The Royal Show

My day 15 was during The Royal Show week. I get the chance to be part of the WAEC team and help at a booth (stall) that the WAEC had organised. The booth was located at Silver Jubilee Pavilion, booth 324, where it was next to one of the exits.

The purpose of the stall was to get as many people to either enrol to vote or just check whether they are already enrolled and make sure their details are up to date. To check people's details, we had a laptop contained a snapshot of the roll and a 'simple to use' look up system.

The one shift at the Royal Show was to approach as many people as you can. We approached them when they were close to our stand or coming close. The most important thing of approaching people was 'DON'T BE SHY!'

At the beginning of the day, it was very quiet as there were not many people coming inside. We discussed that it might be because it was Tuesday and its after the public holiday and also the weather was not looking too good. But during the heavy rain, we managed to get more people and that actually was our highest peak for the morning shift. During the shift there were one or two people that came to us because they wanted some merchandise but we encouraged them to check their enrolment as well.

To try and get people interested, the WAEC had prizes. We gave out entry forms for a prize when they either confirmed their enrolment via the look up tool on our laptop or filled in an enrolment form. The prizes were a daily prize of a $50 IGA gift card and a grand prize of an iPad Air 2 32GB Wi-Fi.

Working at the Royal Show was a great experience because I got to see all different kinds of people. I was surprised that not everyone was interested to win prizes and they all thought that checking their enrolment was not important and assumed they had already voted, which meant they are enrolled to vote. Also some people didn't even know that there is a state election coming up in March 2017.

I enjoyed working with my intern colleague, Ed, and another WAEC staff, Katherine, who is the senior enrolment officer. I think we did a great job in approaching people.

Although, this kind of job doesn't really link too much with PR, it is still a very good experience in seeing all different kinds of people and using our own techniques to approach people.

I am glad that I found my internship at the WAEC, as it is fun working there and I can get a lot of experience in all different areas! 

Enrol Now!

The WAEC Booth

Merchandise

Getting out of the Office! Meeting Time!

Day 13 of my internship at the WAEC. After all the research and writing up a proposal, we finally got the chance to be involved in a meeting!

Today’s meeting was with Murdoch University, we met the Senior Executive Director, Steven Dickson and some head of departments. We were there to discuss about early voting on campus.

The meeting went on for 45 minutes, the topics we discussed include;

•          Are they interested in the project?
•          Day(s) (3 days, 1^st -3^rd March 2017)
•         Time
•    WAEC marquee is 8am – 6pm
•    Main peak hours on campus are 10am – 2pm
•          Location (Bush Court)
•          Key issues
•    Parking ( from 4.30pm onward parking is free for the general public)
•    Security (Campus has 24/7 security)
•    Promotional materials cannot be distributed outside the Marquee area (from candidates).
•   Communication Channels (Social Media)
•   How many students are there?
•    900 teachers, 3000 parking bays, 1000 others = 5000 students/staffs on campus during the 3 days

At the meeting, we first introduced ourselves as interns and the main spokesperson for the WAEC was Justin, supervisor of the early voting on campus project. As interns, we were just sitting the side listening, but during the middle of the meeting, when they talked about communication, Ed had a chance to speak out, and he talked about the communication channels and how this is promoted out.

This meeting was a great chance to see how a meeting works although it was quite informal and was just like a chat.

This meeting helped me gain experience on how to communicate with people in a meeting, and what things we should consider. The most important thing is to be prepared and know what you need to say.

By listening to Justin speak, I have gained knowledge on how to host a meeting with clients which will help me in the future.

I have found the presentations we have done in other units (Cross-Cultural Communications, Media Relations, etc.) to be very useful because it helps with speaking and passing on messages in front of people.

This is the first time I have been in a meeting and representing an organisation. I was nervous to speak and was a bit shy. The things I want to improve after the first meeting is to not to be shy and afraid to speak out. My goal for my next meeting is to speak out!

I can’t believe after all my research and calling people, we actually got to go and join the meeting. It was a great experience!

I love working at the WAEC, and am starting to worry about this internship coming to an end! 

The End (for now)

I've finished my 20 days at the WAEC and it's definitely been a journey. Our last week was still filled with some interesting experiences and conversations.. as well as very sad goodbye to our supervisor Sotear (who is also leaving the WAEC).

