Half Way Point.

It's official - I'm halfway done with my internship!

Last Thursday I was given a project to spearhead myself. Looks like they're starting to realize my potential and giving me some more responsibility. And I'm very excited about it! This is where the fun and learning begin. At the end of the day, another project came my way. This one was for our automotive client that is visiting in a few weeks and a great deal of press needs to be included and informed about the CEO's visit. I've been placed in charge of researching organizations that are green and inviting them to interview our client in the hopes of bringing energy efficient vehicles to Hong Kong. Completed and ready for the next task...

Friday was my big day! I gave my Prezi tutorial to the entire Corporate team. Everyone seemed to be very impressed... Including our GM who now wants me to teach him personally how to use Prezi, along with the company's graphic designer. Moving forward, he wants all of our client decks to be compiled in Prezi. Pretty exciting! Hoping I've started to prove myself now and will be given much more responsibility and possibly even the chance to present and pitch to clients - fingers crossed!

[This past weekend I experienced the Dragon Boat Races on Saturday and had amazing Thai food and a relaxing afternoon paying local beach games at Shek-O on Sunday. Now I was pumped and ready for week 4...]

Monday (6/25) we had an event for one of our beauty/hair care clients where a famous stylist revealed the 2012 hair trend of the year. Like most events, this one was also in Cantonese so I was placed at the media table to distribute stickers and goody bags to the guests. However, I did have a chance to pop inside to check out the scene... The venue was all decked out with the new product and a decent media showing, but I think our brand team would have made some changes if given the authority from the client. Next time!

The rest of this week has actually been extremely busy - And I welcome the change of pace! I've been researching and documenting a great deal on current trends and successful campaigns. Below is just a brief snapshot of some of the results I gathered along with my insight:

[Apologies for the format being a bit off. Blogger doesn't seem to like Excel very much...]

Trends	Description			Addresses	Outcome/Ideas
trendwatching.com
Hong Kong, China
Phenomenas
"Made Better in China" Campaign (see below for full list of "Made Better" campaign)	1. Urban Boom	Urban household disposable income is expected to double between 2010 and 2020 (Source: McKinsey, March 2012).	In 2010, China had 18 million households with an annual income above USD 16,000. By 2020, this number will be 167 million households. That's nearly 400 million people (Source: McKinsey, March 2012).	http://trendwatching.com/briefing/	The outcome? A massive, sophisticated urban Chinese class of CITYSUMERS, with a massive demand for high quality goods and services.
	2. Best of the West in the East	Special ranges or products that are MADE FOR CHINA, or by rolling out the RED CARPET to Chinese consumers around the world	These set the expectations of Chinese consumers, and gave Chinese brands and entrepreneurs the inspiration and confidence to step forward and exceed the standards of quality set by the very best of their Western counterparts
	3. Global Brain	China is connected. With over 513 million Internet users (compared to 245 million Americans online)*, Chinese entrepreneurs and consumers are part of the GLOBAL BRAIN:	frantically feeding off (and adding to) global consumer culture and creativity		Mobile/internet is THE best way to reach consumers. Over twice as many Chinese online than Americans. Perhaps develop mobile apps for our clients so customers can book and purchase or blog or like products/services
Games/Apps	Pinterest–inspired "Buykee"	New Chinese website.			Product placement in apps??And if not already, brands should be involved with "Buykee" early on to establish themselves with innovative consumers since site focuses exclusively on luxury products and offering users the ability to buy what they are seeing
What this means to your brand
Intuitive Futures	Our lives will be streamlined by cognitive fluency planning, by brands, buildings, products and services that intuitively flow around our wants and needs.	Brands that handle this opportunity correctly – by being intuitive, fluent and human to the right degree – will become helpers and enablers, and essential to their customers’ lives.		https://www.lsnglobal.com/trends/view/3423
Social Trends	"Always-on" lifestyle	Business and pleasure overlap	Aside from work or study, they enjoy eating out, shopping, travelling, going to bars and karaoke, dance and fitness clubs	http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-01-15/news/30627890_1_yuan-apparel-spending

Now it's off to a much need break from work after a busy, yet good, week - Next stop, BEIJING!!!

Laugh it off

Going on week three of my internship and finally starting to have my plate full of great projects - Very exciting!! Had a creative brainstorming session for a client's new product to help boost sales, drive revenue, and increase visits for locals to be attracted to this destination. It was fun to be included in the creative team to bounce ideas off each other. Hopefully I'll get to participate in more of those in the coming weeks!

