Now that I am back at my home in York, Pennsylvania, I have had the time to truly reflect on my experience in Ireland and the memories I made as well as the things that I have learned. When looking back on the trip, I can identify my personal growth as coming from three major areas – site visits, guest speakers, and simply the experience of being abroad.
Both in the USA and in Ireland, I feel as though sight visits are so valuable as they truly give you an inside look at a company and the professional world in general that you simply couldn’t understand from the outside. In particular, it was interesting to see how the cultures at each company were so different, but in each case, they were still regarded as great places to work. It is also worth noting that the large multinational companies, like Google and Microsoft, have cultures focused on building a community and employee wellness that I haven’t seen during any of the site visits in Pittsburgh I have been on. Regarding culture, I think it is also important to note the diversity that was shown within each company. This was really highlighted at a company like Google where they had hundreds of nationalities, each with their own unique culture, represented. This really shows the importance and the emergence of a diverse workforce being desirable for companies. This ties into the idea of not being afraid of change or something different. As we have learned, there are many benefits of having different mindsets as it allows you to provide a solution more effectively to a problem as you will have multiple viewpoints on the issue. Along with this, we learned the importance of AI for every company we visited and how important AI will be for them moving forward. Although ThinkHouse has a more limited view of AI, every other company is working on implementing this new technology to make their processes more efficient and for Microsoft, to announce a whole new product line. This shows the importance of businesses being adaptable because in today’s world, everything is constantly changing, and businesses that aren’t able to keep up with this change will ultimately fail.
When looking back at the two guest speakers, I think both did a great job and taught me a lot of valuable lessons or skills that I plan on using going forward. Ellie focused her presentation on the importance of key competencies and personal branding during the recruitment process. The thing that stuck out to me the most is that employers care significantly more about the person you are and the soft skills you possess much more than what you accomplished or failed to accomplish. As someone who has also put a lot of stress and effort into getting good grades, it’s comforting to hear that these grades we get will not ultimately determine our career path or success. Although I will still try my best in school, it takes a lot of burden off my shoulders to know that you don’t need to be top of the class to be successful. The second speaker, Rob Cullen, taught us about the art of networking. I had never thought of networking as a skill that can be practiced, and I found some of the techniques he explained to be valuable. Also, I always thought of networking as how well you were able to speak to someone, but he stressed the importance of being a good listener as just as valuable of a skill.
Lastly, being in a foreign country for the first time taught me a lot about independence and confronting situations I normally wouldn’t be comfortable in. I have never been this far from home, and I only truly knew one person heading into the trip, so I was worried about feeling isolated or lonely during the experience. I can gladly say that this did not happen as I met a great group of people, with a group set of instructors, that truly made the trip a once-in-a-lifetime and gratifying experience. As Ely summed it up at one of our last dinners together, “I thought I was going to hate you guys, but you’re all good dudes.” I’m naturally an introvert, so I feel like being in a foreign country forced me to step out of my comfort zone and make some new long-lasting friendships. Also, I found myself making friends with a lot of locals during the trip. AKA I did what your parents advised against since birth; I talked to strangers. I feel like this is something I would’ve never done back in the USA, but some of the best conversations I had with people were with complete strangers on the side of the street or in a pub. Through these conversations, I was exposed to new viewpoints and an entirely new way of life. In all, this trip helped me with conversational skills that will be invaluable during the upcoming recruiting cycle and throughout my career networking.
