Does this sound familiar – your parents, siblings or friends asking: What do you actually do at Deutsche Telekom? I’m often asked this question, and to give you a better idea about what the practical part of a cooperative study program at Deutsche Telekom entails, I’m going to tell you a bit about what I do.
Varied, interesting and challenging are the adjectives that best describe the practical part of my work.
For the last semester, I have worked in the HR Marketing department at Deutsche Telekom. I support two colleagues, who also give me my own projects to work on. Our department covers many different areas, with experts in charge of various sub-sections such as online communications, school marketing and the planning and implementation of trade fairs and events.
Since my practical assignment began, I have focused primarily on planning, preparing and organizing career fairs and events. Over the course of a year, Deutsche Telekom participates in more than XXX such events. My duties include obtaining quotes and placing orders, then contacting the event hosts to clarify all the requisite framework conditions relating to the trade fair stand. The next task is to design, plan and order the stands, signs and furniture from various agencies. I collaborate with my business expert on this. It’s vital to ensure that nothing is forgotten, all bases are covered, and the various deadlines are met. Sometimes we have a really long ToDo list when there are several events coming up. Fortunately, I’m not alone, but part of a team.
Writing this blog on behalf of our communications team is another of my jobs. All cooperative students in our team regularly contribute to the career blog. We report on our lives as cooperative students at Deutsche Telekom to give readers a better insight into our everyday lives. This entails more than just a bit of writing. We have to research topics and coordinate publication dates, and of course we have to keep our readers interested, which isn’t always easy. But I find it fascinating, because while researching one topic you often stumble across an entirely different subject you knew nothing about, such as Deutsche Telekom’s handset recycling campaign.
Of course, this isn’t the only thing I am working on. As part of the communications team I also support the maintenance and ongoing training of KATY, our artificial intelligence-based career chatbot. We have to train the chatbot with questions and answers to maintain its intelligence. There are days when chatbot users post numerous questions which KATY is unable to answer automatically. In such cases, it’s down to me and my colleagues to teach the chatbot.
And what will my duties be in future practical semesters? My main areas of specialization will remain the same through to the end of my degree course, but thanks to our weekly team meetings, I gain lots of insights into other fields which I can also dip my toe into after discussion with my supervisor. I’lI keep you posted.
