By Olivia Aziz, BSc Marketing and Management with Psychology

A group of University of Sussex Business School and Engineering School students, accompanied by Ödül Bozkurt, Senior Lecturer in International Human Resource Management arrived in Malaysia on 16 June to start a month-long internship with Malaysian telecommunications provider TIME dotCom.  The students have a full and varied programme with the company, meeting with teams from across the business to get real insight into the telecoms industry.  

In the first of a series of student intern blogs about the trip, Olivia Aziz, who is studying for BSc Marketing and Management with Psychology, sets the scene.

“I am so pleased to be taking this internship because as a millennial, telecommunications is extremely relevant and significant in my daily life.  This experience will provide me with an opportunity to learn how telecoms businesses survive in such dynamic, fast-paced environments as well as gaining knowledge of the cultural aspects to help draw comparisons with the UK telecoms market I am more familiar with. I aim to use the information that I acquire in my final year studying marketing and psychology.”

“Our journey began early in the morning on Saturday the 15 June at London Gatwick Airport. Our group consisted of 14 students from both the Business and Engineering schools at the University of Sussex, with a mixture of diverse backgrounds including Singapore, China and various regions within Europe. Initially, I was apprehensive about travelling to a country I had never been to before.  However, my excitement grew for both the experience ahead and meeting new people with the addition of being in the beautiful capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur.

As we checked in and boarded the luxurious Emirates flight, we prepared ourselves for the incredible experience to come working with TIME dotCom during the coming month. Despite the exhausting 14-hour journey, we were lucky to make a stop in Dubai for our connecting flight, as this gave us an opportunity to talk and get to know more about each other. Overall, we had a great flight and were impressed with the excellent service Emirates had to offer.

We landed during the early hours on Sunday morning (16 June), and were greeted by a very friendly Mizi, our TIME co-ordinator at the airport. He made us feel welcomed to the country of Malaysia as soon as we arrived, and immediately offered his help with anything we needed and ensured we arrived at our accommodation safely. We have beautiful views of the city and as we had a slight delay on checking in, we headed to the unique Sunway Pyramid Mall. A highlight of the trip so far was our first day at TIME dotCom. We met various friendly faces of the company from different departments, as well as a tour around the unique TIME building which included a trip down the iconic slide in the main entrance. I am looking forward to the forthcoming weeks and the diverse experiences ahead.”