FREYA GARCIA

First Internship Scaries: How to Time & Project Manage

Managing multiple projects is no easy feat, especially when it comes to your very first internship. No matter how big or small it may seem, if you’re at a corporate office like me, or working for a start-up with only a couple co-workers, management is crucial to the success of any project. Things can get lost, especially with countless emails, projects, assignments, follow-ups, and more, hitting your inbox daily. Having an organization system that works for you, your space, and your workload is detrimental to success as an intern and how you’ll be successful in future jobs.

In my internship this summer as a Corporate Marketing and Graphic Design intern for real estate developer LV Collective, I have learned to manage not only multiple projects but multiple projects across three different student properties, multifamily projects, corporate projects, and the company’s coffee shops. Managing multiple projects was and still is something I had to learn and learn fast when transitioning from my spring internship managing multiple projects from one property to this summer, managing multiple projects across multiple properties. I view multitasking and organization as two of my top strengths, which I also see as being integral to managing multiple projects.

During this internship, I have learned a lot about my organization and task management skills. Even though I am confident in my skills in project management, multitasking, and organization, I learned to adapt to my managers and coworkers’ tasks for me and mitigated any issues along the way. I learned to be as productive as possible with my tasks and utilize my organizational skills as best I can, adjusting along the way to fit with my office culture’s needs and prioritizing tasks based on importance and deadlines. I learned a lot about myself and office life, but the main things that helped me manage so many projects was a good organization system that worked for me, how to say no, and learning what exactly your managers are particular about.

At the top of Waterloo Tower at our Grand Opening this past July 2022!

So how exactly did I learn to be organized? It varies for everyone, but I’ll let you in on what works best for me. I personally used both a written and digital system to hold myself accountable for due dates. Something that was hard for me at first was understanding specific things didn’t have harsh deadlines as they’d need to go through multiple people for approval, so both writing down and keeping tabs on our online system, Asana, when I did a certain draft or followed up with each project helped me keep track of where I was at on all my different projects and which needed to be submitted, edited, or followed up with. I also received all my projects through email, so things got lost fast. Even if I have something I need to do or follow up with is written down and on Asana, it’s easy to get overwhelmed by the number of emails, potentially missing something important, so I had to get to organizing my inbox. Different than some my co-worker’s way of organizing their emails to folders after responding, I found it was best to pin each project to the top of my inbox and keep them up there until the project was closed. I also make it a point to keep my inbox to 0 and delete all unnecessary emails. I keep all project emails in my inbox that are finished but categorize them, so I know what project it’s for and which property it pertains to in case I need to reference it in the future.

Another big thing I learned in terms of project management was how to say no and just how repetitive things can get, and how frustrating some design things may be when it comes to editing. One of my projects was to edit styled floorplans from the leasing exhibit sent over by the architectural team for our student developments, Sweetwater, and Whistler. Mark, our Design Manager, taught me how to record and preform actions in Photoshop to apply to over 50 floorplans to style them. He styled the 77 floorplans for Rambler I used to populate into the styled decks, so he wanted me to learn how to do the rest. At first, Mark and I were trying to edit both the fonts and colors, but when we opened the pdf to edit the fonts, the fonts populated as boxes and not editable links, meaning I’d have to re-type every single box. So, Mark and I decided unless we got embedded fonts directly from the architect, we would need to say no on changing the fonts, which Lauren, my manager/Director of Marketing, and Kendall, our Chief Marketing Officer, approved and had us only change the colors. From then on, they’d ask if any project was too overwhelming and made sure I had the support I needed to finish each project diligently and thoroughly, setting me up for success.

I learned a lot of things during my internship, but what helped me the most was once you learn what your managers are particular about, especially when it comes to graphic design, it is much easier to design based on knowing what exactly they like and don’t like, cutting design processes down by several days. For things like signage, getting to production faster. I usually had feedback on minor tweaks for a few projects here and there, but for the first leasing presentation for Sweetwater leasing signage, I was so happy when Kendall and Lauren replied and said they looked perfect to send over to David, our CEO and Chelsea, our Director of Interiors, for them to select which options I created were the best. I also learned by presenting each design project in a deck, mocked up, and not as random pngs, helps them to visualize exactly which design is right for each project. From then forward, I mocked up each of the leasing presentations to look as if each design was already set up in their respective offices.  

In the future, I’ll be using everything I learned during my time at LV in all my future professional and academic efforts. Not only did I learn how managing graphic design and marketing works in real estate development, but how to better manage projects through interacting with co-workers as well – Professionally, I’ll have already had the experience with co-workers in both a remote and in-person setting, and how to communicate both professionally and appropriately to get things done as accurately and best as possible. Academically, I can apply what I’ve learned by keeping the same level of professionalism, when appropriate, with my professors and peers. Management wise, the workload I’ll get at school will likely be a lot more, so I’ll be prepared to organize and get my assignments finished as thoroughly as possible.

Moving forward, I’m currently coordinating getting my projects up in each leasing office – signage and interior floorplates, so I am excited to learn about how the process works and how to communicate best in a B2B sense, and seeing my hard work come to life. However, I’m most excited and proud of branding Sweetwater, and am so thankful for my managers and co-workers for letting me brand such a beautiful project. I’m most proud of how my mockups and branding has turned out, so I’m excited to see it all come together!