As for my presentation I mentioned last week; I finished it up for our potential client, showed my boss in the hopes of winning her approval, and... she LOVED it! She actually enjoyed it so much that now I am giving a Prezi tutorial to my entire department on Friday! She explained that moving forward she wants all of our client decks to be configured in this format. I'm very excited! Public speaking (and presenting ideas) is one of the areas I feel I excel in the most. The difficult part now will be explaining how to successfully use Prezi in a short amount of time. I, for one, had never even heard of Prezi until I came to USC. Now I have to become the Prezi master in just a few short days and hopefully teach my colleagues well enough that they will be able to continue this new method even after I've left. I can only do my best, and that's exactly what I plan to do. I even composed a Prezi "cheat sheet" that I'm going to hand out to everyone before I start my tutorial, which should be helpful... I hope.

Besides the presentation, work had been a little slow at the end of last week, so I was able to read up on what's been going on in the Chinese media. Apart from the blood, tears, and "Bad World Syndrome", I was able to find this little "pick-me-up" in The Standard...
At the end of the article, I came to the conclusion that this is my new motto for the rest of my time here in Hong Kong. If something is different, uncomfortable, or foreign to me, I'm not going to pass judgment, but instead laugh it off and carry on.

For example, last week when my workload was light, I continued to ask my colleagues if they needed help with anything. They repeatedly told me no, but then wouldn't take a lunch because they were so swamped. The following day I finally confronted one of them. I pleaded with her to give me some work and she just laughed and said she would love to, but it's all in Chinese so I can't help. *Laugh it off! :-)

                                                  - Brainstorming -
I'm realizing very quickly here that PR firms like to brainstorm and bounce ideas off each other fairly often. I've been involved in three brainstorming sessions already and it's definitely a helpful way to learn about clients, HK culture, and how to combine the two to please all parties. My boss runs the majority of these, but it's done in such a way where she comes in with an agenda or some questions and ideas of her own, and then we can chime in (or not) if we have anything to contribute. I like that much better rather than putting anyone on the spot. This way I'm free to think about and develop my own ideas and questions, then propose them whenever there is a break in the banter. I've also noticed that the majority of the people that are included in these creative meetings are fairly quiet. At first, I was slightly wondering to myself why they were invited if they never contributed. Then I realized that when they did say something, it was incredibly intelligent and thoughtful, and more often than not, a brilliant idea. I think I need to take that approach in the future as well as back in the states. Listening is even more important than talking. And as communication professionals, I believe this is more crucial for us to lead by example than anything else. I actually found this article 8 Things Gen Y Can Learn About Workplace Relations from the Chinese which was pretty interesting. It is almost two years old, but I think it's still relevant... And at the top of the list: LISTENING!
"Listen carefully. This means listening before speaking, and paying full attention to a speaker without interrupting. This is especially important when you’re new on the job and nobody cares about what you think. If you say 'yes' quickly when you should be saying 'no,'  you may have a big problem on your hands. Listening carefully doesn’t mean not to ask any questions. It means to keep your mouth shut until it’s your turn and learn as much as possible through listening, studying and observing.  Ask questions when it’s appropriate to ask them. "

My second motto.

It's a Small World Afterall

A week and a half down and still a lot to learn! Before I get started on this weeks' details, I wanted to share an interesting article I read during my first day of work last week. Considering I was new, I spent a fair amount of time becoming acclimated with the company I was about to spend two months working for. I read their April Bulletin and came across an interesting article called, “The Widening Communications Gap in Corporate Leadership”. It spoke about a survey that was conducted which found leaders falling short of expectations (especially Americans and Europeans) and how 31% of those surveyed believed leadership would get worse in the next year (31%), while only 27% predicted it would improve. However, China has a different point of view and holds their leaders at a higher regard. Nearly half (49%) of Chinese “have more confidence in their political and business leaders to navigate the world through difficult economic times”. The article continued by stating that the most important attributes for a leader in China to demonstrate are ethical business practices (42%) and trustworthiness (39%).

Another interesting discovery in the article was a direct link between personal leadership and powerful communication. I have found in my own personal research and studies (CMGT 536 - Team Leadership) that as Comm majors we usually believe effective communication is the most important attribute for good leadership. Apparently the Chinese feel the same since 87% believe effective communication is extremely important to strong leadership. Personal “presence” and involvement of a leader in communicating is also vital since in-person contact is the most credible (57%) with blogs, print media, facebook, and advertising not considered good mediums to gain face, according to the article.
However, I found another source, "The Top 10 Leadership Qualities" for Americans, and communication isn't even on there! It mentions having a common vision and communicating that message, but I believe that communication is even more than just a vision. It's those random water-cooler conversations, brainstorming meetings or casual lunches where the best ideas are born.

I guess us Comm majors are more similar to the Chinese than I originally expected. It’s a small (PR) world afterall.

