POLO WOMEN POWERED STORIES

me from feeling 100% confident in my recommendations. Nevertheless, I was able to adapt

the objectives of the internship and the Nasio trust gave me the freedom to do so.

While it was very different than the experience I was expecting, I thoroughly enjoyed the

internship. It was a steep learning curve, but I truly really enjoyed learning more about the

charity, the medical centre and the healthcare system in Kenya. I was able to grasp a

substantial amount of knowledge and am even more committed to wanting the medical

centre to be as sustainable as possible. The experience has made me realise that I would like

to explore more business and financial oriented career possibilities.

MOZAMBIQUE

POLO WOMEN POWERED STORIES

Susmita Dave, St Benet’s Hall, Second Year Undergraduate, BA Philosophy and Theology, Remote working

Work Projects

POLO is a non-profit global production company

that creates documentaries on inspiring women

(usually from low and middle income

backgrounds). During my internship with POLO

my main tasks were to create informative and

engaging graphics for their social media. This

included quotes on inspirational women, poetry and summaries of the documentaries they

create. We focused on creating a coherent theme, style and wording across all social media

to make sure the company message was clear. Besides this we also tried to engage with a

younger audience so that POLO reached more youth activists on social media channels. I

spent time helping with their advertising campaign, creating condensed trailers and a

business leaflet for their services.

My intern partner and I also reached out to many NGOs to explain what POLO does with

these materials at hand as well as to try and form good relationships with them. Hopefully

this will help in the future when POLO can contact them again to see how they can assist

them and viceversa. I also reflected on my internship by writing an article about it and the

company for an oxford student paper which will hopefully promote their good work further.

The CEO of POLO did not want to micromanage the project which gave us plenty of freedom

to be creative and inventive throughout.

Daily Life

My internship was held remotely but it was still very enjoyable. My intern partner and I

usually called for a few hours in the morning to discuss marketing and set plans for the

afternoon. Getting dressed and making a cup of tea for calls helped to create a comfortable

environment and routine. We would then work on our projects in the afternoons and show

it to each other a few days later. For more important aspects like the leaflet, we would work

on it together over a teams call.

The online internship was very flexible which meant I could also spend time with my family

and working on other university projects on the side. We would touch base with the CEO

every few weeks to make sure we were on the right track and get a better idea on what to

prioritise going forward. I also had a few calls with the other intern to just chat about

university and summer so we could get to know each other better, especially as it was only

the two of us working on this. I took breaks throughout the day to make sure I was not

spending too long staring at screens and to stretch my body.

Lasting Impressions

Overall, I really enjoyed the internship. I

made a really good friend from it (my intern

partner) and I learnt a lot of soft skills. I

gained some great design and marketing

skills as well as some business acumen.

There were some aspects of film editing

that I found hard but I am inspired to work

on this further. It has made me realise that I would really like to work for an NGO in the

future as I feel the work is really exceptional and fulfilling.

It was particularly interesting to see the model used in POLO that worked by suppling

filmmaking services to bigger NGOs at a low cost. That money is then used to film other

smaller NGOs for free. It has also been particularly empowering to read about and work

closely with inspiring women and I hope the work I do in the future could be equally

uplifting. Th experience has definitely given me more confidence and understanding about

the working world outside of the Oxford university bubble as well as something to add to

my CV.

Nina Lewis, University College, Final year undergraduate, BA English Language and Literature, Remote working

Work Projects

I had two principal focuses during my time

at POLO: promoting the company’s films

that they have already produced and then

advertising the filming services of POLO to

potential customers. I did this by working

with the other intern in improving their

social media presence, focusing on Linkedin

and Instagram. We created a series of promotional graphics for each documentary,

interviewed the subjects of the documentaries, put together collages of stills from the films

and used the creative arts to engage with the following (e.g. asking for quotes from

inspirational women). In addition, we created four trailers and promotional videos which

involved editing the full length documentaries down into 30 second videos with key

messages. It was a challenge to compact this material, to make it eye-catching and

engaging, while also, honouring the women that are featured in the documentaries for their

charitable work.

My main achievement was creating these videos that I felt maintained and amplified the

brand that POLO asked us to create, were visually appealing and honoured the women at

the focus of the films. To promote POLOs filming services, we produced an informative

leaflet to be distributed on Linkedin, detailing the benefits of their services, testimonies

from previous subjects of the documentaries and formatted in an artistic and engaging

manner. Throughout this, POLO had regular meetings with us, provided documents listing the products they would like us to produce and gave us data/ contact details/ footage that

we needed to complete each task.

Daily Life

For my remote internship, I balanced my internship by dedicating several hours each day to

work on the products I was given to produce. The fellow intern and I scheduled daily

meetings to begin our working day, discussing what we aimed to complete, reassessing the

work we had already done. This was extremely helpful to stay productive together while

also monitoring our time to make sure we didn’t overwork and stay in front of our screens

for too long. On longer days of working, I would make sure to take an hour break to go on a

walk, or do some reading for my thesis.

My internship was part-time so I often was able to take a day off to socialise with friends or

to focus on my academic work. In general, after having done several terms online, it was

easy to focus and work remotely for the internship. Having online meetings helped with the

sense of engagement with POLOs team, and I managed to meet in person with my fellow

intern which was useful to work in person and report back to POLOs staff together.

Lasting Impressions

Working with POLO was very enjoyable, I

was able to focus on marketing and

promotional work, looking at social media,

which was very different to anything I have

an interest in pursuing in the future.

However, it was extremely useful to learn

particular programmes for graphic design, skills and marketing language for advertising. In

addition, I didn’t expect to learn about the more practical side of a production company, we

learnt about how ONGs work in terms of financing, exploring the world of documentary