This week consisted mainly on filming for our social media content. On Tuesday we went to Curtin University for a few hours and attempted to record some vox pops with students about voting and our new mascot/character (currently named: Vincent the Voting Screen). While we were only able to interview 5 people (due to our shyness and some of the locations we attempted not being very busy), we got some great footage and content that we can definitely use in the final product!

Thursday's filming was less successful as there wasn't many young people in the city area (and TAFE wasn't the best location to film in because of the way the campus is set up). It wasnt the best feeling to come back empty handed but to make up for it we will be trying to film at a couple of universities next Tuesday instead. After viewing Tuesday's footage we worked out what we can improve on to help our success rate and will implement this on our next filming trip.

We were also asked to view the final version of the training videos that Ed and Winnie had been involved in earlier in our internship experience. It was great to see the finished product and we all had a laugh when Ed or Winnie appeared on the screen. Again, our feedback was wanted and appreciated.. an aspect of the internship I really enjoyed.

Our last day with Sotear was a somewhat emotional one. We had a debrief meeting over coffee where she thanked us for all the work we've done over the past 20 days and gave us praise for completing some major projects that would've taken much longer to complete without our help. We were also asked about our feedback of the internship in terms of what we enjoyed and didnt enjoy and there was definitely more pros than cons. It really was a great experience.

While the 20 days are done, we have all said we're willing to come back and help at any time with further involvement in our projects. The 20 days has also helped me to see a side of PR I could definitely be interested. Social media management and creation wasn't something I ever saw myself doing and yet here I am after 20 days wanting to do more!

This is goodbye, for now. For people who are still completing their internships, enjoy it and work hard as it'll be finished before you even realise.

Isabella Olivera (17742580)

Group photo with our supervisor Sotear (next to Ed) and Jodie who is currently in HR

Receptionist Pina says goodbye to her children! We will miss you too

A surprise thank you gift on our desk from Sotear. Yummy!!

All good things must come to an end

As I am writing this post I have just finished my second last week at the WAEC (it really went flying by didn't it?!). While it is sad that my internship is almost over, it definitely hasn't been all doom and gloom.

Some exciting things have happened and are happening at the WAEC! Firstly, I worked at my first proper event, helping out with the WAEC's enrolment drive at the Royal Show last week. I was given the task of helping to confirm enrolments of those who were interested in our booth, the freebies and our competition (involving an IGA gift card & and iPad Air 2!). All interns were given a WAEC polo top to wear on the day (and to keep) and it definitely helped me to feel even more a part of the team. A great experience I'll remember!

Secondly, the fellow interns and myself have been given the fun task of creating some social media content to link into the new advertising campaign and the other social media posts that have been created. We will be at Curtin University next Tuesday to do some Vox Pops with students, asking them to name the new election mascot/character and a few questions about elections and voting. We'll be in our WAEC polo tops so if you see us around, definitely say hi and get involved (we may have some freebies to give away too)..

After almost 20 days at the WAEC, I feel very proud of myself and what I've accomplished. I began the 20 days with the big task of improving our social media channels and have successfully created some images that will hopefully be used during the election timeline from enrolment to polling day. I definitely wouldn't have been able to do this alone and would like to thank my fellow interns for their great ideas and constructive criticism.

Now to make the final week count! See you in my final blog post!

Until next time,
Isabella Olivera (17742580)

WAEC @ the Perth Royal show 2016 - Photo Credit: WAElections Facebook

Just one of the social media posts I've made for our election timeline! This one is a reminder for early voting

A Peak of the Annual Report!

Every September the WAEC finalise their Annual report. Along with Ed and Isabella we were given the draft of the 2015-2016 Annual report for the WAEC. The Commissioner, David wanted us to go through the report and give suggestions on what they can improve and any recommendations we had. As interns they wanted us to view it with critical eyes and have some input into it.

We looked through the report and compared it with the latest published report (2014-2015). Things we picked out/ suggested were;

·         The formatting could improve

·         Use of pictures

·         Use of empty spaces

·         Should make it more engaging (visual engaging)

·         Change some basic dot points to ticks

·         The idea of change the bullet points to the style of a ballot paper (numbers in boxes, 1-5)

·         Photoshop pictures (more nicely not too obvious

·         Use of graphs and tables

·         Colours (the draft version was in black and white)

David and Lena (Executive Assistant) loved the ballot paper format suggestion and thought it was a great idea.

