Georgetown MBA Internship Diary: Alexis

Presentations and more presentations....

It's hard to believe this will be the last week of my Nike internship!The past few weeks have been great, but action packed- which is why I haven't posted a blog entry for a while.

Two weeks ago, a Corporate Audit teammate and I presented our project's preliminary findings at our department's monthly employee meeting. Thanks to the fact that I had taken a Management Communications class at Georgetown, I was pretty comfortable with the idea of giving a presentation to our department of 30 people. I still felt some butterflies, but, in the end, the presentation was a success- and hopefully provided the other members of the Nike Corporate Audit team with some key takeaways that they can use in their upcoming audits.

On Tuesday of this week I wrapped up my portion of the team's process audit. So, I was able to focus more-so on my extracurricular intern project- the Corporate Responsibility Case Competition in which my team came up with an innovative idea of how Nike can improve upon its Compliance standards. Given the size of our team and the minimal amount of time to present, I didn't actually present at the competition, but I did help out with organizing our presentation and giving feedback to the presenters during practice.  In the end, our team didn't win the case competition, but I was very proud of the work we pulled together. We also got some good feedback from Hannah Jones, the VP of Corporate Responsibility at Nike, and from the case competition's "Special Guest", Phil Knight.

All in all, this summer has been fantastic. I have to admit, though, that I'm getting really excited to get back to DC and see my friends and family.

The International Side of Corporate Audit

As of this week, my Corporate Audit team is wrapping up the fieldwork phase of our audit and moving into reporting. The Lead Auditor and Manager on my project have been wonderful in letting me lead client interviews- both in person and over conference calls. In the last two weeks I have met with so many employees at Nike- and have taken part in meetings with Nike Greece, Nike Mexico, Nike Russia, and the European Headquarters- which is based in the Netherlands.

The international aspect of my job is one of the things I like most about Corporate Audit. Since we cover the audits across Nike, Inc., my team gets to know the processes and cultures of many of the international Nike offices, and those of the Nike Affiliates (Cole Haan, Converse, Nike Golf, and Umbro). Since I'm pursuing my International Business Diplomacy certificate at Georgetown's MBA program, I love the fact that I'm able to apply my learning about doing business abroad- to my every-day job.

On a side note, my husband visited me last weekend and got to witness first-hand how beautiful Portland is in the summer. Below are a few pictures of our trip to Mt.Hood.

 

LeBron and Trevor

Believe it or not, the questions I get asked most often about my Nike internship experience are not about Nike's culture nor about the 3-dimensional Nike corporate matrix. The two most common questions I get asked are 1) if I'll get to go to the summer Olympics and 2) if I've had any celebrity sightings. Unfortunately, I won't be heading off to Beijing any time soon, but I have had a few athlete sightings in the past five weeks.

My first week at Nike, Trevor Immelman, winner of the 08' Masters, made an appearance at our end-of-the-fiscal-year party. Then, last week, LeBron James, sporting a Roger Federer baseball cap, showed up on campus for a Beijing send-off party and played P.I.G. and Guitar Hero against some of the Nike employees (including an MBA intern).

It's occasions like the ones I mentioned above that make Nike an even-more fabulous place to work. As my husband recently put it after a visit to Portland and the Nike campus: "who wouldn't love seeing their heroes at work every day?"

CR-eate Competition

A few weeks ago, the Nike interns began a case-like competition to develop a CR (Corporate Responsibility) initiative. Ultimately, interested interns were divided up into four teams of approximately ten interns each, and given a chance to develop and then present a CR-related strategy to Nike Corporate Responsibility representatives at the end of the summer.

Each team is focusing on one of Nike's four CR platforms: Climate, Community, Compliance, or Considered. Although my original team chose Community, I eventually switched to another team that was developing a compliance initiative- which was much closer aligned with my interests in operations. Now, I have the chance to help develop a prototypical program that would make Nike's supply chain more sustainable by the year 2015, and then present that initiative to Nike management!

