My name is Miriam Elfahdi, and I am a senior studying Strategic and Corporate Communication and Political Science. Being in my senior year has sparked a lot of reflection and feelings – the biggest that has come is gratitude. In talking with my peers, those still in school and others in their first year of the workforce, I’ve realized that having an internship for more than two years is rare and pretty special. I got my internship at Franklin Street Studio through the beautiful business of networking – something I’ve learned from those entering the workforce is just as beneficial as every older adult insists it is. Knowing Britt, the founder and principal, through my family’s neighborhood café led her to ask me if she would be willing to hire me as her first Operations and Communications Coordinator employee in her freshly launched education consulting business.

Thinking back to August of my sophomore year, when I first started at Franklin Street makes me reflect on how long it has been and how much I have grown. In a newly Zoom-ruled world, I sat in my new room in Orange, watching Britt work her consulting magic in meeting after meeting – accompanied by my notebook and pen. I quickly picked up scheduling responsibilities. This responsibility was then followed months later by financial report responsibilities and has now evolved into all the previously listed, plus the newly given task, blog assistance. Before the creation of Franklin Street Studio’s blog, however, there were a few months of routine work without much change. Having such consistent duties made me feel like I finally excelled in how to do them. However, learning and growing within the role came to a halt. Going into this semester, I knew there needed to be a switch-up. Knowing how special it was to be in an internship for so long, I wanted to ensure that my growth didn’t end. I emphasized my excitement in taking on more communications-related tasks, which came in perfect timing with Britt’s desire to start a blog.

Since my start at Franklin Street, Britt has grown her team with the addition of two amazing full time workers. This summer brought the new Operations Manager, who leads all things communications. In order to take full advantage of the great opportunity of having this internship, I made sure to communicate my interest in picking up communications related tasks, and she took my interest into action. I’m proud of myself for communicating this early in the semester, because it would have been easy to remain stagnant in this role and not hold myself accountable for learning new skills. 

On The Art of Mimicking…

This semester my Organizational Communication class has covered all things management style-related. A key point has been the importance of training and onboarding. To avoid what’s known as management uncertainty, it’s crucial to give newcomers as many tools and resources as possible to minimize their uncertainty in their new responsibilities. In every lecture on this point, I’ve realized how great my boss is at ensuring I have the right resources to feel confident in my new tasks every time I’ve gained one.

The blog plan was that for each month that the blog would be released, there would be a newsletter and LinkedIn post that I would be responsible for writing. For this assignment, she made sure I had a meeting set up with her strategic writing consultant, someone she had hired a few months back to strategically plan how Franklin Street communicates to the outside world. This consultant provided me with endless documents. Voice guides, style guides, and blog schedules left me with a lot of information to sift through. In the time between meetings with the consultant, I ingested everything she and my boss sat down to create. It quickly became apparent to me that writing these newsletters may be a writing style that I would not be very used to. This is because it required me to practice the art of mimicking someone else’s voice. These newsletters and LinkedIn posts are meant to cohesively blend with all the writing output by Franklin Street, and be especially reflective of the blog they were referring to.

My first go at writing the newsletter consisted of many dashes – something the voice guide said was a part of Franklin Street Studio’s style. It also included the words like learning and inspiration more than I use in my more academic writing. Unconfident that my first go at newsletter writing would be a success, the consultant complimented my ability to summarize and mimic Britt’s writing. While her words of encouragement gave me confidence, my first draft still required plenty of red-markings and re-wordings. Since then, the red markings have become less every week – and I’m starting to get a more natural feel for the use of dashes. 

Overall, this past semester of work has shown me the importance in being communicative about my own growth to avoid staying stagnant, in order to fully take the responsibility that a great opportunity like this internship brings.