Besides adding our comments to the Annual report for 2015-2016, we also finished calling all the universities that we needed to call, and gave them more information about our proposal. This was the first time I’d sent an email to an official person, as before all the emails I’d sent were only to tutors/lectures or ones applying for internships.

It was a great opportunity to look at the WAEC annual report. I enjoyed putting forward my thoughts and I hope they are used. Calling universities is a great chance to build up my PR skills and on how to communicate well with different people. This internship is helping me built up my PR experiences a lot!

Here is a link to the WAEC annual report 2015-16: https://www.elections.wa.gov.au/sites/default/files/Annual_Report_2015.pdf 

Hello...I'm Winnie from WA Electoral Commission...

Day 7 at the WAEC, my task was to contact universities' Vice Chancellor, assistant.

The first thing before calling them was to write up a script. This is very important as I need to know what I am going to say. Also I have to prepare what kind of things I might get asked.

The first uni I called was Curtin. Making phone calls for the first time in the office where I'm representing a organisation was SUPER nerve-racking. I was so scared to press the numbers, so I got my intern friend, Isabella to help me dial the numbers! Sounds silly right?

Hopefully the call to Curtin's Vice Chancellor's assistant wasn't too bad! The lady, Allison picked up the call and she was super nice. I followed my script and asked her whether the university was interested in our project or not. Allison sounded interested in the project and told me to send a proposal to her so she can discuss it with the Vice Chancellor.

After making more phone calls to other universities, I worked on the proposal which helped me to answer questions from other universities.

When the proposal was put together. I went to the supervisor that was in charge of this project to check the proposal before sending and getting it finalise. We discussed what we needed to consider and what the universities would think, (i.e would they go for it?).

The outcome of this day is that calling people isn't that scary! Today I heard the best suggestion about how to overcome my nerves, think that the person on the other end of the phone is just as nervous that the phone is ringing and they are the one who has to answer it.   

Another outcome or experience I gained from Day 7 is that I now know how to write an official proposal, that needs to be sent to official people and what kind of things I should consider.

I love working in WAEC as it helps me gain more and more experience and knowledge in all different areas, not only PR! 

Script 

Ready to call!

Proposal for the project

Contributing to the Annual Report!

Contributing to the Annual Report!

In September of each year, the WAEC finalise their Annual Report for the previous financial year. This year I was lucky enough to contribute to the decision making behind the 2015-16 edition.

Our staff Executive Assistant gave us a copy of the draft report, along with the 2014-15 edition, and told us to view it with a critical eye. I was a little surprised that they wanted our input on the report, but it felt like I was a valued member of staff, even as an intern.

Along with my two fellow interns, we analysed the draft report and compared it with the 2014-15 edition. Having three different sets of eyes looking at the same document was great because each person has a different way of looking at things.

Our feedback generally focussed around content layout and how it could be more engaging. We noticed that the 2014-15 report used a lot of graphs and tables, something that we felt the new draft report lacked. Content delivered solely via text is not engaging for any audience, especially when it is in a vast quantity. The use of graphic formatting to display statistics and figures would break up the report nicely, and allow the reader a chance to see the content in a different way.

We found the overall use of empty space could be improved. Although an Annual Report must be packed with content, you can’t underestimate the use of empty space. In this regards, the picture sized could be made a little smaller, and the Photoshop editing could be used a little more discretely!

As this was a draft report, it was still in black and white. I presume that when in full colour (yellow, blue and white), that the final product will be more engaging on the eye, as was the case with the 2014-15 report.

Part of our role was to contribute any creative suggestions to the report design. In this regard we came up with an idea to change one of the box designs to have a number in them, as opposed to ticks (I.e. number the boxes 1-5). This in a way emulates a ballot paper, and the staff members who we shared the idea with absolutely loved it.

The next day in the office, Winnie and I walked past the Commissioner in the corridor who stopped us to tell us that he really loved our suggestions for the report and that they would definitely be taking them on board. This made me feel appreciated and it was great to see that a person as busy as the Commissioner has time to express how he feels to an intern.

