Assignment 4

1)Part 1: Personal networking objective

Personal baseline: I am Paulien, a driven student at Artevelde University
College.
Cold and warm contacts: My friends in Ghent and from my secondary school
are all part of my warm contacts, including my family as well. People I see as cold
contacts are acquaintances from the secondary school and one person in
particular I met on a holiday, with whom I exchange emails from time to time.
Networking goals: My networking goal for the coming year is finding a fellow
student who is willing to help me with my seminar slidecast. Finding an internship
that really suits my interests, being Human Resources, Marketing and
International Business in general is my second goal. I have been able to find
someone who is willing to help me through networking in our classes and for my
internship I have been networking on LinkedIn and whilst I was in San-Francisco.

2)Part 2: Elevator pitch

I am a second year International Business Management student at Artevelde
University College in Belgium. In our third year we have to look for an internship
abroad and your company caught my eye. I am a real-people person who has
been involved in EYP which is a 5-day event full of debating about current
problems. When it comes to courses I am passionate about Human Resources
and Marketing, and since you are specialists in this field of business I would like
to show you my capabilities.

3)Part 3: LinkedIn profile

Link: https://be.linkedin.com/in/paulien-thyssen
Tips:
- How to Build the Perfect LinkedIn Profile
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMs4w4HF-Y8
- 5 Fast ways to Improve your Profile
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dRExBRY6nI
LinkedIn Report
From the first video I learned that you have to write a catchy phrase so people
are drawn to your profile. So this is something I changed. The second item I
learned is, that it is good to include videos and presentations so people can get a
glimpse of who you are. When I have made or used this kind of techniques, I will
certainly include this in my LinkedIn profile. Furthermore, I learned that you can
join more than 50 groups. When you join groups, your profile will get spread more
and you will become known to people who may otherwise not have found you.
That is why I will be looking for groups that interest me.
I have followed some suggestions from LinkedIn itself as well, like adding my
volunteering work and other sections that popped up at the top of your profile.
In the second video some interesting things were mentioned. For example, the
80:20 principle; when you invest 20% of effort, you will get an 80% return. And
this is correct because I invested 2 hours and a half on my profile but after that it
already looked quite proper. When I heard him talk about the profile picture, he
said that this is something that can make you stand out. So that is why I choose a
profile picture that is rather original.
Another item that caught my attention was about the URL, apparently you can
change it and this is something I was not aware about. After checking my URL, I
didnt think I wanted to change it but it is something I want to keep in the back of
my mind for when I ever would want to.

4)Part 4: Auditing my Facebook page

Since March I am daily auditing my Facebook page. There is an option on
Facebook whereby you can look at memories on a daily basis. So every day I
get a notification about what I have published over the several years I have
Facebook on that specific day. By looking at these memories, I have been
deleting some statuses I had put on there when I did not care what was on my
Facebook page just yet. Sometimes I also change the settings of some of my
profile pictures or statuses people have put on my wall. Some pictures that were
posted or written do not align with how I would like my future employer to look at
me, so I have hidden them which means only my friends can see them and no
one else. I hope that after a year I will have changed everything that made my
profile unattractive and that my Facebook page will have a professional look.

5)Part 5: Life networking activity

My life networking activity has changed from networking with a guest speaker
from a lecture in San-Francisco to two different networking events in Ghent. I
went to the Graduation Fair and was able to have several new contacts who are
willing to help me get in touch with the people who will help me find the
internship of my dreams. I approached several different representatives and
received some valuable input from them. The only difficulty I encountered was
looking for a networking event where there was a fair amount of people with
whom you could network.
For this assignment, I went to two different networking events. The first one I
attended was organised by AIESEC Ghent, but unfortunately there were not a lot
of people present with whom I could network. Thus, the only difficulty I
encountered was looking for a networking event where there was a fair amount
of people with whom you could network. Hence, when I saw an announcement on
Facebook of the Graduation Fair, I was keen on attending this event. Before
leaving I wondered how I could start the conversations with the business
(wo)men and how I could retrieve the information I needed to find the internship
of my dreams.
On the event, I learned that I am communicatively strong. I went together with
Damieta, Bianca and Evelien. I walked towards a stand of a company and went
through my elevator speech. All the information that was important and
necessary was in there thus the representatives had all the information that they
needed to help me further. After a while, I noticed that there were a lot of
companies related to HR, which is the field where I am most interested in. Thats
why I asked Damieta and Bianca who are both interested in more or less the
same topics, to go together to other stands where they could find the information
that they were looking for. But they mentioned that they thought I was doing well
and that they do not have the same amount of guts to approach people. When I
want to retain more information, I dare to ask whatever I would like to know. I will
always do this in the most polite and friendly way possible. In this way, I was able
to get a decent amount of contacts that I may email about a possible internship.
My future approach at such events will as follows not change because I was
content about my way of handling the situation(s).
The representatives that I approached are listed below.
Representatives information; I did not have the time to write all names of the
companies representatives down nor did I think it was polite to do so while
having a conversation/debate with them.
A) Company: ACV Oost-Vlaanderen
Follow-up: I will email the company about further information
concerning the income linked to my studies. On the event, we received
a preliminary salary calculation.
B) Company: TUI NV
Other contact person: while having a conversation with one of the
representatives, she mentioned that her colleague would know more
about the abroad possibilities TUI has to offer. After talking to the
second person, she referred me to a 3rd person whom I had a
conversation with that ended without a possibility of having an
internship in TUI abroad.
Follow-up: They informed me when going to the website, I may be
able to find other possibilities within the TUI group that they were not
able to inform me entirely about.
C) Company/school: Antwerp Management School
Name: Caroline Rahier
Title: Recruitment Manager
From Ms. Rahier I received information about a master in HR that I may
want to pursue. The representative of this school explained to me that
within this degree, there is no course related to statistics or math. I first
thought that the pamphlet she gave me was about a master that I
could start with instantly after this programme, but they offer an
additional masters degree which is not immediately what I am looking
for.
D) Company/institution: WEP
From WEP I received information about how I can possibly find paid
internships via their services. I am planning on emailing them at the
end of this school year.
E) Company: Lidl
As with TUI, Lidl was not able to help me further because they were
mostly present on the Graduation Fair to recruit students looking for an
internship in Belgium. But I received a tip to surf to careers.lidl and
there I will be able to find more opportunities within the Lidl Group.