No matter the context, I have always been passionate about solving problems. The idea of taking on a challenge and working my way through it bit by bit to finally achieve it is what drives me. It is what I strive to do in my work, in my studies, in the sports I practice, in the music I play and in my personal life.
I believe that problem-solving goes hand in hand with creativity. To tackle a problem, one must be able to approach it from different angles and make links between seemingly unrelated concepts and facts. Throughout my experiences, I have practiced this ability to think creatively and connect things together. This is what I aim to demonstrate in the following descriptions of critical incidents. I will first describe how I turned a struggling temporary work agency around. Then, I will explain how I conducted Social Return on Investment Analysis for an upcycling and woman empowerment social enterprise in South Africa. Finally, I will detail how I designed an Enterprise Resource Planning software solution for a start-up web agency.
These experiences have contributed to shape the way I work, both in academic and professional environments. They have showed me the importance of patience and rigor and taught me to always seek efficiency.
I believe that problem-solving goes hand in hand with creativity. To tackle a problem, one must be able to approach it from different angles and make links between seemingly unrelated concepts and facts. Throughout my experiences, I have practiced this ability to think creatively and connect things together. This is what I aim to demonstrate in the following descriptions of critical incidents. I will first describe how I turned a struggling temporary work agency around. Then, I will explain how I conducted Social Return on Investment Analysis for an upcycling and woman empowerment social enterprise in South Africa. Finally, I will detail how I designed an Enterprise Resource Planning software solution for a start-up web agency.
These experiences have contributed to shape the way I work, both in academic and professional environments. They have showed me the importance of patience and rigor and taught me to always seek efficiency.
Turning around a struggling temporary work agency
In April 2014, I became Managing Director of a student-led temporary employment agency, Interface TC . Our 5-people team took over this organisation that had existed for fifteen years at the University of Caen, in France. When I became in charge, the agency was in a critical state: it had been running at a loss for several years, had low client satisfaction and had been imposed tax penalties because of internal mistakes.
However, I knew the organisation had the potential to be successful if it was managed well which I believed was my responsibility. Time was one of my biggest obstacles, as the degree I was studying was very demanding, with 36 hours of lectures a week and regular exams and oral presentations to prepare for.
To resolve that situation, I first assigned two members of my team to "clean up" the organisation by getting up-to-date fiscal-wise, putting in place new and well-organised archive systems and designing essential support documents. This way, the back office was efficient and ensured the fast and smooth running of operations. Meanwhile, I assigned another two members to select and phone a high number of prospective customers in order to gain new clients, whilst I set up meetings with existing ones and used my communication skills to strengthen relationships and reinstall trust. Moreover, besides managing the team and supervising operations, I set up Key Performance Indicators to monitor the agency's performance and conducted a thorough financial analysis to identify opportunities to cut costs and improve margins. I also used my marketing skills to design marketing material, such as posters and pamphlets, to increase brand notoriety both amongst prospective clients and students. In order to increase staff performance and therefore customer satisfaction, I set up a new recruiting system and conducted job interviews. Hiring the right staff necessitated great attention to details and excellent interpersonal skills. Finally, to ensure the long-term sustainability of the agency, I researched new services that could be offered and compiled my findings in a report for the use of the future teams.
Thanks to all these efforts the agency acquired several new clients, customer satisfaction increased, and profits occurred for the first time in 5 years, allowing us to help finance three society projects on campus. This experience of running an agency was extremely rewarding. It has provided me with confidence and many useful transferable skills, such as leadership, teamworking and effective communication abilities. I learned to effectively delegate tasks and acquired excellent organisational skills. In addition, I have used these skills to be efficient in group project at University, such as group presentations, and they proved to be very useful. They also helped me thrive in the positions I held in Societies on Campus, especially those who involved managing teams. Furthermore, it prepared me for the workplace, as these abilities are, I believe, essential to thrive at work.
However, I knew the organisation had the potential to be successful if it was managed well which I believed was my responsibility. Time was one of my biggest obstacles, as the degree I was studying was very demanding, with 36 hours of lectures a week and regular exams and oral presentations to prepare for.
To resolve that situation, I first assigned two members of my team to "clean up" the organisation by getting up-to-date fiscal-wise, putting in place new and well-organised archive systems and designing essential support documents. This way, the back office was efficient and ensured the fast and smooth running of operations. Meanwhile, I assigned another two members to select and phone a high number of prospective customers in order to gain new clients, whilst I set up meetings with existing ones and used my communication skills to strengthen relationships and reinstall trust. Moreover, besides managing the team and supervising operations, I set up Key Performance Indicators to monitor the agency's performance and conducted a thorough financial analysis to identify opportunities to cut costs and improve margins. I also used my marketing skills to design marketing material, such as posters and pamphlets, to increase brand notoriety both amongst prospective clients and students. In order to increase staff performance and therefore customer satisfaction, I set up a new recruiting system and conducted job interviews. Hiring the right staff necessitated great attention to details and excellent interpersonal skills. Finally, to ensure the long-term sustainability of the agency, I researched new services that could be offered and compiled my findings in a report for the use of the future teams.
Thanks to all these efforts the agency acquired several new clients, customer satisfaction increased, and profits occurred for the first time in 5 years, allowing us to help finance three society projects on campus. This experience of running an agency was extremely rewarding. It has provided me with confidence and many useful transferable skills, such as leadership, teamworking and effective communication abilities. I learned to effectively delegate tasks and acquired excellent organisational skills. In addition, I have used these skills to be efficient in group project at University, such as group presentations, and they proved to be very useful. They also helped me thrive in the positions I held in Societies on Campus, especially those who involved managing teams. Furthermore, it prepared me for the workplace, as these abilities are, I believe, essential to thrive at work.
