Full Circle

BELGIUM

FULL CIRCLE

Yasmin Nguyen, Mansfield College, BA Human Sciences, Second Year Undergraduate, In-person internship

Work Projects

The internship was very much self-directed so my tasks were varied as I got to do what I was interested in. My main task was to design events for Full Circle’s annual debate series which was to be on ageing; I was given a lot of trust and freedom, and was able to redesign the event series to be on wellbeing, choose and contact speakers to invite, and identify possible partners and sponsors for the event series.

In addition to this, I worked on digital strategy, highlighting issues with their websites and points for improvement. I was told by my host organisation to create wireframes and do site architecture to aid me in redesigning their websites, and I had to teach myself how to do these things which was quite fun. I also did various small jobs such as create sketches for their website, evaluate member engagement with their lockdown newsletter, work the bar on their weekly bar night, and do transcripts of recorded talks.

Daily Life

Full Circle found accommodation for me (I had to pay rent, but it was much cheaper than private accommodation) a short walk away from the office. I really enjoyed lodging in someone’s house as it gave me a local experience of Brussels, and it was nice to come back to a house (with a kitchen, garden, etc) as opposed to a rented single room. I would arrive at the office around 10am everyday and leave between 5 to 6pm each day, but our work hours were quite flexible (e.g. we could leave earlier if we had somewhere to be in the evening).

Our work day was also quite flexible and, besides scheduled meetings, we were given a lot of freedom with our time and able to organise it ourselves. The flat structure of the organisation meant that we all worked in one room, and this meant that our bosses were always close by and we could easily approach them to check on our work or for a casual chat. There were 8 of us interns in total (6 from Oxford, 2 from Brussels) and we quickly and easily bonded as a 5

group. At lunch, we would either get takeaway from one of the many brilliant restaurants in the area or come back to the house I was staying at to cook ourselves a meal.

In the evenings, we would often cook dinner together at someone’s house, go out for drinks at one of Brussels many bars, or stay in and watch a movie together. On a few occasions, we had dinner with our bosses and the employees at Full Circle.

Outside of work, we made day-trips by train to nearby cities like Gent and Bruges, explored Brussels many offerings (parks, museums, breweries, restaurants, neighbourhoods, markets, shops), and even went on a long weekend trip to Amsterdam together.

Lasting Impressions

I definitely did not expect to enjoy it as much as I did, especially as Brussels tends to be a city that is quite under-the-radar. But spending two months in Brussels where we lived and worked in the beautiful neighbourhood made it difficult not to fall in love with the city.

For me, the best part of the internship were my fellow interns; although we were all quite different, spending a lot of time working and living together meant that we became quite close. Through conversing and interacting with people I may not have otherwise come into contact with, I was able to learn a lot about different fields, about myself and my aspirations, and about the wider world.

Being thrown into a completely new environment helped me grow my independence, confidence, and self-sufficiency as I navigated a new city and created family out of new people; further, the relaxed nature of the workplace meant that I had to decide for myself what I wanted to achieve each day and how I would do that. I enjoyed the agency I had over my work, how each day was different, and appreciated how approachable my employers were; this showed me that I would like to work in an organisation with a flat structure and with a relaxed yet dynamic culture. Although I don’t plan to work in event organisation specifically, my research into topics and speakers for the wellbeing event series showed me that this is a field I may like to work in in the future. Beyond this, I truly enjoyed living and working in Brussels and hope to work there in the future.

What advice would you give to future interns?

As the culture of the organisation is quite relaxed, don’t expect a clearly structured internship programme or set of tasks. Instead, be ready to carve out or even create tasks for yourself and identify projects you would like to become engaged in otherwise you might get stuck

doing administrative work like data inputting or list-building (which all interns had to do, but it does not have to form the bulk of your work if you don’t want it to!).

Also, take time to explore the many parks (Bois de la Cambre is beautiful!), neighbourhoods, markets (Chatelain market on Wednesdays, Flagey on the weekends...), and museums (Horta House, Parliamentarium, Magritte Museum... there are so many!) in Brussels – it’s actually quite a lovely city with lots of hidden, interesting places to discover.

Regarding museums, do take advantage of their monthly free days (usually the first Wednesday and Sunday). Regarding accommodation, if you don't mind lodging (I recommend it - you get a very local, authentic experience!), you can find the best options through Bridie and Louise (employers) as they will put you up with people they know.

Isobel Chappell, Worcester College, BA Philosophy, Politics and Economics, Second Year Undergraduate, In-person internship

Work Projects

I completed an internship at Full Circle in Brussels. Full Circle is an ideas club, they host discussions, debates and events that put forward new and exciting ideas. My internship was very varied, I helped in lots of different aspects of the business.

