Joining
Just joined Confed Overseas consultants from 2nd June 2014. I was selected under US Consulate general Mentorship program. Under this program i am going to perform as mentee under my mentor Mr Najiullah Khattak (MD Confed consultans and Confed school for professional studies). briefed by GRK(Ghulam Rasool Khan and Saba hussain about my job description.
It was my first experience to sit 9 to 5 and perform in a professional ambience. I loved it though. I wore informal jeans and a maroon tshirt and to be honest havent had my official wardrobe ready for the first day. But very quickly i was enlightened by Mr saba hussain that i must be formal and on fridays i can wear whatever i am comfortable but normally shalwar kamees is the trend on fridays.
Given with the manual about my job and also scrolled my organizations website. We particularly deal in consultancy and career counselling for UK universities but also help with other countries like USA, Canada and Australia.
3rd june
Boss meeting
On the date of my joining, Boss was out of town. On 3rd june he returned and had a meeting with me. I told him about my first day experience and also discussed my job description. What i observed was that, he wanted me to have a taste of office environment but then he wanted me to incorporate in his political and governance expertise with various officials and get to know how the things tick there. Well i was delighted because i myself have a deep interest in it. I told myself that i havebeen lucky to land in the right place and at the right time.
4th june
A normal day routine. studied some material of universities and confed affiliated consultants. Visa requirements for UK and other countries. Also registered one of the student for Ielts Language proficiency test.
Had amazing discussions with GRK and saba about future of consultancy and trends of the market.
6th june 2014
Najji told me we are having a meeting with education minister at PC peshawer. After friday prayers, We went there and met interflow media pakistan reps who were already present. Then after few moments Mr Atif khan arrived with his crew to the hotel. we were taken to conference room. the meeting was regarding TV commercial for imran khan's new venture about KP education #TameereSchool project.
The media house gave a presentation and education seceretary plus najji accompanied minister in this meeting. I was observing the meeting from nearby table. What an amazing experience it was to see the political reps, Media reps plus the establishment reps. All under one roof with some agendas in their mind. I think it was the brightest day so far in my mentorship programme. Looking forward to such amazing encounters in future
7th june 2014
Half day on saturdays. GRK spends some bucks to throw a mini party of dahi bhallas and all the discussion of past when the vendors used to sell fresh dahi ballays. We to be honest this was as good as i have ever tasted elsewhere.
9th june
My new intern colleague Momina shahid joins in. Although i was surprised as to see her. I knew her very well before. But this was the first time we were working in a professional ambience. The day was great and we exchanged views relating to our job descriptions. I gave her an overview about how to fill out an ielts form plus minor briefing on the organizational culture of the office.
10th june
Najji suddenly took me along with saba hussain to the shoot of TVC for Tameer e school initiated by KPK governement. The day was hot and humid but after watching the glimpses of our stars shahid afridi and Imran khan, it was not a big price to pay for. I took tons of photos alongwith other professional photographers over there. I observed the making a TV commercial first time in my life. To be so close to superstars was absolutely an amazing feeling which motivated me through out. Me and saba also featured briefly in the ad
11 june
Myself and momina collected the records of students who have already attended Confed's seminars and have shown interest in going abroad. We made excel sheets so that we can follow them up for the upcoming seminar for University of Hertfordshire which was scheduled for 20th june at PC peshawer
12th june
the data collection continues. we also discussed different marketing strategies with najji and saba about how we can market our ad for the students and make the upcoming event a success. As a marketing major it was a beneficial learning experience and apply the theory first hand
13th & 14th june
we discussed a design for poster, and banner with the designer asif siddiqui and finalized both
15th june
A holiday i was never expecting to be so tough. 47 degrees in the heat drove to Akora for some personal reasons. i was absolutely exhausted
16th june
Myself and momina pasted posters on busy university road in the heat. everyone was welcomeing except Mr cod which excused because of its outlet's policies. In matter of an hour we got a couple of calls which means positive response towards our marketing through posters so we got some motivatiion out of it
17th june
Me alongwith saba and momina went out and distributed posters in some universities. Most of the universities entertained us with a positive response. But imsciences lower staff response was not so much encouraging as they felt advertising another university's campaign was not in the interest of the institute. Well that policy doesnt apply for FES and other consultants as per my personal experience as a student at Imsciences Peshawer. But we'll not go deep inside the politics and keep it clean.
