Two weeks ago, I knew nothing about consulting. In fact, if someone were to ask me to explain what consulting was, I don’t think I could have given them a legitimate answer. After my first week at diiVe, that has completely changed.
The main reason I chose to intern for diiVe was because of its educational component. Like I said, I didn’t know much about consulting. However, as an economics student, I began to think consulting could be a potential career path. Rather than being thrown head first into a consulting project, I was looking for something more educational. This was the reason diiVe was so appealing to me. I wanted to learn consulting knowledge and business skills in a direct way, then apply these skills to an actual project thereafter. This is what diiVe is all about.
Although the first week consisted of many laborious online sessions (which I’ll admit was tough at times), the skills I learned in only one week have been truly indispensable. Professionals of the field taught us everything from strategy consulting to creating change in our communities. Moreover, after learning knowledge and skills through presentations, we were given the opportunities to apply these skills in groups in subsequent sessions (my personal favorite part of each day). In addition to concrete knowledge, these activities also allowed me to improve my presentation, speaking, and teamwork skills. I personally found this extremely valuable because, even if I decide not to pursue consulting as a career, I can apply these assets to other jobs.
One highlight from the first week was planning a birthday party. After learning about effective teaming and agile work environments, our assignment was to plan a birthday party for a diiVe employee in teams. I’ll admit, upon hearing this, I was a bit confused on how this activity was relevant. Additionally, I didn’t think this would be very challenging to accomplish. However, after being thrown into this task, I realized that the only way to plan a successful birthday party was to apply the teamwork skills we learned in the previous session. This activity involved doing research on what this employee liked, talking with this employee and her friends, and effectively budgeting for the party. To do these things effectively in a short amount of time, we had to work in an agile way. This ended up being my favorite activity of the entire week in addition to one of the most valuable.
While working online for numerous hours in a day can be difficult, each session completely flew by. The knowledge I’ve learned, skills I’ve developed, and people I’ve met have been extremely memorable and important. I can’t wait to apply these skills to a project next week and continue this journey!
Cameron Riley
A student at Middlebury College majoring in Economics, with a double minor in Political Science and Film. He hopes to pursue a career related to finance, economics, and/or government work.
