Unilever Career Day organized with AIESEC

Hey guys,

As an active member of AIESEC this is like the last major event I took part in and I just wanted to share some of my thoughts here about the event and everything. Well this is not the first time I have seen a promotional campaign done by Unilever within the universities to attract potential candidates to their annual management trainee recruitment program which usually takes place in the mid July. And this time around Unilever partnered with AIESEC in this massive recruitment drive which is beneficial for both the parties.

The event took place on Friday, June 24th 2011 in the New Arts Theatre [NAT] Hall ,University of Colombo from 9.00am to 4.00pm as a full day event and which is quite unusual just for a recruitment but in the agenda for the day there were few interesting sessions with intriguing topics, Panel discussions and Personal experience sharing as well. So this wasn't a typical "This is who we are" kind of a promotional campaign but more of a "Come and see who we are and take something back with you when you leave" promotional campaign which is quite good for the brand name Unilever as well.

The whole event was promoted with social media (mostly facebook) and off-line poster promos as well. Then again the registrations were online (http://www.unilever.aiesecsl.org/) which was quite effective. And when it came to the sessions starting with the Introduction to Unilever by Mr. Thalib Caffoor the energy and livelihood was there and this was a very strong brand promotion I would have ever seen and the effects of lighting were even used in favour and made me realise how many brands of Unilever I use in my day-today life which I hardly knew as well. Kudos goes to the speaker Mr. Thalib Caffoor, Director Finance. The panel discussion was followed by the presentation and it was hosted by non other than Ajanthan Sivathas, One year senior fellow graduate from University of Moratuwa who is currently in the MT program of Unilever and alongside him it was Sandamali Perera, Gayani De-Alwis and Asanga Ranasinghe. The topic was "What do Industry Expected form a young Graduates" and I should say that the delegation took the most of this discussion as questions were pouring off the limit even though a screening was done to ensure that no same questions will be asked twice or more. The panel made sure that they answered most of the question in the allowed time for the discussion and the unanswered ones would be answered during the next sessions to come on the relevance. The discussion was very informative and it was like awesome if you are planning on to apply for the MT program as well. The next session was the most awaited session on the day to be frank and it was about the Unilever Management Trainee Process by Chathurika Amarakoon and Inoka Dias. They thoroughly went through with all the 5 steps in the process which are namely

• Application
• Aptitude Test
• Assessment Centre
• Final Interview
• Welcome On board

All these steps were explained extensively during this session and we broke out for lunch. Reuniting after the lunch was the time to introduce the largest student run organisation of the world - AIESEC which was done by Niradh Perera, the elect Member Committee President for AIESEC in Sri Lanka and then after the ice was broken by Ashan Jenabdeen with a rain dance :P All were set to step into the next session which was on Personal Branding was done with referral to a conch shell was quite interesting Ramani Samarasundera and she spoke about how to be the unique person just by being yourself wherever you go and whatever you do which was seconded by a Management Trainee who expressed herself in the last session My life at Unilever-Management Trainees sharing Experience. All 4 of the Trainees weren't hesitant to mention about the though challenging situation of actually being selected to the MT program but in a very positive and an enthusiastic manner. It was quite evident that Unilevers' walk the talk and an interesting point was emphasised which is that out of the 4 MTs who were sharing their experiences 2 had local degrees and other 2 had degrees out of the country. This shows that anyone is compatible to apply and be successful at Unilever MT program :) The day came to an official end with the vote of thanks plus a give away of a gift back for the delegation plus the organisers and I loved the gift pack too :D

Then again we ended up the with the AIESEC style of finishing an event with quite a few AIESEC jives and Damn I realised then only how an Alumni would feel when we used to dance all those new dances. I was a bit away due to a personal reason from AIESEC and damn 2-3 new awfully sexy jives has come up on the stage :D I shouldn't be much away as all those so called persona matters are dissolved for good! And this event was like the PERFECT ending point for quite a few AIESECers who were present at that day but we know still the take over is gonna be glorious this year! :)

Few points of improvements as I saw the event.

