My internship marked a significant step in my future career. It is during this period that I put all that I had learned in class in practice. The course opened up new doors, and I was able to understand the scope of my career. My contractor was a well-equipped man, especially in my field of study, as he was very generous in information and improving my skills. During my internship, I was able to achieve more than I could imagine. I acquired various skills that I believe will play a significant role in a successful career. Some of the skills that I learned include communication skills. During this period, I was able to gain confidence as I interacted with clients more often. I was in charge of giving quotes, emailing, and marketing. Being the head of these departments, it was difficult as I felt shy addressing people. I would often meet with clients and discuss our work in detail.
As time went on, I was able to build courage, and I could address as many people without having a twinkle in my stomach.
Another skill that I learned was bookkeeping. During the internship, I was in charge of bookkeeping, writing quotations, and following up for payment. This was not an easy job as we had many clients, and balancing the records was a hard nut to crack. I had to be orderly to ensure that I did not mix up the orders and payment. My contractor was proud of me as during the entire period, I did not mix up or mess the records. This skill will be of great importance to my future career, as I will be able to handle my business and finances.
During this period, I got to learn various skills in the remodeling of homes. Many people tend to decorate their inside and outside spaces in their homes to bring that feeling of isolation from each other. Some of the designs that I learned included a deck or patio. A deck brings in an indoor and outdoor flow in your house. Doing a deck in your home increase the value of your home incase you want to sell it. Barn doors is also another indoor improvement that we made to some home owners in the neighborhood. Barn doors are sliding doors and are becoming an eye catchment to many home owners. Barn doors are doors that slide across on another, or the two doors can met in the middle. We did many indoor improvement and the one that captured my eye was pocket door that we did to another home owner. One unique element about these doors is that they were not sliding behind one another but instead the whole door was sliding into the wall. It offered a completely unobstructed entry way. This door took a lot of our time as it required us to rework on the existing framework on the wall. Another project that we did was the construction of an old Chicago driveway and it was quite breathe taking. Doing quality work for our clients was our driving force and we made sure we delivered the best. These projects really stood up in our works and at the end we were all happy to satisfy our clients.
Commitment is another element that I got to achieve during my internship. Many of our clients were honest people and we had to be professional in our operation. We had to be committed in our work, time, the promises that we made to our clients. This element made us took out among other competitors and we got referrals from the clients we had done work before.
What I did well is that I was able to attract new clients through our marketing techniques. I was vigorously involved in posting our products and showcasing some of the works that we had done to our clients. I further developed an app that used big data sets which helped us predicting market trends and also the taste and preferences of our clients. Through our various marketing platform we engaged our client to get their feedback about our works. I was actively involved in addressing issues that were raise by our clients and those that I could not handle I directed them to the manager.
I believe if I had more time I would advertise our work in different regions by printing more fliers and giving them away to the residents. I believe that not all potential client saw our work on our social media but if we branched to different region and communicate face to face we could have attracted more clients. During this period a number of conflict arose up. There was this client that wanted a French door. We had promised to work on his door after a week because we had other projects ongoing. But as time went on we were overwhelmed and we did not start his work on time. He was furious and he wanted this money back. We had to cool him and explain to him why we delayed in starting his project. From this conflict I learnt that time keeping is very crucial if you want to manage and to keep your clients. However, if you feel that you may delay or you rare overwhelmed it is important to tell your client that you may be delayed prior accepting his work. This will help me in my future career and also limit conflict due to lateness.
My next career step is that after, finishing my school I want to a private contractor dealing with in outdoor and indoor remodeling. I believe I have acquired enough knowledge in this field after doing my internship. Later on I want to start a firm where I will empower and educate other youths regarding this diverse field.
When COVID -19 emerged it really affected our work as the permit building closed. This then hindered us from acquiring new clients and now we had to focus on our old projects and continue marking our products through social media. In response to combating COVID 19 the ministry of health developed new regulation such as social distancing, reducing movement and not congregating. This then completely shut us down as we could no longer visit our client or go to site. We were restricted to office work such as mailing our clients, giving quotation and following up for our debt