Laurel Miller

It took me three weeks to get hooked up to a printer. Typically at Cigna you get assigned a “routing” which which describes where your desk is located, and you automatically get set your account set up with a printer that corresponds to that routing. However, I was given the same routing as my manager, which seems sensible, but my manager actually works in Bloomfield, CT, so for a while I was printing things and they were appearing in Connecticut. It took several weeks for me to get the approvals to use Philadelphia printers.

One of the most important things i had to find out on my own during my internship was contacting our IT department. During the summer, one of my network drives wasn’t appearing on my computer. I noticed that on my work phone there was a number to call IT, so i called that number and had to go through a process to place a ticket with the IT department. This is not something that they showed us in orientation, but it is definitely a useful tool that I found out about on my own. Another important thing I found out on my own was how to use the printer/scanner/fax. It was one of those very large and confusing printers, so it took a week or two to figure it out completely on my own. There was also printer etiquette that I had to quickly pick up on, so I did not slow up or annoy any of my colleagues if they were in the middle of printing something.

I’ve been very lucky during my time at Comcast to be surrounded by people who are always willing to help answer questions, offer guidance and mentoring, and reset me in the right direction when I’m “lost” in finding out how the business world really works. When I first started, I couldn’t figure out how the elevators worked for at least a week. There are 4 elevator banks, each only servicing certain floors in the building. Luckily, with some trial and error and some help from other interns, I found my way. After I was with the company for a few months, a new intern was hired and I got to teach her how they worked too. As far as company culture goes, I learned that it is customary to call everyone by first name, and it is acceptable to reach out to VP level employees and below with questions. SVP and above should be contacted through their assistant. That was a big change for me! I still don’t know everything, however, and recently I was in need of cleaning supplies while I was reorganizing and cleaning the storage closet on our floor that we use for computer/iPad storage, marketing materials, etc. I used our employee portal to find the facilities request and was taken care of quickly. Learning new things every day!

I am fortunate to have a boss who is very friendly and willing to introduce us to many different people at Subaru headquarters. Since the summer, I have had the opportunity to meet many people in every department of the company. The company culture at Subaru is relaxed especially compared to other car manufacturers (from what I’ve heard). Generally, everyone is friendly and willing to lend a hand in any way possible. My department, Field Operations, works closely with requests from the executives so we are on a first name basis with these individuals. The COO of Subaru, Tom Doll, is very down-to-earth and embodies the company’s culture in his role. I enjoy the work environment at Subaru very much.

Artemid Leskaj
When I started working at FIS I was so pleased to see how welcoming everyone was. I was immediately introduced to the team and taken around the company to see where things were. I liked how FIS had their own Keurig 3000 coffee machines (I remember the name because I used it quite frequently), lounge, cafeteria etc. for people to go to during their free time. At FIS i was provided with a login account to access the computers. I worked on learning how to use it on my own. I was also provided with an access card to the building. To go anywhere you would need one of these cards. I used the card to travel around and about. If there was a problem somewhere in the building the card would grant me access to that area. You always had to scan to enter anywhere. FIS also had these high tech printers that were pretty complicated at first. If there was a problem with them I had to go and fix it. I quickly learned how to work with these printers because I wanted to be ready in case something were to occur.

Most departments at IBC held multiple interns in each department when I started, but I was the first intern my department had ever had at IBC. This meant that for the first few days I was busy trying to figure out most things on my own or asking people how to do things. For example, I believe there are a total of 20 or so elevators at IBC and each set goes to a specific set of floors, so you might have to go to a specific elevator to get to the 23rd floor, and then find the next elevator shaft to get to the 44th floor. Furthermore, in health care there is a huge amount of acronyms used on a daily basis. For most people working there, they understood all of them because that is what they were used to, but I had no idea what any of them meant when I first got there so I was constantly looking up new acronyms. Luckily I caught on pretty quick and everyone around me was willing to help me find whatever I needed.