Conducting SROI Analysis for a Women Empowerment Social Enterprise in South Africa
I spent my Junior Honours year studying abroad at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. Conscious of the crippling social issues of this country, I thought it would be particularly interesting to study Social Entrepreneurship in that context and I enrolled in a Social Impact Enterprise course. The main assignment of this subject was to work in a team to conduct in-depth Social Return on Investment analysis for a South African social business.
The first step was to find a social enterprise willing to work with us. I researched and emailed a number of organisations, detailing the nature of the project and highlighting its potential benefits for them in order to convince them to take part. After a couple of days, a social business that aimed to empower women through upcycling used plastic bottles agreed to take us on as social consultants. We only had just under three months to conduct a thorough and demanding analysis. I was in charge of project management, and in order to meet this tight deadline I broke the project up into small, achievable steps with defined deadlines. Then, I used my research skills to conduct interviews with the founder and manager of the organisation and with some of their employees to get more insight into the business. Some of the employees only spoke a little English and good communication skills and patience were thus necessary to acquire accurate data. Next, I completed the acquired information by conducting more research using the internet and academic sources, and analysed the data collected by drawing on theoretical models and frameworks and organised it into themes.
Before the final deadline my team and I delivered a 12,000-word report to our client detailing our findings in four distinct categories: Financial Sustainability, Leadership, Sustainable Social Impact and Environmental Awareness. The report provided valuable insights to the client on their social impact and on how to adjust their strategy accordingly. We received the high grade of 80% for our work, the third best grade of the class. Thanks to this experience I further developed my project management, teamwork, research and analytical skills. Furthermore, I learned a lot about social entrepreneurship and impact measurement, and I am now considering pursuing a career in this sector.
The first step was to find a social enterprise willing to work with us. I researched and emailed a number of organisations, detailing the nature of the project and highlighting its potential benefits for them in order to convince them to take part. After a couple of days, a social business that aimed to empower women through upcycling used plastic bottles agreed to take us on as social consultants. We only had just under three months to conduct a thorough and demanding analysis. I was in charge of project management, and in order to meet this tight deadline I broke the project up into small, achievable steps with defined deadlines. Then, I used my research skills to conduct interviews with the founder and manager of the organisation and with some of their employees to get more insight into the business. Some of the employees only spoke a little English and good communication skills and patience were thus necessary to acquire accurate data. Next, I completed the acquired information by conducting more research using the internet and academic sources, and analysed the data collected by drawing on theoretical models and frameworks and organised it into themes.
Before the final deadline my team and I delivered a 12,000-word report to our client detailing our findings in four distinct categories: Financial Sustainability, Leadership, Sustainable Social Impact and Environmental Awareness. The report provided valuable insights to the client on their social impact and on how to adjust their strategy accordingly. We received the high grade of 80% for our work, the third best grade of the class. Thanks to this experience I further developed my project management, teamwork, research and analytical skills. Furthermore, I learned a lot about social entrepreneurship and impact measurement, and I am now considering pursuing a career in this sector.
Designing an Enterprise Resource Planning software solution
At the end of my final year of University in France, I secured a 4-month internship in a web agency. One of the projects I was asked to take on was the creation of a new Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software solution. The current system was out-of-date and complex to use. It was slowing down operations in a fast expansion time for the business, which therefore needed maximum efficiency more than ever.
The first step I took was reviewing the old ERP. I analysed it thoroughly, identifying its strengths and weaknesses, and consulted my co-workers who had been working with it for a long time in order to get their feedback and ideas for improvement. I then designed a new structure and new functionalities, with the constant goals of simplicity and efficiency. This step required me to work very closely with the technical team to make sure my ideas were feasible and well-understood. It was sometimes a challenge and required excellent communication and argumentation skills to convince the technical team of the importance of having the simplest user interface possible, when they did not understand the interest of making it user-friendly as it was for internal use. Once the main structure was designed, I collaborated with a graphic designer to present the information in a clear and attractive way. I then supervised the construction of the system, ran tests and gathered feedback for continuous improvement.
The company quickly saw a boost in productivity by using the newly-designed ERP, and my co-workers and managers were very pleased with the user-friendly interface and the convenient functionalities. Later on, the model I had designed was even used to sell personalised ERP systems for clients. When I took on this project, software design was a completely unknown territory for me. Therefore, leading this project successfully provided me with adaptability and fast self-learning abilities. Besides, collaborating with web developers and graphic designers gave me experience in working in a team of diverse backgrounds and personalities, as well as abilities to influence and understand different points of view.
The first step I took was reviewing the old ERP. I analysed it thoroughly, identifying its strengths and weaknesses, and consulted my co-workers who had been working with it for a long time in order to get their feedback and ideas for improvement. I then designed a new structure and new functionalities, with the constant goals of simplicity and efficiency. This step required me to work very closely with the technical team to make sure my ideas were feasible and well-understood. It was sometimes a challenge and required excellent communication and argumentation skills to convince the technical team of the importance of having the simplest user interface possible, when they did not understand the interest of making it user-friendly as it was for internal use. Once the main structure was designed, I collaborated with a graphic designer to present the information in a clear and attractive way. I then supervised the construction of the system, ran tests and gathered feedback for continuous improvement.
The company quickly saw a boost in productivity by using the newly-designed ERP, and my co-workers and managers were very pleased with the user-friendly interface and the convenient functionalities. Later on, the model I had designed was even used to sell personalised ERP systems for clients. When I took on this project, software design was a completely unknown territory for me. Therefore, leading this project successfully provided me with adaptability and fast self-learning abilities. Besides, collaborating with web developers and graphic designers gave me experience in working in a team of diverse backgrounds and personalities, as well as abilities to influence and understand different points of view.