Overall, it was a great experience to be trusted to make some recommendations regarding the 2015-16 Annual report. I’m glad our ideas were taken well and I look forward to seeing examples of my inputs in the final copy which will be available online in December 2016.

Last year's annual report - used to base our recommendations on
2015-2016 edition won't be uploaded until Dec 2016

I'm in a Video!

Day 6 of my internship at WAEC, Me and the other intern, Ed went on an excursion to the retirement home complex in Woodlands. We were there to help with filming a video (actually being part of the video, the ones being filmed), demonstrating how  the voting process works and also taking shots for updating the previous video. The use of the video is basically for employees and staffs as it shows how the whole process of setting up the venue, equipment and how the day will run, also the basic knowledge on how the day will be, for example the video includes on how the ballot paper would be given and how you should explain and give instructions on how the ballot paper should be filled plus after filled where should they put it. This video would help understand the steps that would happen when someone comes to vote at a polling place.

To make the video more realistic, we invited the residents of the home to participate in our video, also in the video it can't only be one age group (seniors), so me and Ed and few other staffs were also recorded casting our votes but it was not only for one time but for numerous occasions. Each time we were given a different identity to vote.  

After this excursion I found that WAEC would not only focus on one age group although our project is mainly targeting towards Youth groups, but WAEC would also consider the elder, for example they have used the elder group to help with our video.

This process of the video gave me a chance to look at the other side of the election which is the behind the scenes. I can clearly see that the staffs need to put in a lot of effort into setting up the polling place and making it go smoothly as there should be no mistakes and everything needs to follow the instructions given which is the video that we are involved in.

I found that PR is very wide and when events are involved, it is just the matter of planning, consideration and professional execution. I enjoyed being part of WAEC and a part of the video. It was a great experience. The video is not only to teach staffs on how things operate on an election day, but it gave me a great experience on the things I have never thought of, and it also made me understand all the behind the scenes which includes the planning and running the event and how it actually works.

Benchmarking and Recommendations: A real world perspective

My project is all about improving the WAEC's website & social media and in order to do that, the topics of benchmarking and recommendations are heavily involved.

Firstly, the WAEC aims to make their website more user-friendly and easier to navigate. My task was to go through the website, the content and how it was all organised.

As a student who has had to visit the WAEC website to find information for assignments, I had an understanding of what information could be made more accessible and how information may be able to be presented differently. Regardless, I thoroughly analysed the website's presentation and content in order to provide recommendations for how this could be presented differently.

I have recently been told that my recommendations have been taken on board and that a couple will be featured on the new website. One of these recommendations is the creation of a legal page that will include all relevant legislative documents as well as information on election fines (that are issued for not voting). I was very surprised and ecstatic to hear this news.

Improving the social media channels however, has proved to be a more difficult task. It is important to mention that the WAEC has regulations on what can & can't be posted to social media to ensure political neutrality. In order to make recommendations for the WAEC's channels, I first had to look at what the other electoral commissions in Australia were posting to their channels.

Benchmarking has always been emphasised in our PR units and I've never really given it much thought until now. By having a look at the other electoral commissions, I found a great amount of similarities and differences.

Some of the similarities include but are not limited to:

• Social media guidelines regarding political neutrality
• Promotion of election information and content (as various states are in the process of conducting state & local government elections)
• The specific social media sites used (every commission has an official Facebook page and a majority also use Twitter and Youtube)

The major differences between commissions is how the information is presented. For example the Victorian Electoral Commission uses animated videos to provide electoral information while the NSW Electoral Commission uses power-point lecture styled videos to present similar information. 

There were also differences in the consistency of usage. For example, the Tasmanian Electoral Commission has not updated their Facebook since July, while the WAEC tends to update their Facebook weekly. 

I have found the benchmarking process very eye-opening and helpful for the creation of recommendations for social media content and presentation. My next project involves the creation of a content schedule as well as the creation of content for fixed events in the election timeline (role close, early voting, etc.) and thus the findings from my benchmarking & recommendations will very much come in handy.

Only 10 more days left of my internship and the pressure is on to make the most of it.

Until next time,

Isabella

The first 4 days: my experience at WAEC so far

Hi fellow PR interns.

