Posts Tagged ‘leadership’

A Leap for Change

Friday, May 10th, 2013

“The one constant in this world is change. You can either adapt to change, ignore it or lead it.” -Publicis Kaplan Thaler

I am a Midwest city girl from Minneapolis, MN. I attended the accredited University of St. Thomas, in St. Paul, MN. Following in both my mother and brother’s footsteps, I graduated with a BA in Marketing.

At 24 years old, my whole world has changed. While I have adapted to it without skipping a beat, last month, I decided it was time that I lead the change in my life. Right then, I contacted Mark Olson, the leader of Sales and Marketing for Bamboo Skateboards. After a nice conversation about their internship program, I knew this would be the perfect opportunity for my first leap towards change! I am working my first several weeks remotely from Minneapolis, but my next leap will be moving out to Oceanside, CA in July. After this first week has gone by and I have met all the other amazing interns, I could not be more ecstatic to continue working with and representing Bamboo Skateboards! I have already learned my first lesson with this internship- adapting to change is good, but taking the reigns and leading your life towards change is thrilling and rewarding.

Minneapolis Skyline

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6 down, 10 to go!

Friday, February 17th, 2012

I am learning a lot with BambooSK8. When it comes to business, it really is amazing to see how a company works. With BambooSK8, you have the ability to see it very clearly because it is such a small company. I am able to quickly recognize the tremendous value each employee adds to the company, even the interns! Once again, since it is small, all the employees wear multiple hats. One day you can be working on sales, another marketing, and the next managing how the company operates. Being able to see and experience all these different roles first hand has also allowed me to learn what I do like and what I do not like. One example of something I learned about myself is that I can be salesperson. I never really considered myself a person with a sales mentality, but I have gotten a chance to learn this skill with BambooSK8. I have found that not only I can do it, but also I enjoy it. I enjoy the aspect to it of building relationships with people. It is also interesting to me to see how sales affects and adds value to a business firsthand.

Trying to manage all the different tasks with the various roles I mentioned above is not easy. That is why the leadership at this company is crucial. The president of the company, Geoff, does a good job at this. When he shows us the importance of what we are doing and stresses that what we achieve here will ultimately determine our next jobs; this helps to keep me on track and motivated. It also spurs on myself and other interns step up and assume leadership roles. This internship is 16 weeks long. Six weeks are in the books with ten now to go. Leadership will be critical to ensure we meet our goals in these remaining weeks.

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A Lesson on Leadership

Monday, October 24th, 2011

 Every week each intern sits down with their mentor to discuss different aspects of the company and of being a part of any company. Last week Geoff and I discussed leadership and management. From these discussions I learned there is a very big difference between a leader and manager. Management is the discipline of getting things done right, while leadership is doing what is right for the good of the organization. Anyone can be a manager, all they need to do is follow the simple steps that are laid out on paper. Not everyone can be a leader, or has it in themselves to be a leader, because it requires  more than the ability to follow steps and rules, it requires a vision.

Leaders work to get people to believe in their ideas and what they will become. They do not sit out their high horse and dish out jobs to their employees. Instead they immerse themselves in the company and get to know the employees. They focus on communicating their vision with their employees, tying customer benefits to employee contributions, linking working to results and instilling passion in their employees.

Leadership is essential for all companies to grow into a successful business. Through this internship I am learning about how different leaders approach running a company and what is most effective.

 

 

 

 

 

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Interested in interning with BambooSK8 or BambooBuddy?

Saturday, March 26th, 2011

First step will be to set up an appointment with Mark Olson for an interview.  molson@bamboosk8.com

Next, you will need to sign a NDA (non-disclosure).  We simply don’t share anything on the internship until after a NDA is signed as we need to protect our valuable internship documents.  At the interview is where we are able to show you the inner workings of the internship in full detail.  For now, you can read more about the internship through the intern blogs to gauge what they are experiencing. 

Some of the basics… The internship is based on 400 points.  These 400 points are made up of a midterm, final, 3 part higher level MPS system, communication with the team, weekly skype calls, 1 on 1 with mentor, blogs, communication with me, as well as fulfilling the weekly duties we require such as contacting the skateboard kids through one of our social networks at www.hookit.com  We provide a lot of structure in the beginning – there is a syllabus with details of what is due each week.  Each of the interns has a folder on our server where you keep all your documents and each class has its own folder broken down weekly with 16 weeks of material.  We also have an intern bible, which gives a lot of information on past things we’ve done, resources for finding things, etc.   On the flipside of all of this structure, is a significant amount of autonomy – it’s up to you to drive the results and find solutions to the problems we face.  50 points of the 400 is based on your ability to get the results, which leads to sales.

We provide a few key content areas that we like to focus on: sales, marketing and PR but leadership is a major focus throughout each.  It’s best to align your strengths first, but we always strive to cross-train with other content areas to broaden you.  Also, each month we rotate who your mentor will be, so you get use to different leadership styles.

The last month is devoted to interviewing skills and resume building.  The entire internship is focused on networking!

We start the 1st week of May, for internship class 10.

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