Internship half-time
Half of my internship has passed already. Today I realized that this is not really what most people would call a “normal” internship. One of the people next door from our Hamburg office, whom I’ve met daily for a month now, realized only today that I’m an intern.
That was already the second pointer this week. The first one came on Wednesday, when we went to a meeting with a magazine editor. While I was sitting at the conference table with Georg and JJ (our press spokesman), the magazine’s intern was busy downstairs at the photocopying machine. That made me realize what a good choice I made in picking the FSFE for my internship.
After so many exciting experiences, it will be hard to go back to university and just write my thesis. I still have about seven weeks left to enjoy working with this highly motivated team. I’ve learnt a lot about organisational structures, managing a network of people, getting things done with a group. But most of all, I have gotten used to being challenged and challenging myself more than I did before.
I would like to describe my regular work, but that turns out to be somewhat hard: There is so little regularity. Days usually start with reading and answering emails by external and internal people. But that’s where the routine ends. Usually, a bit of travel planning for Georg slips in at some point. The last few weeks, we have been extremely busy with the Fellowship cards, printing and mailing them. Now, I’m looking into next steps: People might want lanyards to wear the cards on their necks, and stickers, and…
I’m also writing news entries for the websites, making sure that the right mail goes to the right people (and gets answered), and generally coordinating things. I like it that FSFE is such a lean and small organisation, and that I am located right were the action is. This gives me the chance to learn a lot. It helps that people trust me with work that is actually meaning ful. Anything else would be a waste of capacities.
Handling all the technical stuff, which had made me a bit nervous in the beginning, has turned out alright. After all, this organisation is full of techies. I just have to be open to being taught a new trick every now and then. It helps that the team members seem to realize that not everyone has grown up exclusively in front of a computer screen, and that they respect this. Still, I started to do things with my computer that I never supposed I was capable of.
If anyone is thinking about becoming my successor on this internship, I can only recommend it. It’s time well spent.