Monday, March 20, 2006

Sydney Law Careers Fair

Friday 17th March - Sydney Exhibition and Convention Centre Darling Harbour.
I was never scared to start my new job but I also didn’t expect to be given so much freedom to just run with things. In my second week my manager went on holidays and I was pretty left on my own with a big “To Do” folder left on my desk. I looked at this folder sitting on my desk 2nd week in and thought…what have I gotten myself in to?!?!

One of the most daunting tasks had to be organising the Sydney Law Careers fair. There is a lot of work involved made harder by the fact that this was my very first one. I had assumed that I could just ask the rest of my team whenever I had questions, but my role is so unique that no one knew the answers besides my manager who was away…great.

In the next two weeks with deadlines looming I approved budgets, organised promotional material, liaised with our Hong Kong office for volunteers, arranged presenters, ordered T-shirts, timetabled helpers, booked furniture, shipped over banners and fielded enquiries by the media. At one stage I sat at my desk silently panicking, wondering if we would have everything ready in time to exhibit.
It was like someone heard my prayer and one by one everything started falling into place, banners arrived, volunteers responded, lollies were ready and we were still within budget!

The night before the fair, I boxed everything all ready to be couriered. I think I pulled a groin muscle trying to kick boxes with my leg because they were too heavy to lift. I then hobbled over to the convention centre and spent the night setting up and building the banner. I was exhausted!

We ordered our lollies from Sticky "the traditional hand-made yummy" you'd almost think that it was something coming out of the Engrish site.


The turn out was excellent! I've been told the volume of people were at least double the amount from last year, by 11:00am my voice was gone. The mock interviews were a hit and we had a full table for the round table discussions.

Then there was the free stuff: mugs, usb mobile phone chargers, post it notes, high lighters, pens, stress balls and lollies. Unfortunately I was pretty busy most of the day to collect anything. A big thanks to Mark for getting me a slurpy and a free mug!

And look, I made it into the papers again (thank you to all the people who emailed me to let me know) I shall cut it out and add it to my little collection. For those who I have given permission to my protected posts in xanga keep your eye out as I will be sharing some rather amusing stories from the day that I can't post here.

5 comments:

Student154 said...

Nice work, getting your name into publications. I'm doing this HRM subject at uni right now. I can't help thinking hmmm... wonder if I can get Emily's notes...

DJ Ho said...

made it in the papers "again"? You must be scoring a lot of media hits! I went last year representing a stall, it was v crazy with people firing the same questions all day. it was fun, though i wasn't doing any of the organising.

And there's nothing better than freebies at careers fairs!!!!!!

PiCkLeS said...

Bosco: Man Uni seemed like a life time ago...i'm not sure if i even kept my notes? i did a massive clean up not so long ago to make room for shoes and stuff.

Matt: well i was a Hudson recruiter so i sold many many ads in the SMH and local papers during my time. My assistant at the time (thanks Emma) laminated them all for me as a keepsake...kinda nice.

Ivan: only if you get me a letter opener from where you work!

Anonymous said...

No problemo dude~ My room is filled with law firm stationary and my bathroom even has a Corrs towel in it too. Respect to you all for the upgrade on the mad goodies!

Natasha said...

YOU'RE FAMOUS! haha