                                                                 - - -

Now on to this week... The majority of my time has been spent doing trend market research for our biggest client. I found some interesting charts and graphs as well as additional helpful information that seemed to impress my boss. I've reached all of my deadlines ahead of time and am eager for more work to show my true potential. Who wouldn't be impressed with color coordinated spreadsheets? :-)

Monday I assisted with one of the highest level industry meetings in Hong Kong, attended by over 800 delegates, speakers, and government officals. It was an interesting experience! Since I've been involved with events for many years now, it was a nice comparison to see how they are run in another country. Just as efficient as the MTR, my collegues also had everything planned and prepared down to the minute. Unfortunately, the language barrier came into play again as I was posted at the registration table where some guests would come to me for assistance, while others waited to talk to a Cantonese speaker (there were 65 Wongs!). The hall was lavishly decorated and the speaker that I saw was very inspiring. 

 

One of our other big clients is in the automotive industry and I have been assigned the task of compiling a presentation for when they visit us in July, along with arranging for an exclusive with an international media outlet to do a story on them. Not my favorite, but an essential part of PR... Media pitching will begin shortly!
My week continued with additional research for an airline client regarding the new intelligent seating system called SeatBuddy by Satisfly. Pretty interesting results! In addition to daily research for current clients, I am currently creating a presentation for a potential client to showcase what we can do for them if they choose us to be their agency. I'm actually really excited about having the opportunity to be creative and learn more about design at the same time.

It's still early in the program, but so far, besides the language barriers and cultural differences, the business work and PR in general is exactly the same here as in the U.S. You still deal with the same issues and the same trials and tribulations. Intern work is tedious and not often the most glamorous, but it's essential and a good learning experience. 

I'll leave you with this quote by reiterating what I discovered my first day on the job.

"The art of communication is the language of leadership."                                                              - James Humes

...And especially in our field, communication is everything. 

The Chinese Way...

After flying half way around the world, I am now four days into my first week working at a global PR agency. I’m excited to apply the concepts I’ve learned during my first year of graduate school and eager to learn more about different cultures’ working environments.
                                                                        - Culture -
The biggest difference I’ve noticed thus far is the office culture. In the states, normal working hours are approximately 9am-5pm. However, I’ve realized that in HK people don’t come into work until 10am and it’s not uncommon for them to stay late into the night. For example, I’ve arrived at work by 9am every day this week as per requested on my contract, but besides the receptionist and a few other employees on the other side of the office, I’m the only one here. Throughout the day, everyone always appears to be hard at work or in meetings. Lunch is social time. Everyone eats together, whether they all go to the same restaurant or all order in. I didn’t realize that 1pm was the designated lunch time, but every day as soon as 1pm hits, everyone is out of their desks and off to lunch. It’s the little things that you don’t realize when you think of coming to a new company in a different country.  
                                                                      - Practice -
Our office concentrates on three areas of practice: Financial Communications, Corporate Technology, and Brand Marketing, and is split accordingly making it appear that the three parts don’t have much interaction (at least not that I have been included in yet, but it’s still early). I have also witnessed that the employees appear to be very set in their ways with not much room for change when a new employee comes onboard. Perhaps it’s just the busy time of the year, but I have been on my own without much guidance besides email exchanges from my supervisor since she’s usually in meetings or with clients. Hoping for more projects next week!
                                                                      -Language -
The other obvious cultural barrier is the language. Most everyone speaks Cantonese all of the time, even around me. A few nice colleagues have filled me in on what the discussion is about, but for the most part I am very quiet in the workplace. On that same note, I unfortunately can’t do a portion of my assigned work because I don’t speak the native tongue. The majority of the phone calls and contacts that I have and need to book through prefer native speakers. It’s a helpless feeling and at times I get the impression that the employees here would rather just do the work themselves instead of having to do it twice (once in English and once in Cantonese). I’m hopeful that after I’ve been here for a while then I will know which contacts I can communicate with and which I will have to pass onto someone else instead of waiting to hear back from them and potentially wasting people’s (very valuable) time. It’s all Greek to me.
                                                                  -Introductions -
So far, everyone has been very nice, welcoming and helpful. I toured around the entire office and was introduced to everyone that I could potentially be working with at some point. When they shook my hand they stood up from their desk first, looked me straight in the eyes, and spoke English. Even people that were away from their desk my first day have since sought me out and came to my desk to introduce themselves. A very nice welcome, to say the least!

The cultural barriers are many, but the experience is priceless.

View of the harbor from my office!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/business/global/24chinawork.html
Interesting article about the differences in work cultures between Americans and the Chinese - "In the West, there is such a premium on getting things done quickly, but when you come to work in China, you need to work on listening and being more patient and understanding of local ways of doing business."..."Likewise, America needs people who truly understand the Chinese, in order to compete and cooperate. Having Americans working alongside the Chinese in China 'is one of the best ways to cultivate and internalize this understanding in the future.'"