Farewell To NYC Opportunity’s Ladders for Leaders Summer Interns!
Ladders for Leaders is a component of NYC’s Summer Youth Employment Program, the nation’s largest summer jobs program. Ladders for Leaders is a nationally recognized program that offers outstanding high school and college students the opportunity to participate in paid professional summer internships with leading corporations, non-profit organizations and government agencies in New York City.
As the end of their summer internship is coming to an end, Khailyn and Zhaobin is going to share a little bit about their experience in NYCO.
Finance and Administration Intern: Khailyn Waite
This summer, I had the opportunity to intern at the Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity. I was excited to join the NYC Opportunity team after being inspired by their mission of reducing poverty and increasing equity. Working with NYCO for the summer provided me with a unique opportunity to learn more about city government and gain work experience.
What did you worked on and what was the process you took about the thing you worked on?
I worked with the strategy and operations team on a mixture of long and short-term projects in addition to shadowing meetings. This included organizing invoices into contract folders, logging and tracking incoming reports/invoices, and assisting in tracking office-wide initiatives. What intrigued me the most was how I was able to complete tasks that I had never attempted before. Even though the projects I completed were unfamiliar to me, I was able to learn very quickly and adapt to changing circumstances. In the end, I understood the significance of quick thinking.
What did you learn this summer?
I learned a lot about how city government operates and the long process it takes to get things done in the city. This internship has given me a newfound appreciation for the people who work for NYC. I am most proud of the contracting & invoice consolidated tracker that I was able to complete. I improved a spreadsheet that tracked and analyzed invoices. With the use of Google forms, the new tracker is now able to automate tasks that originally had to be done manually. I am delighted to have created something that could make someone’s life easier.
What would you take away from your internship and utilize going forward?
One thing that I have taken away from this internship is the transferable skills that I obtained. Aside from learning how to adapt and manage my time effectively, I gained a lot of technical knowledge while working with Google Sheets, Apps Script, and AirTable. Another takeaway is the network that I was able to build while working at NYC Opportunity. One highlight of this internship was talking to people at NYCO and across agencies about their background and experience working in city government. All the wonderful individuals that I had the chance to speak with had unique perspectives and skill sets and gave great advice that has helped guide my career aspirations and will help me in my future career choices.
All in all, I could not have asked for a better experience. It was a pleasure to work alongside these great minds for the past six weeks. I’ve met some incredible people who I admire. This internship has helped me identify areas of improvement, and has given me confidence in my abilities. I am super grateful to my supervisor Brigit for providing me with networking opportunities and helping me reach my summer goals. The knowledge I have acquired over the past few weeks has brought me closer to my career goals, and I look forward to what the future holds!
Web Communication Intern: Zhaobin Tan
The reason I wanted to work for the Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity is because I was intrigued by how the team here was able to serve and help New York City residents by developing effective technologies and products.
What did you worked on and what was the process you took about the thing you worked on?
There were 3 big projects I worked on that focused on NYC Opportunity’s web communications. The first one was a visual communication for prospective candidates regarding NYC Opportunity’s recruitment timeline for their career website. I was provided information about the process and designed the entire layout in Figma. This was probably the most challenging one because I had to design the web page and code it entirely from scratch. This was a really fun one since I did not know how to make websites mobile-friendly previously.
The second big project was to help develop an internal site where NYC Opportunity staff can quickly access helpful information in one place. I started by gathering data on what employees wanted to see in a central hub. What I found challenging was determining what information should be included. Everyone had different ideas and opinion's on what documents and information would be useful depending on their need and role.
My final project was updating the design and content on NYC Opportunity’s main website. This one required the most work because there were so many iterations and fixes I had to make to ensure the content and design were consistent across pages, and the user experience was improved. This one was really fun since it was their most front-facing site for the organization.
What did you learn this summer?
The main thing I learned this summer was to allow myself to “think on my own”. I noticed I sometimes follow directions too strictly which can limit my creativity, however, during my internship I was allowed to make decisions on how many of the projects should be designed and visualized.
My supervisor’s time was limited due to varying work obligations. If a certain issue arose, I worked on finishing the prompts first and then presenting the solution for feedback — instead of having my supervisor telling me how some things should be done.
What would you take away from your internship and utilize going forward?
The main thing I will utilize moving forward is my ability to communicate my ideas with my colleagues. I learned to be decisive about changes or improvements that should be made and how to iterate on them later down the road.
Overall, I love my time here. My supervisor (Liz) gave me a lot of freedom on how things should be done and she has given me an ample amount of opportunities to network with fellow engineers and designers on the NYC Opportunity team. Best of all, she always tries to see if the tasks assigned to me are aligned with my initial starting goals. She is just fabulous through and through. The NYC Opportunity team in general, of course, is filled with amazing and personable people. I am super grateful to have spent my brief 6 weeks here, and have nothing but good things to say about this experience and NYC Opportunity.
