July 11th was a big day for me. It was the day I officially got on board and join the great Influence Matters family as a summer intern. On the first day to work, I felt a little bit confused about what we were doing here, because before joining, I know little about the PR industry and had never engaged in media work previously.
After a period of time with my colleagues’ patient instruction, I gradually got to understand this industry. For a PR agency, it is important to craft the message and voice for their clients and help them reach a better awareness and image in front of the public.
One of the weekly tasks for me was to do our networking agenda that is posted on the official WeChat account NetworkingMatters, from searching for the events to editing and formatting the post in WeChat, jobs I had never done before, and I now had to do all on my own. At first, I made plenty of mistakes, however my colleague still patiently pointed out my mistakes and helped me improve.
After two months at Influence Matters, I learnt a lot about PR and working, and also had a great time with my colleagues Simon, Tingting, Naomi and Lucrezia, they are all friendly people and more importantly, they are willing to help me to get a better understanding of this industry. And I sure did! This summer internship has not only enhanced my ability to write, translate and edit content, but also taught me some of the required computer skills needed for doing PR work, such as using the WeChat editing tools. As a science student, I mostly do mathematics work in school, but at Influence Matters, the team’s main tasks are all about developing stories, content and disseminating to the client’s audience. As an intern, I had to translate articles, write articles and proofread articles. So I have to keep up with them and try to help them.
By the end of August, the weather was cooling down, and it was time for me to leave and go back to university. I have to say that was a really nice experience for me, and I would absolutely recommend an internship at Influence Matters to colleague students who speak English and want to discover PR, have some fresh new social experience and interact with some cool people.
Amy, here with the rest of the team on the far left, is a undergraduate student at Beijing University of Architecture and Civil Engineering. She spend the Summer 2016 as a full time intern at Influence Matters in Beijing.
