This week, my boss was away on development trip to Arizona. His absence meant that I worked in the library throughout the week. Not working from the office certainly did not bring a week that was any less busy, however. It was actually quite exciting given that I got to take the lead in putting together an important presentation about the Academy that will be shown at a donor luncheon later this year. Aside from gaining the satisfaction of playing a lead role on a project that will be important to the Academy's future fundraising success, I also gained a new sense of both where the Academy has been in the past and where it is going in the future. More specifically, via researching for the presentation, I had the opportunity to learn about older, more experienced organizations with missions and goals similar to those of the Academy. Taking account of where these organizations are today, I became more hopeful that the Academy can experience similar levels of success.
Looking back at the first paragraph I just finished writing, I realize that I may need to clarify what I meant by my becoming "more hopeful" concerning the Academy's success. By saying that I became "more hopeful," I certainly did not mean that I felt little hope for the Academy's success to begin with. To both clarify and speak candidly, I really did not know what to expect when I decided to serve as the Academy's first-ever intern. Being the optimist that I am, I guess I thought that with the Academy being the infant organization that it is (with only one official employee on payroll), I would be given the opportunity to leave an indelible mark on the Academy's foundational projects and operations. Don't get me wrong; in many ways, I have been able to do so---quite literally. For evidence, refer to my past entries where I detailed setting up office phone lines, Internet connections, as well as organizing a new donor database in MS Excel. Yet, on the other hand, there are very defined downsides to interning for an infant organization. One is that I might get the chance to work on ambitious book projects, conference proposal research, or event planning research. Yet, due to lack of partner organization interest or time constraints, many of my assigned projects have never been carried out to full fruition. As a result, I often find it hard to imagine the Academy experiencing large-scale, macro-level success when there still seems be so much room for improvement at the micro level. At the end of the day though, I guess every project (regardless of the stage to which I am able to carry it) sheds new light on the true realities (i.e. both the highs and the lows) of non-profit management. Being exposed to these realities will---at least I hope--prepare me for the similar future realities I am bound to face as an entry-level professional of any variety.
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