My name is Isabella and I've just finished my second week working with the West Australian Electoral Commission (WAEC), and so far, have loved every minute. I first found out about the WAEC through the Public Relations Planning & Evaluation unit last semester as they were our client for our 2 major assignments. 

I work at the WAEC office (located on St Georges Terrace) twice a week on Tuesdays and Wednesday. On Tuesdays I am joined by two other Curtin PR interns - Ed and Winnie. I have had one class in the past with Ed and none with Winnie so it was nice to meet some somewhat 'fresh' faces.  All three of us our based in a little area in the middle of the second floor, called the ROLO area. This area is the most central part of the office which will be very helpful when we need to interact more with certain staff members on our projects

WEEK 1

Day 1 of the internship began with a guided tour by our supervisor Sotear, who introduced us to all of the staff members. It was interesting to see how diverse the team was and how some staff members have been working at the Commission for a really long time. [I can understand why after only being there for a few weeks! All the staff members are so friendly and definitely try their best to make us feel comfortable].

After the introductions, the other interns and myself along with Sotear and our secondary supervisor Katherine went to one of the meeting rooms upstairs and brainstormed in our  Engagement Strategy Workshop, where we discussed the various projects we will be working on for the duration of our internships. My project will be of a similar focus to what was covered in Public Relations Planning & Evaluation as it relates to how the WAEC can improve their social media channels while also engaging youth in enrolment and voting. 

During the session we collaborated together to brainstorm ideas for  all the projects which also include internet voting for disabilities and voting on campus. I definitely enjoyed hearing all different ideas we had and the input and feedback from our supervisors. 

Once the workshop was done, it was time for lunch and we made ourselves familiar with the kitchen facilities available and the tea room area. It was then back to another meeting but this time with IT who sat us all down to explain and emphasise the organisation's online security policies. After this we received our log in details and began typing up our workshop notes in to a document as asked for by Sotear. 

My second day at the office was spent alone (as I'm the only intern on Wednesdays) and while it was lonely, I enjoyed the ability to work a little more independently. I was given the task to create a ‘Project Briefing Document’ that would cover my project and focus on  the objectives, outcomes, resources and contacts that I would need to consider in all stages of research, implementation and evaluation. This process was one that I did not find too difficult thanks to the notes from the strategies workshop. As a result  the document was completed earlier in the day and emailed to the supervisor. As I had finished a little earlier than expected I started to work on the research component as outlined in the document. Our supervisor Sotear had a few meetings that day and I was unsure on how to tell her I needed more work so I was somewhat bored for a while until Lena (the Commissioner's assistant) came by to see how my day was going. I told her that it had been good so far but that I needed a little bit more work. She was very friendly and even gave me a phone list so that I could contact Sotear and other key staff members if needed. I later received an email from Sotear outlining some more tasks to do including some meeting points about new social media platforms the WAEC could possibly use and the ways we could use them, as well as possible issues and how to manage them. 

WEEK 2

Day 3 of the internship was somewhat similar to the first day in terms of the busy meeting and activities schedule. We began our day at a meeting with the Commissioner, David Kerslake, who had briefly spoken to us on our first day. The meeting focused on feedback from David regarding the documents we'd worked on during the previous week and it gave us some ideas on what to work on when we had time. Later in the morning we had another IT meeting that focused on the specific program used to save documents. I appreciate the effort the WAEC has made to ensure to make us feel welcome and part of the team.

After an early lunch, we joined our secondary supervisor Katherine (who is looking after us while Sotear is away in Darwin) for an excursion to the WAEC'S Electoral Education Centre. We took the local CAT bus to the EEC which is located across from Parliament. We were introduced to Nigel who explained what the EEC does and gave us a quick tour of the facilities before we were joined by a year 9 group from Butler College. The program for the afternoon focused on the levels of government and the preferential voting system used in both the state and federal lower houses. It was really interesting to visit the EEC as I had never done so during primary and secondary education.

After the visit was over it was back to the CBD where we decided to have a second lunch and a quick visit to Nespresso for a coffee sample.. then it was back to work where we began working on some of the dot points mentioned during the morning's meeting with David. We started to collaboratively research contact details for universities and disability radio services for final part of the work day.