I am really excited to take part in this project and am certain that Georgetown's MBA curriculum has prepared me for success. Specifically, I plan to pull in my experience from two of my favorite 1st-year classes: Professor Soule's business ethics class- where my 5-person team and I reviewed Coca Cola Enterprise's CRS (corporate responsibility and sustainability) report and presented our suggested changes to executive management; and Professor Heino's communications class (which was essentially a public speaking class) where I learned to not only develop a strong power-point, but also to present it without feeling like my stomach is in my throat!

Teamwork Really is Key

I'm now in my fourth week of my internship. Hard to believe!

Since my last post, my corporate audit team has moved from the planning stage of our audit to actually executing the fieldwork. Now, we're meeting with the "clients" (Nike employees in various parts of the business) and gathering information about their processes. This stage is my favorite because I get to meet with people from all over the world and learn about the work they do for Nike.

Throughout both the planning and fieldwork stages of the audit, I have been amazed by the amount of teamwork that goes into everything I do. From brainstorming, to meeting with clients, to writing up workpapers- I have worked with my three other corporate audit teammates throughout every step of the audit process. In some work environments, an extremely-collaborative work system such as the one in Corporate Audit might prove challenging, but Nike (and, specifically, the Corporate Audit group) has done an extremely-good job of screening potential corporate auditors for not just their technical skills, but also for how they would fit in with the team. As a result, I feel like every day I go to work with people I would be friends with outside of Nike.

Lucky for me, I also have a lot of experience with teams after my first year at Georgetown's MBA program -where, over the course of the year, students work on class projects in a team of the same 5 people. Although I was spoiled with my Georgetown team (I had the best group ever- a guy from Korea, one from Mexico, one from Pennsylvania -who spoke Arabic!-, and another hilarious person from Texas), the experience taught me to work with people from unique work experiences, and to take advantage of hearing ideas and opinions that may be completely different from my own.

Over the weekend, I was talking with a friend of mine about the reason I chose Georgetown's MBA program, and about the fact that I passed up an opportunity to attend a higher-ranked school. In our conversation, he asked if I ever regretted my decision.I said no, and gave him the example I just spoke of; I am certain that Georgetown's team-centric and internationally-focused program has been pivotal in the success I've had in this role at Nike. 

End of the Year Celebration in June?

This morning I arrived at the office and began my day by studying previous Nike audits that have overlapped with my group's current process improvement initiative. Looking through past process, operational, financial, and IT audits helped me to familiarize myself with Nike's audit documentation methods as well as with Nike's business model in general.

Later in the day, we celebrated the release of Nike's earnings report for the fiscal year 2008 which ended on May 31st, 2008. All the World Headquarters (WHQ) employees were invited to the Tiger Woods Center for a summary of the year's milestones (led by Mark Parker -CEO of Nike), and a party directly following. I cannot explain how impressed I was with the earnings celebration. There were Nike-produced videos, celebrities, motivational speakers; the whole nine yards.

After the end-of-year party I returned to my desk where I finished researching past audits and completed my portion of the team's project planning document- which explained related past audit results as well as the systems involved in our process improvement initiative.

One thing I really enjoy about working with the Corporate Audit department is that the group operates under a very structured audit system which includes relatively-strict time lines and numerous deliverables to keep me busy and on track. Additionally, I enjoy the interview process associated with audits in general and the fact that I get to meet colleagues from across Nike's international operations.   

The First Week

Well, I've finally started my internship and it has been great! The week began on Tuesday at Nike's Tiger Woods Complex where the other interns and I heard from speakers, watched motivational videos, etc. Then, some members of Nike's Corporate Audit team came to pick me up for lunch at the "Boston Deli" (a Irish-pub-type restaurant on Nike's campus) where I ate with my new boss, a lead auditor (and his wife and baby who were visiting for the afternoon), and two corporate auditors. After lunch we returned to the Woods complex to hear about the intern benefits which include a free membership to Nike's two campus gyms and our Nike discounts!

Wednesday was my first real day of work with Nike's Corporate Audit team. From the beginning, I was impressed with my team's "on-boarding process." I was given a buddy, team lunches were set up, and training sessions were organized. As a result, I was able to fall right into place and get working on my summer project- an initiative that spans operational processes of the entire organization.

Should be a great summer!

