The Intern Takeaway: Sales & Marketing
Hello! My name is Chuan Ying and I was a Sales and Marketing intern working under the Marketing team at FoodRazor. Before FoodRazor, I was about to begin my final year of university education. I had always wanted to do an internship with a start-up, but the Covid situation put a halt to those plans. When the opportunity to do a part-time internship with FoodRazor during my university semester arose, I immediately signed up for it.
It was an interesting time, to say the least. With my friends mostly gunning for banking internships or with other huge corporations, going to a start-up initially felt like a regressive move, but I went for it anyway. It turned out to be so much more enriching and fulfilling than I had dreamt of. Let me share some of the key takeaways from the experience.
Being Part of a Start-Up
As an intern at FoodRazor, I was tasked to assist the team in various sales and marketing related goals. I prepared pitch decks for potential customers and investors and managed the company’s online presence through social media and ad campaigns, on top of other tasks. This is where the start-up experience truly kicked in.
As an intern, FoodRazor did not treat me with much hand-holding and trusted me with the same responsibilities as anyone else. It was a steep learning curve for many aspects of the internship as I was expected to learn fast and handle various tools, such as the Google Marketing Platform (Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, etc.). I also had to adapt quickly and hone my problem-solving skills to think outside the box. While working with limited resources and funding, I had to be creative to deliver results. This really pushed me to take the initiative to stay on top of things and strive to make a difference.
Being a part of a start-up meant working with a small team and only having each other to rely on. On top of my daily responsibilities, I also had to work closely with the rest of the team on bigger projects and help each other out in whatever ways we could. In some moments, it was all hands on deck. I recalled a time where I had to have a crash course on video editing with Final Cut Pro to help with video editing for a project due in 48 hours. Without a doubt, the start-up environment was action-packed.
Sense of Belonging
One element I will really miss about FoodRazor is definitely the people. They are a big part of what made my time here so enjoyable. A big part of FoodRazor culture lies in the team’s approachability and selflessness in helping each other. With such a small team, they truly felt like family. The FoodRazor team was diverse (from many different countries and backgrounds!) and came from all walks of life, but these differences were easily bridged as we formed strong bonds through our time working together.
During my first few weeks at FoodRazor, the team also took the effort to make me feel extra welcomed. Even though I was their newest member, I was invited to a Christmas party with the team, where we had a really good laugh and learnt more about each other.
It's Christmas time! (Me at the bottom left-hand corner)
Despite the pandemic currently keeping most of us working from home, it was not enough to keep us apart. Even in Singapore’s Covid-19 Phase 2 restrictions, FoodRazor held weekly happy hours on Friday evenings to get together online to chat about our week and our lives while having a drink (or two).
Goodbye for now?
All in all, I can confidently say that this internship has given me a unique perspective on start-ups and also imbued in me a set of soft and hard skills that will definitely serve me well in my future career. I am also glad to have formed lasting friendships with the team at FoodRazor and I am thankful to have had the opportunity to work alongside them.
Me and the team again!
The experience at this start-up has definitely fueled my drive to learn more and be more. I guess this is goodbye, but I would definitely recommend anyone looking for a fruitful experience working in a start-up to consider FoodRazor. It was a wonderful experience for me and I know it will be for you too.
