Week 1: A Jarring Journey
Updated: Jul 12, 2022
Welcome to Burke’s Bulletin
Hi, my name is Connor Burke and I am a rising junior at Bucknell University. I am from Wellesley, Massachusetts where I currently live with my parents in between Bucknell semesters since my older brother now lives in Washington D.C. This blog will be about my experience abroad in Dublin studying and completing a marketing internship.
I am a Marketing, Innovation, and Design major interested in advertising and brand management. I am passionate about marketing related developments in the industry and innovations within the tech industry.
Upon hearing about the Bucknell-in Dublin Program, I knew this was an incredible opportunity to combine my interest in studying abroad with acquiring international business experience. The unique feature of integrating a study abroad experience with career development during the summer meets my desire to further develop my skill-set while at the same time, allow me to fulfill my desire to connect with cultures different from my own. As a MIDE major, being able to connect what I’m learning in the classroom at Bucknell with an international business directly aligns to my interest in global marketing. Applying to this program, I hoped that with the internship component of this program, it will provide an experience abroad that will further expand my understanding of the interconnection across cultures, geographic locations, and business sectors.
After declining my first internship as a marketing intern for a health company, I was placed at DataShips. DataShips is a software as a service company that specializes in data privacy and compliancy. They focus on handling marketing compliance for company around the world catering their business to be in good standing with global data privacy laws.
This internship interests me because they are a tech company while also having a product that directly involves other companies personal marketing habits. With my internship, I would like to find a mentor in the program who can share their experience and the steps they’ve taken on in their career path, as well as provide me with insight into their industry and markets. Specifically, plan on requesting to be very involved with the company’s marketing department or communications team to gain greater knowledge about the function and the skills required to be successful in their sector/industry. This hands-on experience will help me as I complete another internship next summer in the states and then the following year entering the workforce.
While the majority of my time will be spent at the DataShip offices (and the pubs), I will also be taking a Real Estate course taught by Bucknell’s own Stephen O’Connor every Monday. This course titled, “THE PUBIC POLICY OF AFFORDABLE HOUSING: The Tale of Two Countries” will dive into the good and bad within the housing market of Ireland. With lectures from Professor O’Connor, there will be 6 other guest speakers specializing in different topics related to Ireland’s real estate sector.
While I have the structured feeling from the real estate course, the uncertain aspects of my internship is what is making me uneasy. Currently, I am a bit anxious going into my internship since I am not sure if I have all the adequate skills to complete the tasks that will be given to me. I believe that living and working in Dublin will take me out of my comfort zone and expose me to alternate ways of doing business. This new environment aspect of being abroad makes me nervous yet curious in what may lay ahead of me. I am looking forward to the more relaxed work environment that Ireland has to offer since in the United States this is largely not the case. I am excited to continue to develop and expand my growing marketing skills while at the same time immerse myself in the Irish professional culture. Something that I am curious about as I was on the plane to Dublin was the different vocabulary I would experience and how some things are referred to differently in the states. Something I found interesting was on the DART (basically a train similar to the green line I take into Boston) was an informational sign.
Myself and a few others laughed to each other because we were not sure if this sign was satirical in nature where in Ireland everybody is supposed to be sociable or if “Anti-Social” is how people refer to somebody being “suspicious”. We needed this laughable moment because before getting on the DART towards EPIC Irish Museum, we had been trying to figure out as a group of 15 how to travel into the city when there were no Taxi’s and all the local Bus stops were out of commission for a marathon.
As you can see, for an hour I was hailing a taxi and kept getting the notifications that there were no drivers. Therefore, we had to start on a journey to walk to numerous bus stops that we hoped were functional which led us to the end of the marathon road closures giving us hope.
The next bus stop on a working road unfortunately was not in service so we found ourselves walking what felt like an eternity towards the DART through some walkways surrounded by nature. Overall, even though I got soaked due to my lack of a raincoat, it was a fun experience. I can not wait to see what is next for me and the friend’s I am meeting in Dublin.
DUBLIN AIRPORT RECOMMENDATIONS
As you may have heard, Dublin airport has been facing difficulty with managing passengers and facilitating them to their flights. Fortunately, we did not have to endure these lines (queues) but many people have.
My recommendations to management:
Increase employee numbers — this will allow for faster queuing times — more “servers” shorter queue (credit to my analytical operations ANOP 202 course)
Informing passengers on time protocols — this will let passengers know the estimated time they should arrive at airport before the flight so it does not cause delays or passengers taking up employees time during security when their flight does not take off for four hours
For a period of time, restrict personnel into the airport to those with a boarding pass — this will allow for faster movement to specific locations in the airport preventing congestion and foot traffic
Thanks for reading my first blog! Until next week!