The collaborative nature in which Rady was built upon doesn’t end with the academics in our classrooms. The employees foster unity in order to guide even the most unseasoned interns, such as myself, to fruition. Prior to diving into the world of marketing and communications the only experience I had communicating was as a former food service worker in a town seemingly invisible to the greater population. My desire to write wasn’t new, but Rady realized that vision and I am here today as a fresh-faced and eager-eyed assistant writer who was simply given the freedom to give his words a new meaning.
After what seems like a lifetime of self-doubt, my Rady intern experience has so far led me on a path of self-realization. Working at a leading business school was never my intention, but it is now my reality, and I’m ever so grateful for what it’s become. While I’m not made to be on constant coffee runs like a typical office intern, I am instead fetching interviews with up-and-coming business leaders, a rush that coffee can’t seem to replicate. To sit in on a team meeting is a task most don’t romanticize, but it’s a privilege I’ve seen as both a respect of inclusion and power. It’s one thing to respect those in charge; it’s another to have those in charge equally respect you back.
As a UCSD student with a somewhat vague idea of where they want their future to go, I have found a niche in business communications that a year ago today I didn’t much know existed, let alone put too much thought into. The business world may appear grand and intimidating, but now that I’m looking from the inside out, it doesn’t look as scary as it did the day of my first interview. My experience has humanized the entity that was “business.” It may just be that as a relatively new school, Rady is still digging its roots into the soil, but the foundation in which its set itself has helped stabilize my career focus as I forge onto graduation in the coming year.
I can’t speak for the experience of others here, but what I know to be true now that I didn’t know prior to sitting in this very cubicle is that it pays to keep an open mind. Opportunities exist in places one wouldn’t think to look in before. Whether I continue to work in an academic marketing setting or not, I can at least say I know the purpose behind the passion that drives employees here to excel. Part of Rady’s self-proclaimed mission is to “educate ethical leaders for innovation-driven organizations,” a holistic mission that as a student of Rady’s marketing department I hope to carry out as a soon to be student of the world.
Written by marketing and communications intern Pablo Valdivia.