Business Development Internship Part 2

Hi again, 

Soon it’s one month since I started the internship (crazy how fast time passes!?), and I’m starting to get comfortable in my role as business development intern. I have to admit that I can’t wait until our graduation next year ­– I want to jump into working life soon as possible. During the past month I have found out 3 things of work life that I really appreciate with being at a workplace. 

1. The colleagues – What I enjoy is the broad spectrum of different people when it comes to age, background, knowledge, experiences etc., compared to school where it’s often a much more homogeneous group of people. 

2. Belongingness to the company ­– I like the feeling of being attach to a company and aligned with the corporate values. For me, I see it as highly motivating knowing that the tasks have an actual purpose. 

3. Work within a project model – I really enjoy working within a project model and interdisciplinary. I hope that I get the chance to work in this manner in the future. It suits me and my personality better to work in a dynamic and flexible way, over having a linear schedule.  

At the moment, I’m compiling the data I collected the last weeks, which will be the foundation of my best practice manual.  Hopefully I will be able to use parts from the data collection as well in my academic report. Before I started the internship, my aim was to manage at least 5 interviews during the period. After the last 2 interviews today, I have done 13 interviews. What’s been really pleasurable is that I have captured many interesting perspectives from different functions and roles within the organisation. In my sample, I have people represented from the management team as well as people from the shop floor, and it’s the contrasts that makes it interesting ­to analyse. 

What I also see as highly interesting is the link between a project and its outcome and effect in monetary terms, like return on investment (ROI). Within the meetings, the economic point of view is always taken into consideration and discussed, and in my opinion, I see that this perspective is essential within a contemporary retail context. I think that there are tendencies that retail companies sometimes forget that the most important factor (from my perspective) is about creating value for a) the end customer and b) for the company in economic terms. Instead, retail companies focus a lot on being “high-tech” and do major investments, in order to be fast on digital trends, before having done an accurate calculation on what it actually gives the company in terms of ROI and/or value for the end customer. It’s just a reflection of mine, after my 13 interview sessions...

Now it’s a short downhill to summer – only a few more weeks to go. 

/ Maria