Week 5: Solving Problems + Improving Leadership
As expected, this internship has made me much more confident in myself, my critical thinking skills, and my ability to problem solve. In an unexpected turn of events, my supervisor has only been present for a total of 10 days of my entire internship thus far. She still expects, however, that I am staying on top of my project and meeting every deadline. Of course, this has been very difficult for me considering I know very few people in the company and very little about the company’s wide range of resources. Although it has been a challenge to overcome the lack of guidance, I have managed to use my networking-skills to find out what to do, where to go, and who to be talking to. Not only have I managed to use my problem-solving skills to overcome the challenge of not having a supervisor readily present, but I have developed a new set of problem-solving skills that I will use in all future research. This structure of problem-solving is referred to as DMAIC, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control. I have sat through several training sessions for how to use DMAIC as a roadmap to problem solving, and I have since started using it to tackle my final project. I am excited to carry this new skill-set with me to school, as I plan to use it for my Thesis and other research that I will conduct in the future. Understanding the core structure of DMAIC has provided me with a new outlook on problem-solving, one that has allowed me to truly understand the reasoning behind the things that I do and the decisions that I make with regard to taking on challenges, whether they be in my everyday life, work, or the classroom.
I am truly sorry to hear that you’ve had a somewhat absent supervisor; that is really unfortunate. I always hope that interns will find some mentors and resources at their sites. Sounds like this problem-solving tool/strategy could be really useful and something that would also be transferable to other jobs, other industries, etc. I encourage you to keep a list of all the projects, tasks, etc. that you complete this summer – and think about how you’ve used DMAIC when completing those projects, tasks, etc. – so that you can pull from those examples when interviewing (for jobs, graduate schools, etc.). Having concrete examples that you can use to illustrate your competencies, skills, abilities…how you learn quickly to apply/adapt new tools/strategies (DMAIC)…that will be key when marketing yourself.