• Registering delegates were still a trouble so use more resources (human and technology) at the registration stations
• When you are registering the delegation online make sure the website/link is 100% functional at all the times and acknowledge with an email if possible with the seating arrangement if it's important. (Just an idea of mine)
  
• Few complains about the food saying that it was spoiled and so on. Take care of that and that's all :)
  

And Better yet the event was so glamorous and it's a hot topic still :) Hearing more regrets on not being able to participate and so on. Organising committee has done a tremendous job and kudos should go to them without a doubt! It's too bad that I don't have any photos to show off here but when they are uploaded to social media I shall post a link here as well.

Thank you letting me be a part of this wonderful event and I'm signing off from this post.

When you see this blog next time it'll be a completely different one I promise :D
Keep AIESECing!!

My Journey!!

Hey friends,

How you guys have been? Except for the fact that super busy? :D It's the busiest era for an AIESECer with the transition activities and planning and so on and so forth. I couldn't write much here so I thought of saying few words about my journey in this wonderful organisation but briefly. As per another reason these are the last few days of my AIESEC life and even I need to look back and reflect on things happened during the last 3 years :)

I got to know AIESEC via a classmate and a good friend of mine, Keheliya and by that time he was super involved with AIESEC and then again I joined in my 2nd year. Purely to the fact that I was too busy concentrating on my academics and making good grades in the first year though I knew where I wanted to end up for the rest of the 3 years were more than achievable. And Once I got to my 2nd year the rat race was off and I had plenty of time left. I thought of investing it to something out of which I'll be able to give something back to the society and at the end of the it develops me as well. So AIESEC was my no1 choice without a doubt simply coz I was amazed by the charms of Niradh (Who's the elect MCP for the Term of 2011/12) :P Yeah he was a batch-mate and it made me get to know about AIESEC and learn about it more!

If I reflect why I joined AIESEC initially is that the way they presented themselves. It was quite unique and that uniqueness had an attraction for this organisation as well. To be honest the 2nd reason was non other than the eXchange program and yeah it surely was an eye-catcher! I was ready to go on exchange then and there literally and the thought of going for an exchange one day made me jump around the whole day! And quite frankly non of the Leadership, Global Learning Environments and Virtual Platforms were like not a big deal at that moment! All the opportunities were just nice words for me initially. The last reason was the conferences both national and international. And when I reflect now I don't see much of a change but the effects of Leadership, GLEs and etc has grown on me simply coz of my personal involvement and I see myself as a conference addict after these 3 years :D

Why do I call myself a Conference addict? If you have ever been to one you might know why :) The atmosphere in a conference is so friendly, lively and energetic and it makes you ask when is the next one :D I was privileged to attend quite few national and international conferences during these 3 years of my AIESEC carrier, Namely my first conference was NLDS - (National Leadership Development Seminar) 2008 and it was as a part of the delegation. Then had the chance to fly to Hong Kong for APXLDS 2009 for the regional conference as a part of the delegation to represent AIESEC Sri Lanka. I was a part of the Organising Committee of NLDS 2009 and I was a part of the faci team in MyLDS 2010 in Malaysia. My last conference was EQUIP 2011 in Sri Lanka and these are some of the highlights of my livin' the dream as an AIESECer :) (10 conferences including Singapore NLDS 2009) Yes I loved every bit through the way of all the conferences except for the last part of EQUIP this year! Knowing that it WILL be your last conference it way too hard than it sounds believe me!

I had my ups, I had my downs
I had my wows and I had my boos
Well my friend, there is no such place as this
To see you succeed and To see you fail
Enjoying both as much as the same
I had the time of my life
with no regrets without a doubt

So here am I signing off from a chapter of my life, A chapter to remember for a long time! I wanted to post this on the 30th but who knows what would happen in the future :D Good Luck for each and every AIESECer out there changing thousands of lives!!

Once an AIESECer is ALWAYS an AIESECer!

ADIEUS!

Interesting thoughts from an unique individual

Heya guys!