A Great Resource

A few weeks ago I was copied on an e-mail that went out to the Nike Corporate Audit group reminding the team that their intern from last year would be joining them in late June. So, I took it upon myself to contact last year's intern to pick her brain about her experience the previous summer, and to mentally-prepare myself for what to expect when I start my internship.

I am so glad I contacted her because she was able to share with me information about the operations-based project she worked on at Nike, about being a part of the Nike Adrenaline internship program, about how the Nike Corporate Audit team encouraged her to take part in all the intern activities (which includes lunches and speaker sessions with representatives from various Nike departments), and about how Nike really promotes employees to schedule time in the middle of their day to go to the gym/play sports!

After hearing about her summer, I feel really excited to get started with my internship, but have to admit that I'm a bit nervous about navigating Nike's internal audit system. That being said, I have a good bit of experience in corporate governance/internal controls, am a hard worker, and am confident in my writing, computer, and people skills- so I’m hoping the learning curve will be quick and painless.  I am also very encouraged by the fact that I'll have last year's intern as a resource since she will be starting a week after me as a full-time employee!

Late Start Date- great now, rough later?

When I accepted my internship offer to work at Nike I was hesitant about the fact that I wouldn't start until June 17th- since our final exams were over in the end of April! I contemplated attempting to negotiate the start date, but remembered the Nike "Adrenaline" internship recruiter mentioning at the Georgetown information session that we needed to be committed to working the full ten weeks and that all interns go through the same orientation process- so I decided to just wait it out.

Now, I am so glad I am starting late because I have had the opportunity to do things I know I would have otherwise missed out on if I had started my internship earlier. For example, I was able to stick around DC another couple of weeks to see the second-year's graduation (which takes place nearly three weeks after classes let out) and to say goodbye to members of the graduating class. I also was able to go on a family vacation to Europe where I visited Budapest for the first time- and loved learning about the country's extremely-interesting political history. Last, but not least, I have had the opportunity to tie up many lose ends I neglected during the school year like doctors' appointments and spending quality time enjoying DC with my husband!

However, while the time off now seems great, I know I will be really stressed out once school starts in the fall- a mere three days after my last day of work as an intern at Nike. Unfortunately, this means that I'll miss the incoming MBA student's orientation- an event that I had hoped to attend since I will be a Career Services Peer Advisor next year. I'm sure I'll also be sad to miss all the back to school parties that my extremely-social Georgetown MBA friends will be throwing when they get back from their internships.

In the end, though, I am certain that working for Nike's Corporate Audit group will be well-worth a little extra anxiety and a few missed events at the start of the school year. I can't wait to get out to Portland and start work!

Getting the Gig

This summer, I will be interning at Nike Inc. as a Corporate Audit intern. For as long as I can remember, I have been playing sports. From field hockey to tennis to hunter/jumper horseback riding, my experience with sports has taught me about teamwork and healthy competition -- two important aspects in any business environment. Therefore, I decided to pursue an internship with Nike because the company promotes a product and culture I sincerely believe in.

As one can probably imagine, however, I was not the only MBA student with ambitions to work for such a company. So, the road to landing an internship at Nike was arduous. The process started in October when I met Nike representatives at the National Society of Hispanic MBAs (NSHMBA) career fair in Houston. Next, I attended a Nike corporate presentation hosted by the Georgetown MBA Program and took note when the corporate presenter gave us her e-mail address and told us, “If you ever see an internship you are really interested in and qualified for, feel free to send me your resume.” About a month later, such a “perfect” internship showed up on Nike’s job site. I adjusted my resume and cover letter to highlight my interest in the company and position, and sent it over to the recruiter I had met on Georgetown’s campus. A series of interviews followed, and I was offered an internship at Nike in February.

As a Corporate Audit Intern, I will be working with Nike’s Global Operations and Subsidiaries to build and maintain a well controlled and efficient business system. Therefore, I hope to get additional experience working with international operations and to see how such a large and complex supply chain as Nike’s functions around the world. I also hope to learn about working in operations for a company which contracts out its manufacturing, but still manages to maintain world-renowned social and environmental standards.