On the events side of the business, I researched speakers and ideas in order to help put together their events programme for the coming year. I was also heavily involved in the marketing of the business. I helped create content for social media and devised a new strategy for making their social media channels more effective.

Full Circle is also currently in the process of renovating a house in which they will host events and provide a space for members of the club to socialise and work. I was helping with some of the planning for this as well as building connections with businesses and groups in Brussels that may want to hire out the space in the future.

Daily Life

Living in Brussels was a really fun experience. I was renting a beautiful place with two of the other interns that was about a ten-minute walk into work each morning (just off Place Flagey). Outside of work I spent a lot of time with the other interns (there were seven of us), we explored Brussels together- going to museums, bars and for dinner. We all did a trip to Amsterdam together which was great fun and I also went to Vienna with one of the other interns. Our bosses also hosted us for dinner a few times which was really kind of them.

I had a really amazing summer living and working in Brussels. It was so great to have such an interesting experience, especially in the current pandemic situation. I feel I learnt a lot about myself through living away and made some great friendships with the people I was working with. The experience has made me consider that I would like to work in a policy related field as a lot of the people I interacted with over my time in Brussels were somehow connected to the politics scene there and I found their roles very interesting. It has also confirmed for me that I would like to work abroad in the future.

Imogen Stead, New College, Second Year DPhil, DPhil Classical Languages and Literature, In-person

Work Projects

Full Circle is an events organisation and members club which recruits members who are interested in using its House facilities for work or socialising as well as those interested primarily in speaker events and discussions as part of their 'ideas exchange' programme. I worked at Full Circle for 6 weeks, shortened due to quarantine restrictions imposed on Belgium from the UK, on a variety of different tasks.

My specific work was in speaker research & engagement which included reaching out to interesting speakers such as academics, authors or businesspeople and pitching the aims and ethos of Full Circle to them. This also required liaising with the speaker agencies and negotiating a suitable contract. Once speakers had been confirmed, I was tasked with writing the publicity copy for each event in advance so that it was ready to be used in all forms of marketing including a physical brochure, email invitations, website event listing and booking platform.

By the end of my time at the internship, the speaker events calendar for the 2020/21 season was mostly full and the marketing copy was complete for all confirmed events. With another intern, I also looked at how to improve Full Circle's website, specifically in the area of UX. We tested and mapped the current websites and together designed a new, streamlined layout taking into account all areas of the business which is ready to be implemented.

I also helped to compile and edit a new publication called the Compendium which is a collection of essays on past speaker events. This required me to create a consistent 'house style' in order to edit pieces accordingly and to develop a coherent visual design for the collection which is now being put together for publication. Alongside these specific tasks there were more general areas of work which everyone was expected to chip into such as

'list-building' of potential audiences in the Brussels area, data cleaning of existing customer data and helping to organise, prepare and execute events when they were hosted.

Daily Life

I stayed with Full Circle members in a spare room in their house and I settled in very quickly as they were accommodating, friendly and helpful. The house was centrally located, it was only a 15minute walk to the Full Circle office from where I was staying and a 30-minute walk into the centre of Brussels. I found I rarely needed to use public transport as a result, and I was glad to have a quick and simple commute.

I arrived at the office around 9.30am each morning, took a lunch break with the other interns around 12.30pm, and left around 5pm each day. Outside of work, I socialised either with my host family or with the interns and I used my time to explore Brussels and beyond. This included walks before and after work, visiting museums, going out for drinks and dinner and cooking with the other interns.

At the weekend, the interns often took day or weekend trips together to places like Bruges, Ghent and Amsterdam and I also visited Leuven and Namur by myself. Flexible office hours meant that we were able to take days off if our family or friends were visiting, or for longer trips such as to Amsterdam, and also on the first Wednesday afternoon of August when the museums in the city offer free entrance.

Lasting Impressions

I loved the experience of living and working in Brussels, especially as I was fortunate to have an excellent group of fellow interns around me as well as a kind and welcoming host family. I particularly enjoyed the group working environment. In previous years, it seems that interns have had staggered starting and finishing dates across June-September, but for me working for the same time period was the most important and enjoyable aspect of the internship. I would not have enjoyed the work or my free time as much without the other interns around

me.

I gained some useful ideas about my future plans, specifically that I would like to work outside the UK on a long-term basis and that I'm interested particularly in the EU whether that is working in it or working alongside it, this is something I plan to explore further. The work itself was largely an extension of previous marketing roles I've held and therefore did not challenge me as much as I thought it would, but the overall experience of getting to know new places and making new friends made the whole internship worthwhile.