Shraddha Mahesh

7.00 AM

Still closing my eyes, I turn off the last of my 6 alarms reminding me to begin my day. I have a quick shower, which gives me a much-needed burst of energy, and then realise I am running late for my tram!

8.00 AM

With seconds to spare, I hop onto the tram and I begin my 1-hour journey to the office. I use this time to check what I have on for the day in my calendar and make a list of things to do in my head. The remaining of the tram ride I catch up on Netflix while eating a small breakfast.

9.00 AM

I arrive to the office. In true Melbourne spirit, I can already see a crowd standing around the beloved coffee machine. After chatting to the Melbourne Office’s newest Graduate, I grab a coffee and a banana from the shared fruit bowl and head to my desk.

9.15 AM

I catch up on emails and translate the invisible to do list that I made in the tram onto my OneNote. Today it looks like I will be updating trackers with the sales numbers from the previous month, creating a slide deck to showcase P&G’s newest innovations to customers and rating & review syndication. As an intern in a FMCG, there will always be tasks that pop up ad hoc during the day, so it is important to keep my schedule flexible. I then jump straight into the first task of the day, updating the trackers.

10.00 AM

Once a week I have a one-on-one with my manager, the director of eCommerce. In these weekly one-on-ones, we connect on the progress of any open tasks, any help needed and training in new areas of the business. These connects help me to maintain a 2-way relationship with my manager and help to determine my focuses for the week. As I only work part-time for the moment, these meetings also help me to catch up on any business updates I may have missed during the week.

12.30 PM

The Melbourne P&G office has a long-standing tradition of the whole office bonding over lunch and a competitive battle over the newspaper quiz at exactly 12:30pm. The friendly banter and laughter over sarcastic answers are a great way to relax after a busy morning. However, today it is just me and the pharmacy intern having a chat over lunch as most of the team has decided to work from home in light of the pandemic.

1.00 PM

After lunch, we go into the conference room where the monthly ‘Sales Call’ is held. In this call the Leadership Team goes through the sales function’s achievements, targets, and updates for the month.

2.00 PM

After the Sales Call, I head back into the main section of the office and have a quick catch up with my manager and the eCommerce Finance Guru. I then plug in my headphones and smash out my second task for the day, which is rating & review (R&R) syndication. This mostly requires me to send follow up emails requesting the brand teams to provide approval for the syndication. I also did an audit of reviews on the retailer’s website to check if my R&R work from the week before had been successful. R&R syndication is one of the tasks that I have been given end to end responsibility of, so seeing the ratings and reviews pop up on our retailer sites by the thousands gives me a great sense of achievement.

3.30 PM

In a few weeks’ time I will be transitioning from a part-time eCommerce Administration Intern to a full time Independent Pharmacy Account Manager, which is a very exciting career development. To prepare myself for this new role, I had set up a meeting with a mentor who had also joined P&G through the Graduate program and had previously managed the Independent Pharmacy channel. He shared with me some great advice over coffee, with my main takeaways being to build deliberate and deep relationships and to thoroughly understand the fundamentals. I am grateful to be working for a company where mentors of all backgrounds are readily accessible and enthusiastic to share their knowledge and experiences.

4.00 PM

I head over to the relaxation zone and sit in a massage chair to complete the last task on my to do list, which is to create a slide deck presenting P&G’s latest haircare innovation. Doing tasks like this is great practice for when I will become an Account Manager as it allows me to understand the story telling behind selling new lines. This slide deck will be presented by my manager to her customer the following day.  

5.00 PM

It’s now time to get ready to close-up for the day. I reply to any outstanding emails that have accumulated during the day. I send my manager an email outlining what I had accomplished today and what tasks I have left for the week. I then pack up my things and grab a coffee for the tram ride back home. On the tram, I pick up where I left off with the Netflix show I was watching that morning.

6.00 PM

Upon arriving back home I get tackled by my dog begging me to take her for a walk. Even though all I want to do is crash on the couch, I succumb to her cuteness and take her for a long walk around the lake near my house with a friend who lives close by. I have dinner around the table with my family where we fill each other in on our day. I then sit down at my desk to complete a couple of university lectures and assignments. Super keen to be graduating this year and jumping into full time work with P&G soon!

11.00 PM

After scrolling through all my social media and binge watching more Netflix, it’s finally bedtime! Ready to be woken up by the alarms going off 6 times the next morning!