May 10, 2009 (Week 7)

This week I spent a lot of time preparing, watching, and helping clean up after Philip's show. It was a great educational experience to see the life behind a comedy show. The mentality need to put on such a performance is definitely a skill I lack. Seeing 3 of Philip's shows gave a great insight into how comedy works, such as just how important timing of jokes is, and that the size/atmosphere of an audience can make all the difference for a show.

 
 

I spent time this week promoting Philip's show by posting flyers, sending e-mails to students in my program, and by mailing flyers to other suppliers in Wellington. I spent more time researching the peer support program and we had a LONG meeting on Thursday to talk about it. It was interesting to see how sometimes the entrepreneur, though ambitious in his ideas, can not always put on everyone's perspective. Philip has some great ideas for the program. He wants to create a peer network of support for individuals from an array of cultures and diverse populations who have a disability of some kind. For Philip, the network is supposed to work as an alternative source of support outside of the "system." Janette on the other hand sees the group as a group of support, in any form it may be need. For example, it may be advice on how to use the "system" to get what they need, rather than avoiding the system all together. Red too felt that some people, like himself, prefer to use the "system" for some things, while operating independently in other ways. I agreed with Janette and Red in thinking the customers, or the members, of the group would likely determine the type of support and it may not necessarily be a good idea to impose views, such as Philip's intentions, on the program. It was a tense meeting at times because communication was not always clear. IN the end, Philip and Janette talked it out, but it was the firs instance where I actually questioned Philip's position and essentially disagreed with him.

 
 

On Friday I went to possibly my favorite meeting I've been to so far. Philip's friend ____ is starting an elite group at a near by high school which is intended to act as a forum for students to discuss topics and debates on diversity- what it is, issues around it, etc. The students in the room were hand picked either by teachers or by peers who had already been selected. Therefore this group was very impressive. The students in the room were energetic, excited, curious, and confident. I saw a lot of potential in the group. I found it absolutely fascinating that you could just create a culture by sticking people in a room together. I could already see the special bond forming between the students and knew that the group had great potential to help develop and mold their minds. So many of them were just at the point in their lives that you could tell they wanted to be leaders, but were not sure how. I think the group they were in definitely was structured in a way that they could begin to learn these skills. It was inspiring.

 
 

It also made me think. I really got excited and decided that probably meant something. It strengthened my belief that social work might be the right path for me, and being a school counselor may even be an option. I would be pleased if I could someday conduct a group towards learning like I predict _____ will. I'd love to see how and where those kids all end up.

 
 

 
 

Hours:

Week	Dates	Goal	Hours	Net	Total
7	4/5- 10/5	29	39	0	204
Date		Hours	Description
4/5/2009		1	reading
5/5/2009		7	reading, show, research and planning
6/5/2009		9	research, team meeting, meeting with sl interpreters, guy building theater
7/5/2009		11	content meeting, peer support meeting, show
8/5/2009		10	student diversity group, show, reading and research, e-mails

 
 

 
 

April 30, 2009 (Week 6)

This week I felt as if I was actually doing a few things that were practical and helpful for the company. I did a lot of research on examples of peer support and summarized information in notes. I did a lot of work with the website too, making links to connect blog entries and creating invitation links to start discussions in the "café" and to "contact us" if you would like to report a comment.

 
 

I also got to go with Philip to some more meetings and to a television interview. I like to think I have gotten a lot better at wheeling Philip around, but this meeting was a new challenge with tight squeezes between cars, narrow ramps, and ominous pool just feet away from where we were rolling. I felt nervous, and it must have been apparent because one of the video people commented on it while we were passing the pool. Great. Anyway, I still feel more confident than I did originally and I've also gotten better at knowing which tasks Philip is able to do on his own vs. ones that would be just more practical for me to do (i.e. putting the keys in the ignition, snapping his seatbelt).

 
 

We also met with someone who works with residential homes and she came to talk with Philip about his recent trip to rotorua, where he and Amy visited several homes. Philip made many interesting comments on the dress, treatment, and layout of the facilities that he thought could use improvement.

 
 

I have really enjoyed reading "Getting to Maybe." The book is both inspiring and informative. I also smiled a bit when I started reading Drucker's "Managing a Non-Profit Organization" because I thought it was quite appropriate to be reading another book by Drucker for my Entrepreneurship Internship.

I hope to get going a bit more on my proposal soon. Unfortunately that project has taken a back seat to research and web content lately, but I think I will be able to do reading and research for my project at home and start doing interviews in the next two weeks.

 
 

I think I may have hit something good in "Organizational Identity and Self-Transformation." The chapter on Organizational Identity breaks down the identity of an organization into three types- corporate identity, substantive identity, and reflective identities. It defines corporate identity
as the presentation of the organization to other observers is not directly related to organizational operations. For example, how the organization markets itself. I will be looking into this for my proposal by looking at how Diversityworks presents itself. Substantive identity is defined as shared rules, values and world views is realized in the organizational structures and as such influences all organizational operations. I will use my own observations of how the company operates for this section. My interviewing will likely be most important for the company's reflective identities. Reflective identities
are 'claims' or 'narratives' about the organization and are not directly inbuilt in the operations but are reflections on operations.

 
 

 
 

 Hours:

Week	Dates	Goal	Hours	Net	Total
6	27/4- 2/5	23	20.5	-10	165

 
 

Date		Hours	Description
27/4/2009		3.5	reading
29/4/2009		8	CM meeting, website links and research
30/4/2009		9	team meeting, project research, tv interview, client meeting about residential homes