The Internship of Internships

At the end of 2015, Daryl was a second year university student looking to gain industry experience relevant to his Bachelor of Commerce and Arts majoring in Marketing and Entrepreneurship. So, he chose to accept Workible’s mission:  A two month stint as a Marketing Intern where his only responsibility was to learn as much as he could.  

And that he did.  

Here’s Daryl’s summary of his experience as The Intern: 

Note from the Editor: No bribes were offered in exchange for this blog.

Fetching coffee? Printing documents? Photocopying? Forget about it!

Stop wasting your time and come to intern at Workible.

Let’s get straight to it.

Pros:

• Not only do you not have to fetch coffee, you get offered cups of freshly brewed tea SEVERAL times a day by the co-founders, Fiona & Alli.
• They know what they’re talking about: You will learn the most current and effective marketing strategies to refine your knowledge.
• Birthday Donuts: Does your birthday fall on a weekend, public holidays or any holiday periods, DON’T WORRY! At Workible, with every birthday, comes donuts!
• Are you a sucker for inspirational and motivational quotes? Workible HQ has a whole wall dedicated to these nifty little phrases and wherever else they can manage to scribble more quotes onto with coloured chalk.
• The office is literally across the street from Wynyard Park (and the train station) where pigeons and office-workers convene for lunch at 12-2pm everyday.
• At the end of your internship, you will have learnt so much that if your mind had a protagonist, it would be played by Bilbo Baggins in the Hobbit in his three movie adventure. This is a good thing, because interning at Workible equips you with industry skills and knowledge that you can take with you anywhere allowing you to apply for jobs you never knew you would be able to.
• Not a morning person? Workible cares about you AND your health (Research has proven ZZZs are good for you) so you can come in anytime between 8-10am.

Cons:

• No-one has control of the air-con and no-one knows who has control of the air-con (probably the janitor who you never see), so if you are freezing in the office, you stay that way until 5pm when you make your way home.
• IT guys who sit behind you (unless Alli, one of the co-founders, decides to orchestrate one of her classic last minute out of the blue office transformations) talk to themselves from time to time when they work.
• You will hear the word, “Hot Fix”, close to a dozen times every week and unless you are an IT whizz (I think it’s related to IT, not sure), you will have no idea what they are talking about.
• You won’t have an office key so if you come in early before anyone is in the office (which I’ve done several times), you’ll probably end up wandering around the city to pass up time (not really a con unless you hate walking).
• The bathroom needs a key and you have to go through THREE doors to get to the bathroom. Worst case scenario: You accidentally leave the bathroom key in the bathroom, you are now stuck between two doors. The only choice is to walk down SEVEN flights of stairs, take the lift back up to the office and tell Alli or Fiona (the co-founders) what happened. Then the search for the invisible janitor begins.

Ultimately, interning is a great way to gain specific work experience but you must work for the right company with the right team to help you. With my experience, Workible can definitely provide you with opportunities to develop and implement your marketing knowledge.

- The Intern (Daryl Tze Kong Lee)

Immediately after Daryl’s internship with Workible ended, the experience he gained helped him secure a great part-time job as the Social Media Manager at Vocational Educational Training and Employment Australia. We love happy endings!