Friday, July 29, 2011

The Intern

I received an unexpected surprise from one of my temporary staff today. He came into my room this morning bearing a gift for me which took me back a little since I've never ever received a gift from any of my staff or colleagues before.

Now before any of you start thinking weird thoughts like he's got the hots for me or something, let me explain a little further. Besides, my other partner also got the same gift from him.

A little over three months ago, I spoke to my partner about offering internship in our office to graphic design students who need to do their practical training in a design or print firm as part of their college syllabus. He agreed and I started sending out emails to all the art and design colleges out there.

We're pretty busy and I really don't have all that much time to train people but with the quality of future designers that comes out after graduating with utterly horrible skills, that I really want to do my part to make sure that at least one or two of these future designers actually have some production knowledge when they graduate and not come up with all kinds of impossible ideas later in life and people like me end up suffering and figuring out how to execute these ideas.

You'd be surprised at how utterly clueless some of these so-called creative directors or art directors are in some of those international ad agencies. They just come up with all kinds of silly creative ideas with hardly taking into consideration the production aspect if things and then when we tell them it can't be done, all they can say is, 

'Aiyaaa, how ah? We need it tomorrrow.'

These guys may be creative and all that but oftentimes have the production knowledge of a cow. That is why I decided that we take in students for internship (and also cheap labour ... hahaha ... just kidding) so I can train them on the production aspect of things.

I got lucky and we had an immediate response from an art college (coincidentally it was my former art college at that) who had some students to send over. So after some interviews, we took in this guy and he started his practical with us, which would last for two months. Today is his last day and as a token of his appreciation, he gave both me and my partner a neck-tie and cuff links which had smiling away cos it's a gift that's going to be lying in my room seeing as how I only wear tees and jeans to work everyday.

But it still was a pleasant surprise anyway :D Though he had his ups and downs as a trainee, I enjoyed training him and he did a pretty good job of listening. He even managed to come up with some creative work that was selected by a client which made him very happy seeing his hard work come to fruition. I know how that felt cos when I was doing my practical all those years ago and had an advertisement I did actually be published in the papers was like pure joy :D I still have the ad till this very day.

It's his last day today and I wish him all the best and hopefully he's learned enough here to put that knowledge to good use in the future. And when he graduates and if he decides to want to come back here to work, the door is always open for him.
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14 comments:

  1. Tat is a smart move to hire interns. We hire interns here all the time too :) and its good working exposure for them.

    You got yourself a good fellow there. Hope he comes back to work for you when he graduates.

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  2. It's gewd if you get those people who are dedicated. Reminds me of a fren telling me about her office with a new intern. LOL. You must be treating your intern gewd XD

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  3. It's good to know he actually listened and learned from your training.

    At least you got a good one - most grads just come in to kill time or pay little attention to everything

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  4. I agreed on offering internship in a company. It's killing two birds with one stone for the company and benefits both parties.

    yr intern guy is so thoughtful to buy you & yr partner a gift. must b his gf idea.. haha! :P

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  5. After digesting your post, i must agree that you are a person who is passionate about what you do and you would even take it a further just to make sure someone out there feels that way you do...good on ya...

    i must agree with you too, there are so called designers who are of lesser mind..........

    you see your good deed has turned out to be a blessing to that intern and i am sure this intern will one day turn out to be great too..

    haiz, i love design but too old to be considered an intern lioa...have a great weekend bro

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  6. Your intern has good attitude, I think. :)

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  7. Anny - I'm hoping we get more of these interns :D I kinda enjoyed being a teacher when I had the time :D

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  8. Maslight - Not easy to find people who really want to learn. Hopefully that attitude of his will stay with him when he goes to work later on.

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  9. Sriyany - I was kinda skeptical at first but glad he turned out fine :D

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  10. Jean - It was a win-win situation :D

    Actually, I just found out he bought everyone in the office something too :D

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  11. Eugene - I am very passionate about what I do and I cannot stand incompetence which is why I like the people I'm dealing with to have at least an ounce of brains.

    If he keeps up that attitude, I'm sure he'll go far.

    A good weekend to you too :D

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  12. I'm glad we had all the interns we had this year (3.5 of them - 0.5 was borrowed from QC because she had nothing to do there, ha ha)because we had so many problems to solve.

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  13. Terra - 3.5? LOL! I do hope they'll send more my way.

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