Day 4 was a very productive day yet again I ran into an issue but this time it was more to do with not being able to work rather than not having any work. I began the day working through the meeting points that focused on the social media project and included how social media could be linked to the other projects as well as a seperate youth focused strategy and plan. After this I decided to create a document for important contacts that would be involved with all the projects. Both of these documents were sent to Ed and Winnie to review when they were in office the next day.

I had a quick look at the briefing document I had made on Day 2 to see what tasks could be done. I decided to work on one of my main research elements, which involves analysing the WAEC's current social media platforms as well as their website to see what types of content were being used and how this could be improved and if anything was being missed. I had no issue completing this task for the website as a link is easily found on the staff intranet and there is currently no external content on the page. My main issue with this task however was that I do not yet have access to social media sites from the office computers (although a request for access has been put forward by our supervisors). Instead, I had to improvise and use my own mobile device to access the WAEC's social media and analyse the content. I was able to complete the Facebook portion before my phone decided to go on low battery. Again, I improvised by focusing on social media platforms the WAEC currently doesn't use such as Instagram and Snapchat and how those platforms could be of use to communicating with the 18-29 year old demographic and how it can be used effectively and appropriately. Thankfully I already had notes on these platforms from the meeting notes I had made the previous week and from
my social media plan I had made earlier in the day.I emailed Katherine to discuss the issue of the social media access and to ask if I could finish work 30 minutes earlier because of not being able to finish this task and not having any further work to do.

Overall, my experience at the WAEC has been great and my only complaints are really about the lack of tasks to do, although I'm sure we will start to get very busy over the next few weeks ; and the lack of social media access which is key to my project but hopefully shouldn't be an issue for much longer. I've really been enjoying working in such a friendly and comfortable work environment and having two other PR interns has made the process of interning a little less daunting than I was originally thinking it would be.

Until next time...
Isabella

BONUS: Here's a photo of my work space along with  my  handmade name sign which is now pinned up to my wall so staff can remember my name! There is also a phone next to the computer and a few draws that contain essential stationary items 

Working in an New Environment!

Last Tuesday 9th August 2016, it was my first day of my internship at Western Australian Electoral Commission (WAEC). WAEC is a Government department where it deals with election enrollments. The office is located in St Georges Terrace.

On the first day there were three interns Ed, Isabella and me. The first thing we started with, was knowing all the staffs at WAEC, we got introduced to them and also we had a tour around the office, as we got introduced to the staffs, we also got explained how things work and also have the knowledge about the areas and where they are. There are 2 levels of WAEC and we were located on level 2 and we were settled down in an area called the 'ROLOs', where it is in the middle of all the areas/departments which includes State, Federal and Local. Those areas are very important as each different areas we might be working with during the internship. And also we have to work with our individual project and we will be helped by those areas.

As WAEC is a Government department, we were given mil keys so that we can access through the office because security is very important in the office as the department deals with personal details. First day of intern was pretty full on because we received a lot of information such as staffs' names and roles and what thing we have to do. I found it full on as I have to adapt to this new environment as it is my first time to work in a proper office for a 7.5 hours. But I found it very interesting and I really like it, especially the staffs are very nice which means me feel very comfortable working there. One thing I didn't know is that working in an office can also be so flexible.

Throughout the first day, all of the interns, worked together so that we can give ideas and help each other with our own projects. Our supervisor, Sotear organised us to work together as a group on some broader engagement strategies before we get started going off doing out individual projects. The engagement strategies workshop, we brainstorm a lot of ideas about the project that WAEC will focus on before the next State Election and we worked out what kind of strategies we can consider. The workshop was very useful and working as a group does help with the ideas. I love working as a team/group.

Thursday was my second day of the intern, when I arrived to the office my task was to work on my project and using the information that we all worked out on Tuesday as a guideline to start researching. Sotear wanted us to prepare a project brief, in the brief thing that we have to include was the objectives, outcomes, deliverables, how it should be done and what resources we need and also who we should contact. As Sotear said this brief will also be a guideline for us to use during the internship.

After the first two days of the intern, learnt about how to work in an office environment, and I found it is very interesting working in this environment. After the first week, I know that working in a PR industry, planning and research are very important. Also working as a team is very useful as more brains have more ideas.

From only the first 2 days I have already been gaining experiences and knowledge on how the PR industry works. I really enjoyed the first 2 days. Also me and Ed figured out how to use the printer which we thought it was a great improvement.