Day one things got rolling quickly, I was set up with a computer, log in information, designated phone and assigned number, email information, and lots of paper work to fill out. USI Affinity wasted no time in getting me set up but I quickly learned that there was no formal internship training since I was the first intern that USI Affinity had hired. Being the youngest individual in the office and lacking a structural program I asked many questions, learned quickly, and made an attempt to be involved in every project I could be. That meant I had to request to shadow other staff members in different departments and joining up on projects that were outside my comfort zone. The most important value I learned is that everyone who assigns you a task will state it is important and needs to be completed immediately. Then you have to prioritize based on the position title of the individual assigning the task.

While working at IMS, I can do a majority of the work remotely from where ever there’s internet access. So most of the time I don’t need to go into the office unless it’s a new assignment and my boss wants to sit down and explain the objectives. While working at home my account password notified me, that my account was going to expire unless I updated and changed my account. So I went and changed my password and didn’t realize or know I needed to be on-site to change the password. Not sure why but I guess for security purposes. When I changed my password off site it locked me out of my computer and I ended up having to go in and call tech support. Which was very helpful and fixed the issue very quickly. As far as finding the bathrooms or other company culture during initial training everyone was very helpful in explaining where the bathrooms, break-rooms, lunch-rooms are and what the policies are for how long or when you can take lunch or a break etc…

Firstly, being a family owned business the culture at the store is highly personal, and involves building relationships and trust. My first week at the store included making the owners comfortable with me. Secondly, the computer systems used for inventory management and making purchase order did not require any password, anyone was able to login to the system. I convinced the owners to allow me to install security features that would help the secure the store’s privacy in the long run. Lastly, the locations of the office, bathroom, and break room were some of the important things that I had to find on my own as an operations analyst.

One of the more important things that I’ve had to learn on my own, and never really put much thought into before starting my internship was where to go for my one hour lunch break. The Food Services Department usually provides a small cart of new foods they are trying out in multiple schools, but that always runs out fast. Luckily, being located on Broad Street right near Spring Garden there are quite a few locations that are with in walking distance to the School District Headquarters that have good eats! There are many small pizza places and Chinese restaurants, but so far my favorite spot I’ve found to go would have to be Bain’s Deli. Nothing beats a good hoagie at a 10% discount for showing your student ID!

I had to learn and adjust to the culture at SAP on my own. The culture of the company has been one of the most pleasant surprises. SAP is a German company, like most european companies, they have a great work/life balance. The work environment gives off a completely different vibe than the America based companies I have interned before. At SAP, almost everyone enjoys their job and buys into the company goal; most importantly, everyone has a life outside of work. At SAP, everyone is on a first name bases, and seem to have a more personal relationship with those they work with. This was something I was not use to at first, since then it has turned into one of the highlights of my SAP experience.

I was surprised by the level of camaraderie among among employees and their bosses. Although I didn’t expect attitudes to be standoffish, I thought that the hierarchy of roles within the department would matter more in personal relationships. At first, I was very guarded with my supervisors because that’s what I assumed the relationship to be, but now I have a much more direct line of communication with them.

I currently work at Independence Blue Cross as an Operations and Support Government Markets Intern. I began in June of 2014 where I started as a Business Process Improvement Intern. I was responsible for designing and creating a SharePoint site through the use of HTML, CSS, and PHP for the department, and when complete I transitioned to Operations and Government Markets to design a new SharePoint site based on the needs of the department. Currently I am in charge of the maintenance and addition of new features on the site, ensuring that items are easy to access and that the design is easy to follow for new users.

I am working for the Imaging and Workflow team at Temple University’s Computer Services department. I have been working here since July 2014. Currently, I am responsible for modifying existing programs that automatically import documents for different departments across Temple. This involves mostly working in Visual Basic to help automate the process of getting the documents to where they need to go. This week I’ve been working on a program for the Admissions department, and it is almost good to go.

I currently work at Yoh Services as a contract Data Steward for IMS Health. I starting working as a Data Steward July of 2014 on a three month contract, and after the contract expired I was brought on part-time to work during school. While working at IMS, I have contributed to a number of Master Data Management(MDM) projects for various Pharmaceutical clients. Projects I’ve worked on have mostly been using Excel and researching IMS internal databases for quality check/data governance efforts to provide the client with a best match resolution. I started work a few month’s ago on another MDM project in which my manager and I are developing the standard operating procedures and would eventually have me as the project lead for this portion of the project. I look forward to continuing to improve and learn from the Data Steward position at Yoh Services.

