By Leoš Malec

 June 12 – 2020

“Walking Meetings – Aka When Corona Brings Innovation and Creativity”

You probably wonder who I am and why am I writing this blog. My name is Leoš Malec. I am from Prague, Czechia, and I am currently a rising senior at Drew University, in Madison, New Jersey, USA. I major in Economics, and double minor in Business and German. Right now, I am doing my summer CPT internship focused on finance, investment, and marketing at Global Student Recruitment Advisors, LLC (GSRA). To learn more about GSRA click here, to learn more about me and my background please click on the link here and find my advisor profile at the bottom of the page. Moreover, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn, link to my profile here, and/or email me at lmalec@drew.edu, or at malec@gsra.org.uk, if you have any questions and/or comments.

Now, let’s jump into it. My boss and I came up with an idea to hold our daily meetings outside and schedule 1-2-hour walking meetings every day from Monday to Friday. Since COVID-19 does not allow interns in New Jersey to work in the office (at least as of now), we came up with this idea because I did not want to spend all day sitting on my arse and getting on one Zoom meeting after the other. After I got introduced to the whole business, GSRA colleagues, co-workers, and clients, my boss and I started with our walking meetings. Every single meeting has an agenda, I prepare for each meeting and have my notes ready. During the walking meeting I discuss the covered material with my boss, we walk, I make notes in my small notebook or record the meetings, so I can create a summary for myself after I come back home. Not only is this very efficient, but it also enables me and my boss to get a good workout every day while hiking (6.5 miles), we get plenty of vitamin D and some fresh air, too. I really enjoy these meetings and believe that it is much more efficient, as well as very helpful during this time of self-isolation and living in a “lock-down”. Sometimes we even do our phone calls and conference calls during our walks.

My point is that this pandemic is not necessarily bad in all ways. It also presents plenty of opportunities for innovation, improvement, and creativity. The main reason of this blog is to provide you, international students, in the US and all over the world, with a unique perspective and insight information about an internship happening during a COVID-19 pandemic. I, myself, have struggled to find an internship for the summer here in the US like many of you did. I applied to over fifty companies and contacted and cold-called another thirty, well before the pandemic started, but as the end of the spring semester approached, most of the companies that I applied to announced that they were cancelling their internships; some companies did not even get back to me. I was fortunate enough to land this internship at GSRA and would like to share my experience, knowledge, and adventures with you each week so please tune in and let me know what you think. I hope it helps you as much as it does for me.

I will be posting every week, every Friday. Stay tuned and let me know what you think!

Leoš Malec