What a fantastic first week it has been. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t exactly sure how things would go once I started. After all, I was right in the middle of General Conference 2016, so half of the staff (including Bishop Mueller) was gone. But to be honest, there was still plenty to do, and let me tell you, I think I’m really going to like it there.
WHAT DID I DO THIS WEEK?
- Paperwork
- Getting access to things
- Annual Conference 2016 prep
- Helpdesk work
- Tons of research
- Asset management
- Driving people to lunch
Of course, it wouldn’t be working for the United Methodist Church if I didn’t start out with filling out paperwork. To be fair, it was the standard stuff (employee manuals, account setups and things like that). But after that, I dove right into the work to do. I started the process of compiling and sorting for a ministries video for Annual Conference 2016, and that’ll be one of my first big projects. However, the more immediate work that I did involved getting the Conference Office Manager up and running again, as her computer was very unstable and her scanner wasn’t working, and she needed both for mission-critical work. So I had the opportunity to troubleshoot, fix, and eventually replace and restore her computer in order for her to be back to 100% on Monday. And that was a great feeling, to have only been there a week and finding ways to be helpful and contribute to the overall functioning of the office. In addition to that, I also got to do a variety of things like restore old laptops with new copies of Windows (for usage as spares), research on a variety of IT topics for future projects, recording and tagging assets, and even driving people to lunch! (I joked that the driving part is what makes me an “official intern”.)
So in general, there hasn’t been much in the way of big, groundbreaking experiences, or eye-opening insights into my vocation and future path (at least, nothing I can really share anything about yet. After all, I did sign a confidentiality agreement as part of my paperwork). But hey, next week will be chock full of meetings, AC2016 preparations, and really delving into what it means to work in IT at a faith-based organization.
Until next time,
Jacob
JacobTurner.me 