Working Girl (Saturday, July 23, 2011)

I’ve already written a little bit about my internship, but this post will be all about it. I’m really loving my work! Last week we filmed a documentary, called The Great Race, which involved employees ‘racing’ from one County office to another using different modes of transportation. The goal of the video clip is to promote public transit and alternative modes of transportation like biking. I was the producer of the video, which was much more complicated than I had anticipated, but also really fun! (Between producing this documentary, and talking to all the Pixar interns and Polly/Alex about ILM and special effects, I have a new appreciation for all of the work that goes into making movies.) We had help from my supervisor’s friends who are amateur filmmakers. I had been prepared to film guerilla-style using point and shoot cameras, but they brought all kinds of gear: a boom to capture sound, fancy cameras, and some big disc to bounce light onto people’s faces to illuminate them better. Leading up to the day of the shoot, I had to deal with all kinds of logistics and organizational details that I never would have anticipated! Day of, my biggest challenge was reigning in the artísts. They would get caught up on the minute details and want to perfect the shots, but since we were on a very tight schedule, I consistently found myself cajoling them into moving onto the next thing. The experience overall was very interesting and it was fun to channel my artsy/creative side (although to be honest, my role was more management-oriented than creative). Once the post-production is done, I’ll try to post a link.

Later in the week, my supervisor, Emily, praised me a lot for my work producing and directing, which was really nice to hear. I’m glad that I impressed her.

Working with one of the filmmakers.

This week passed by in a blur at work… I can’t believe I only have one week left! I’m trying to wrap up my projects and make the final push to get projects approved and implemented before leaving, so things have been really busy.

Tuesday I led a big meeting with employees from agencies across the county and presented on the purpose and goals of having a Sustainability site on the employee intranet, and then facilitate discussions to solicit their ideas.

Thursday was my favorite day at work so far. It was great! I went to a Green Team meeting, comprised of employees who don’t work in the Sustainability Department. At these monthly meetings, they discuss pet projects related to environmentalism that are not directly in the scope of the Sustainability Department’s work. One project they are working on was inspired by a project at Harvard. Because I work with Harvard’s Office for Sustainability, I knew a lot about the project and could share my expertise. It made me feel really good to see that people were really listening to what I had to say and even taking notes, indicating that my feedback was valuable.

Another project discussed at this meeting was Dig Deep Farms (http://digdeepfarms.weebly.com/), which is a cross-agency project that involves repossessing abandoned lands and turning them into viable farmland. The project employs young people from the County’s probation system to give them the resources to stay away from violence and crime. The food that is grown on these farms is then sold back into the communities using a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) model. By doing this, Dig Deep Farms provides healthy food at affordable prices to food desert areas that lack such resources.

This project was on the agenda to discuss because it has been failing to really take off in terms of getting people to sign up for CSA deliveries and continue participating. I had never heard of this project, but as I learned about it throughout the meeting, I had all kinds of ideas and solutions for ways that operations could be improved and better ways to do outreach and get people to participate. Talking about how to improve this project (which I think is an AMAZING idea that incorporates so many issues that I am passionate about – social empowerment, health, and sustainability) made me feel so inspired and passionate. I would love to just stay here in the Bay Area and tackle this project as my own. I had to bite my tongue to keep from volunteering to help them remotely via phone and email during the coming months (between my thesis, running the Seneca, looking for a job, and enjoying senior year, I’m going to be so busy that I really need to avoid taking on anything else).

This meeting was so great for me, because it made me realize that my strengths and skills really are valuable. What I enjoy doing, and succeed in doing, is improving existing organizations and projects, which are often fledgling organizations, or are in need of rebranding. I’ve struggled at Harvard with feeling like I need to do something technical, like statistical analysis or engineering or some other math/science, in order to set myself apart. Unfortunately I don’t feel very inspired by those things, and am much more interested in the social world (which is why I was drawn to Sociology). After this meeting, I really saw that outreach skills, and analyzing why things fail from a social standpoint, really ARE strengths and ARE valuable, and not everyone can do them. This all makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside, and also makes me feel like my career prospects aren’t so bleak after all.