What;s up? If you don't know I was having some free time the last couple of days thanks to a fever and a cough ;) and now back at my work station in the far far away kingdom with a lot of work to cover up and I'm so badly missing someone who's close to my heart! :)

Let's go for a quick mood check of mine! How do I feel? I feel excited and at the same time tired. It's the time of the year, when someone starts the new term of theirs and feels excited and yeah obviously I'm excited because of that and at the same time I'm super duper excited because of the IC CC teamster opportunity. I have almost completed my application and only few things left do be done and so as few days too. So gotta hurry up :)

Let me tell you why I was thought of applying at the first place. I got to know this amaizing person, who is really unique out of all the AIESECers met. It's the way he deals with people and life which is really unique. I got to know this person at the induction of mine and he was pretending to be a newie just like whereas he was an alumni by that timw and I got fooled in a GRAND scale. It was Rajith who did tis to me. He was sharing some of the experience about the CC experience once he had in Egypt in IPM 207. I was simply amaized by that and luckly IC 2010 came knocking on my door step of opportunities at literally the BEST moment life can offer. Rajith also shared few ideas about internships yesterday with me over the phone. What he quoted was that you can go for a internship of 2 months and just to visit the country. As he had one of the best exchange one can hope for (a TT at the ALCATEL, France) made me really influenced to apply. So here I'm completing my application here.

If you are interested you can grab the application from here (Deadline is 5th of June 2010 so hurry up :) ) and for all the people who are planning to apply to go on to the conference the delegate applications has been opened and the deadline is 15th June (find it here) and grab the 2nd delegate mailer from here too!

Hope I'll get selected to have this amaizing eXperience and if not I would say everything happens for the BEST ya?

Talk to you soon guys! Interesting things coming up :)
Happy AIESECin' !!!

A Letter from an OCVP to an OCVP :-)

Something universal and something we all the AIESECers believe in is *Sharing is caring* :)

Once I was an OCVP Delegate Servicing of a National Conference (NLDS 2009) and I learnt a lot I mean a LOT out of the conference for the personal and professional life and I thought of sharing some of them (not the problems itself but the methods of overcoming them) with another OCVP as it'll help her to do better and way better than I did back there.

Hope she'll continue to do it when there is another conference to be held.

This is what I wrote to her and guys there is a small difference from this one and the original one I sent specially the way I introduced myself and believe me you guys really don't want to see that :P
___________________________________________________________

Hey,

I was the OCVP Delegate Servicing at tha NLDS 2009 (National Leadership Development Seminar) which was the only conference for this term :) Lucky me eh? :D

From the things I leart I have few things to tell you which will be somewhat helpful for you to make your life a bit easier without much complains from the delegates.

• In whatever you do and how crappy the situation is SMILE to the delegates! Obvious right?

• Talk to the OCVP logistics and go to the venue at least once before the conference and find out the places/times where you'll be doing check ins and delegate registrations. (makes it easy to handle traffic :P and you can prepare their name tags LC wise and in alphabetical order to find them easily. Keep the OCVP Finance with you to collect delegate fees when the registration is going on and keep OCVP logistics ready for escorting delegates for their rooms)

• Keep a room leader to hold the room key and hold him responsible (Take the mobile number of him/her at the registration)

• If there are any bonds from the institute/hotel about what's inside the rooms you can ask the room leader to fill it out and give it to you later (This is logistics stuff but synergy makes things easy :) )

• Keep a box to put the key at the reception of near the conference hall or delegates will come to you to find them the room key without knowing who has it where is the room leader is (yeah this happens in like every single break :P)

• Keep the delegate packs prepaired and allocate rooms in a way that delegates will have a good diversity.

• Keep an continiously updating simple database about the delegates, Specially about allergies and dietary conditions if the food isn't a buffet :P

• Talk to the facis all the time and help them out in anything they need.

• Go for the ultimate goal (the end of the conference) as a TEAM! This was the most important one for me out of all the things I learnt
  

and to ensure some learning for yourself as well do participate in some sessions as well only if possible ! :)

It's not easy to do all those things along believe me so keep someone from the OC with you always for the help :)

Good luck OC!

Sameera Wimalaratne,
Vice President Outgoing eXchange (elect),
Colombo South Local Committee,
AIESEC in Sri Lanka.

email:sameera.wim@aiesec.net|Mobile: +94-77-3669571|skype: sameera31

* AIESEC the international platform for young people to explore and develop their leadership potential

____________________________________________________________________________

As we say sharing is caring I wanted to share the story with y'all as well.

I'll be back soon! Till then keep AIESECin' :)