Artemid Leskaj
My place of work was at FIS, one of the fortune 500. It’s quite an honor working for such a large company. I gained a lot of experience of how the corporate world worked. During my time at FIS I worked as an infrastructure engineer. I dealt with a lot of everyday problems, those including fixing and/or upgrading or working directly with FIS’s clients. Here is where I gained a lot of customer service skills as well. The building where FIS was located was also occupied by one of its clients. Whenever there was a problem I would personally go and fix it. I dealt with clients who had hardware and software problems, considering my major it made it a great experience.

I am currently employed as an operation analyst at Cherry Hill Liquors located in Cherry Hill NJ. I have been working here for a year now. My job responsibilities include analyzing unstructured data to forecast customer-buying trends. I use advance Microsoft Excel functionality such data analysis tool pack, pivot tables, v-lookup etc. to perform detailed analysis of customer behaviors of various demographics such as age, ethnicity and physical location. I prepare a biweekly analysis report of customer buying patterns, and use it to establish the price-point for the products. I am also responsible for reconciling expenditure on inventory and perform routine maintenance on store as well as updated Point of Sale System Systems.

Pushpinder Multani

I am currently working at Comcast in the Comcast Business division in Philadelphia, PA. I began working for Comcast Business in May of 2013 and will continue working as an intern until graduation this May. I have been given the opportunity to work on a variety of projects, including sales and marketing effectiveness analysis using Salesforce.com and a variety of Excel-based analytics. I also provide weekly reports with Excel graphs and tables to senior management outlining sales growth broken down by region, division, etc. I look forward to the possibility of staying onboard with Comcast Business upon graduation.

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I am currently working at Trion Group, an employee benefits brokerage firm that is a subsidiary of Marsh and McLennan Agencies. I started working at Trion this past summer as an underwriting intern in the Life and Disability department. I am currently working part time there during the school year and am working there full-time after I graduate in May. As an underwriter, it is my job to price insurance rates based on previous experience of a group. The average day for me at my job revolves mostly around Excel. I am constantly using Pivot Tables to help me better understand and analyze data. I also have been using SharePoint a lot recently. When a client’s plan is up for renewal, insurance carriers will try to bid for our clients business. Insurance carriers will place all the necessary documents onto SharePoint and we will go in there and grab them. I am excited to graduate so I can concentrate more on my career and gain more responsibility within my position.

I’m currently working at Cigna on the Enterprise Architecture Infrastructure Architecture team. My work is project based, and currently I’m working on a project that aims to consolidate all of Cigna’s data from disparate systems into one searchable repository. There’s some development work, a lot of networking work, and a lot of business analysis-style work. I’m the owner of the user interface aspect of the project, which means I am in charge of managing the resources for this portion of the project. As the Spring continues, I will also begin work on some other projects that are scheduled to run through this Summer and Fall.

I am currently working at Subaru of America, Inc. in Cherry Hill, NJ. I began working at Subaru in May 2014 as a Field Operations Intern. The internships lasts for a full year so I will end the position in May 2015. Since starting at Subaru, I have had the opportunity of working on a wide variety of projects that involved many different departments in the company. The Field Operations department deals with sales on a national level. Much of the work I do involved sales analysis and reporting using Excel, JD Power Pin Explorer, and Polk Insight. On a weekly basis, I study the retailer purchase and service satisfaction survey results as well as the traffic that took place within the retailers on a national basis. I am hoping to secure a position with Subaru of America after graduating in May.

Hi everyone, I am currently interning at SAP America as a Global Services Delivery intern. I have been and will continue to work on the SAP Global ONE Service Implementation Methodology. ONE Service is essentially the roadmap for implementation used by our sales and support team. My duties include updating the WBS database, enhancing the SAP Jam site and updating our PMI implementation courses. I will also be taking on other responsibilities and projects throughout the semester.