Line Manager Name: Brian Hume
Job Title: Managing Director
Pathways Programme: Pathways to Marketing 2024
Organisation Summary: At Martec International Ltd we develop and market e-learning education in industry skills for retailers, consumer goods manufacturers and companies that provide them with services, like IT and logistics suppliers. We are a small company with users of our product in 58 countries. We market through a range of inbound marketing activities
How did hosting an intern via the Professional Pathways programme benefit you and your organisation/department?
We received a 52 page report giving the findings, conclusions and recommendations on how our company’s digital marketing could be improved. The author (Sonali Trehon) included many examples of re-working things we had done to show exactly how they could be improved. It will take a little while to implement all the recommendations, but we anticipate that it will improve our conversion rate of leads to sales significantly. Sonali obviously learned a lot at Exeter University, but she also had previous work experience in some of the areas this project covered, so it was doubly good.
How was your experience of hosting a Pathways intern?
Sonali was the fourth intern we have hosted and our experience has always been good. They all worked remotely. As we have done in the past, we had an online briefing for Sonali two weeks before she started to explain the project in more detail than the original University brief and she had the chance to meet her Martec colleagues, ask detailed questions and then think on what she learned to influence the way she approached the project. When she started, we had another online meeting to recap and answer further questions and she got started. The work was spread out over two weeks, partly to give us the time to do the tasks we needed to do to support the project. We probably spoke in online meetings every other day on average, some for just a few minutes and some appreciable longer, depending on what Sonali asked and what we need to tell her. This regular contact is an important part of helping the interns to be successful, for them to be fully engaged in the project and for our own selfish reasons of getting the best overall result we can. Both of us are clear winners in this regard.
Given the Professional Pathways internship is 35 hours in total, how would you recommend ensuring both you and your intern(s) gain as much as possible from the experience?
A key secret of success is scoping a project that really can result in a valuable deliverable in as little as 35 hours and that takes some thinking on our part. It was obvious to Sonali that we were very committed to this project and that we were doing our part to maximise the benefit for both of us.
Why would you recommend hosting an intern via Professional Pathways?
This is a really valuable opportunity if you plan and manage for it. The discipline of scoping a project that has real value and can be completed in 35 hours helps ensure that you maximise your potential return. There is also great job satisfaction in helping young people and paying something back to society at large knowing that you also benefited at the same time. Long term, Sonali wants to start her own business. I did too and was able to share a number of the lessons I learned on the way.