My internship experience in London was my first time working a full-time job. Through that experience, I learned how to maintain a healthy work-life balance and how to work towards personal goals outside of the office. Surprisingly, I found that in doing so, I drew upon my experience not only as a college student but also (and perhaps more so) from my time in high school.

In London, I worked in data management for a venture builder (a venture capital company that invests in companies it helps create). My hours were 9:30 to 4:45 for four days a week (I had Fridays off). Additionally, my commute was roughly half an hour. While in London, I also wanted to tour the city and other parts of the United Kingdom, maintain a regular gym routine, prepare for graduate school, study theology (a newfound hobby while in London), and read a few books. With these lofty goals, I had to draw on the hard-work strategies I had developed in college as well as the motivation strategies I learned in high school (after all, no one really wants to do more work after an eight-hour shift).

To achieve my goals, I worked to find a way to relax after work without falling into the trap of losing motivation to eventually get up and start working again. Here, I found the most success by walking somewhere other than my apartment after my shift; this was especially helpful with achieving my goal of exploring London. By going somewhere other than my “home base,” I kept myself in a “go-go-go” mentality while also enjoying myself. However, this strategy was difficult to implement given the number of places in London that closed after 5 PM. I realize that this strategy is the same I use unconsciously at Pitt; I would rarely return to my dorm until I finished all my work for the day. So, while I didn’t technically discover a new time management strategy, I was able to codify one I was already using – which assures that I will be able to knowingly continue it after my transition from college to the workforce.

In London, I also learned the importance of proactive communication. In college, I am used to looking things up online to figure things out and going to scheduled office hours to meet with a professor, and I wouldn’t recognize that I was struggling with something until I received a poor grade on an assignment or test, meaning that I would wait until then before seeking help. The problem with that mentality in the workforce is that your boss doesn’t have office hours, nor does he or she want to receive work riddled with mistakes because you didn’t understand something. Thus, I had to become comfortable with recognizing when I was struggling and with reaching out ahead of time to concisely explain my issue. This required a lot of active self-reflection and humility to be able to recognize when I could not understand or accomplish something accurately, and to then reveal that to another rather than save face and consult the internet instead (which has so much information on it that it can be difficult to find an answer that makes sense and/or meets my boss’s standards).

Now, two months later, I recognize that this practicum in self-reflection, humility, and proactive communication has made me more comfortable with starting conversations with strangers, which allows me not only to correct mistakes more quickly but also to learn from people I would have otherwise never conversed with.