep up. Once, in my attempt to do so, I had more than three (3) Power Point slides open and I was cross-checking one with the other. My untimely rookie mistake was trying to do more than I could handle all at once, only to have it backfire. This mistake was brought up after the document was sent for approval and it failed to pass. It was a horrifying experience and unfortunately, this bump was not the first of its kind. 

Being unable to cope with the internship's requirements was pressurizing and also made me realize how unprepared I was to embark the real working environment. As an intern, you are essentially on a probation period with less pressure from the organisation and not having to worry about matters like key performance indicators (KPI's). Simultaneously, being a student about to graduate, ideally you would want to learn how to swim before the ship sinks. This journey has been a 'Titanic' in its own right and has taught me an invaluable lesson - Embrace failures in a graceful stride and move forward. Amy Anderson, an entrepreneur and contributor on Forbes Magazine quoted this, "If we aren’t making mistakes, then we likely aren’t trying enough new things outside our comfort zone, and that itself is a mistake" (Forbes, 2013).

Here are some useful websites for you fellow comrades out there:-
a) http://www.thegrindstone.com/2012/02/15/career-management/8-things-not-to-do-when-you-make-a-mistake-at-work-734/
b) http://www.forbes.com/sites/amyanderson/2013/04/17/good-employees-make-mistakes-great-leaders-allow-them-to/


Until the next post, this is Dhiva.

Keep your chins up and skin tough.

Dhivashini. T (Dhiva)
16106648 
Curtin, Bentley 


Reference
1. Alain, Ferrand,, Luiggino Torrigiani and Andreu Camps i Povill. 2007.Routledge Handbook of Sports Sponsorship: Successful Strategies. Oxon: UK. Routledge.
2. Anderson, Amy Rees. Forbes. 2013. "Good Employees Make Mistakes. Great Leaders Allow Them To". Accessed May 15, http://www.forbes.com/sites/amyanderson/2013/04/17/good-employees-make-mistakes-great-leaders-allow-them-to/